11/10/2014

10 Strategies for Working Much Smarter

PRODUCTIVITY

10 Strategies for Working Much

Smarter
Thai Nguyen
Contributor
Writer, International Kickboxer, 5-Star Chef, Spiritual Teacher, TheUtopianLife.Com
NOVEMBER 10, 2014

Whether youre in Australia, England, or America; blue-collared, white,

or pink, weve all got 24-hours to work with. Success comes down to
what were able to do in those hours. No entrepreneur can keep the
sun from setting or add hours to their day, but there are strategies that
will help maximize work habits and productivity.
Here are 10 strategies for efficiency and effectiveness:

1. Parkinsons Law
"If you wait until the last minute, it only takes a minute to do,"observed
Cyril Northcote Parkinson. Weve all experienced Parkinson's Law. We
struggle for a month to finish a project, then magically get it done in the
final week. Or, the house is a mess for weeks, then spotless within a
few hours of the in-laws showing up.
The law provides great leverage for efficiency: imposing shorter
deadlines for a task, or scheduling an earlier meeting. Find the sweet
spot for productive hustle. Rushed work can be a recipe for reckless

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work.
Related: How do I determine appropriate deadlines for my
employees?

2. Finding your flow

For athletes, its called being in the zone, where youre so focused
that you're numbed out to any distractions. Its a state we can all tap
into: writers, musicians, and entrepreneurs.
Mihaly Csikzentmihalyi's research is focused on these flow states that
optimize our performance by finding that balance between challenge
and skill. If the task is too challenging and beyond our skill, then we go
into anxiety and frustration, but not challenging enough and we fall into
boredom.
Stretch yourself, but don't snap. We're at our most efficient when in the
zone.

3. Single-tasking
Theres many compelling cases against multi-tasking. A study found
that even folks walking while talking on a cell phone run into people
more often and were so distracted, many failed to notice a clown riding
a unicycle.
Telling an entrepreneur not to multi-task, however, is like telling a pig
to stay out of mud but he truth is, multi-tasking a misnomer better
termed task-switching. We don't juggle so much as we jump
around. The problem is ending up with too many open projects, and
spreading yourself too thin. A good quote on scaling back is by
Alexander Graham Bell: Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work

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at hand, the sun's rays do not burn until brought to a focus.

Related: The Truth About Multitasking: How Your Brain Processes
Information

4. The 2-Minute Rule

From David Allens Getting Things Done, he explains that the most
productive people capitalize on the little windows of time opening up
during the day. Having an inventory of two-minute tasks on hand
whenever windows appear will increase productivity. Cleaning out the
inbox, checking voicemail, approving a request, all in brief openings in
the schedule, builds our efficiency muscles and gets the ball rolling for
bigger tasks.
A major cause of procrastination lies in overthinking the next
step. Allen says it takes less time to do the action than the time spent
thinking about it.

5. Working to circadian rhythms

Nerve cells in our brains control our circadian rhythms, which
influences sleep-wake cycles, hormone release, emotions and energy
levels. Constant operation outside circadian rhythms (e.g. international
pilots) creates fatigue.
Efficiency lies in synchronizing specific work with these biological peak
times. Dr. Steve Kay says analytical work is best within a couple hours
of waking, when the morning rise in body temperature increases blood
flow to the brain.
Alertness slumps after lunch as the digestive process saps energy.
This analytical disengagement is the best time for novel and creative

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thinking, according to Professor Mareike Wieth.

Exercise increases efficiency. Dr Gerard Kennedy notes more Olympic
records are broken in the late afternoon than any other time. Muscle
strength, lung capacity, eye-hand coordination and joint flexibility
peaks between 4pm and 6pm.
Three sweet spots for maximizing your efforts: the morning analytic
spike, a creative spike after lunch, and a physical spike in the
afternoon.
Related: 8 Steps to Having Wildly Productive Mornings

6. Reverse engineering
Most commonly applied to industrial machinery and computer
software, reverse engineering can be applied to different fields,
products, and strategies.
It is disassembling and analyzing the components that make up the
whole. Efficiency comes not only with seeing how parts relate, but
being able to work on aspects out of order. Tim Ferriss notes his rapid
mastering of the tango through deconstructing the dance, and learning
the female role along with the male.
Expert linguists do the same, breaking a language into pieces and
having a bird's-eye view of the most common grammatical structures.

7. The Willpower trinity

Stanford Professor Kelly McGonigal says the key to hitting goals is
understanding the three powers of willpower: I will power, I wont
power, and I want power.

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I "wont power'' is resisting temptation, such as saying no to social

media.
I "will power'' is to choose an alternate behavior -- sending a social,
but networking email.
I "want power'' is remembering your why, your goal, be it expanding
your career, business or profits.
Willpower is like a muscle. When we fail to reach goals, its due to
solely relying on I wont power, but we can only say no so many
times before we crumble. However, bringing in backup, and using all
three aspects of willpower, will triple the likelihood of success. Resist,
replace, remember.

8. 57 on, 17 off
The entrepreneurial hustle makes breaks non-existent. Recent studies
show only one-in-five employees take lunch breaks, despite
clear cognitive benefits for our fatigued brains.
So whats the perfect work/rest ratio? DeskTime App played Big
Brother, monitoring employees computer use. They found the most
productive 10 percent worked hard for 52 minutes, then took a break
for 17. Its backed by scientists, pointing to the natural rhythms of our
attention span. Our brain can focus for up to 90 minutes, then needs
roughly 20 minutes of rest. Strategic breaks equals efficient work.
Related: Want to Be More Productive? Take a Break and Check Out
This Infographic.

9. Power poses

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If it werent true, itd be preposterous to think simply changing your

posture affects productivity. Professor Amy Cuddys Ted Talk
highlights the psychosomatic and neurological responses caused by
our posture. Taking a high-power pose causes an increase in
testosterone (confidence, assertiveness, energy) and a decrease in
cortisol (stress, anxiety, nervousness). A confident, testosteroneperked person is much more productive than a cortisol-crippled,
stressed person.
Our brain is wired to respond to certain physiologies. A forced
smile will still release endorphins. Pulling yourself out of a figurative
slump is as simple as pulling yourself out of a physical slump.

10. Validated progress

A good warning from Eric Ries: If were building the wrong product
really efficiently, its like were driving our car off a cliff and bragging
about our awesome gas mileage.
Along the same stream of the Sharpe ratios risk/return measures in
finance, and the minimum viable product in the tech world, the
strategy is about being calculated and conscious in our efforts, with a
flexible, rather than fixed process and goal. Its being productive
and ready to pivot, rather than simply charging full-steam ahead.
A case-in-point is Nick Swinmurn's startup of Zappos. He validated his
idea without blowing cash by first going to a shoe store, taking photos
and posting them online. When sales came in, he went and bought the
shoes. He didn't need to pivot, just perservere.
Related: Desk Yoga to Improve Your Posture

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