You look at your job list and your heart starts to race and your nerves are on edge. After that, you realize that it is impossible to organize yourself to carry out all the tasks that are set for the day and you end up feeling very bad about it.
Even if you focus on an inspirational playlist to be more productive, wake up early and leave the day exclusively reserved to try to narrow your list of activities, you know that it will not be possible to complete everything that is proposed there.
This means that there was a lack of planning and that you have a much larger workload than expected, you are overloaded. This is a very common scenario in the lives of many people.
What about now? How can we resolve this matter? How do you organize yourself so that it doesn’t happen anymore?
First of all, you may think that simple planning can solve issues like this, but the human mind can sabotage us in certain situations.
In behavioral psychology there is the concept of planning fallacy. It is a cognitive bias that explains how we tend to underestimate the time it will take to complete a task. We usually think that we will complete this task in less time than the time actually needed to in reality finish the task.
In short, we are very bad at understanding how much time our activities will consume us. We all like to be very productive and, therefore, we underestimate the time needed to carry out each project or activity that we have pending.
There is even research to prove this behavior. To test the veracity of the planning fallacy, researchers conducted an experiment in which some students were asked what the estimated amount of time they thought it would take to complete an academic project.
The students, in the survey, had to assign values to a confidence level of 50%, 75% and 99% that they would be able to accomplish the task within the stipulated time.
You already know what the result was, don’t you? In reality, only 45% of students who gave a 99% chance that they would do the job actually did it.
So, what can we do to change this scenario? Knowing that we have a tendency to decrease the time of accomplishing tasks in our heads, to solve this, we must define and create feasible planning and if possible, use digital tools to control and manage time in a practical and objective way.
How can we program ourselves and make our time productive and organized?
Now we know that the great workload you have can, at various times, be caused by issues such as the fallacy of planning and disorganization in your routine, but how can you really deal with this problem in the best way?
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Set priorities
In this step the focus is on harm reduction. What is on your to-do list that really needs to be done today and what does not have a set date for execution?
Get in the habit of listing your tasks and cutting things off your list that can be done at another time, focus your attention only on the really important items and tasks that should be at the top of your priority list.
This habit and action of cutting and eliminating other non-urgent activities will not only give you a greater and clearer focus on where you should channel your energy, but it will also remove the risk of sabotaging your own productivity.
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Group related tasks
After setting priorities in the organization of your tasks, another very important tip is the grouping of tasks that have something in common. Related issues should be performed together for greater agility in solving problems.
If activities of the same nature were organized to be done in the same period, your time is saved.
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Delegate what you can delegate
At this stage, after setting priorities and grouping urgent tasks together, if you are still not feeling comfortable and still need to make cuts in order for the entire workflow to work, the output may be delegating tasks to other people.
If you are a manager, superintendent or someone with a higher level in your company’s hierarchy, this task can be performed more easily, but otherwise, ask for help from a co-worker and ensure that the favor will be returned in a quieter time.
Another important point to be highlighted when delegating tasks is that, when you are passing the activities on to third parties, be absolutely sure that the information and execution guidelines are completely clear and explained so that there is no rework. This will only lead to more headaches and may ruin your entire planning
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Avoid procrastinations
As we discussed above, don’t let less important tasks distract you from the focus of your goal at the end of the day. Your goal will always be to perform the most urgent tasks of the day and everything else should be secondary. So, all the things that can get you out of focus on delivering results can get in the way. The use of cell phones during work, long breaks for snacks and, mainly, that check on social networks very quickly can make a big difference in the productivity of the day.
Conclusion: try not to repeat the same mistakes again
Sometimes the behavior of being overly busy can be a constant in your life. The accumulation of many commitments, meetings, reports and other activities in your daily life can become a habit and permanently damage the way you see and behave in front of your work.
Don’t always make the same mistakes, get organized, get to know yourself and know what your limits are in the execution of each daily task. With that in mind, it will be much easier for you to be able to fulfill all your obligations.
Currently, there is a possibility to use technology to your advantage in this regard. The internet and companies know that this can be a real problem for some people and offer tools for you to plan and organize your work routine in the best possible way.
Today Adnia Solutions offers the best in the market in spreadsheets and templates for this purpose.
In order for you to be able to organize in a better way the time spent in your tasks, we provide the Timesheet Management Template.
A complete spreadsheet in which are found numerous resources for measuring time and organization of each task of your team or sector.
Come to Adnia Solutions you too!