Best off the wall productivity tips from Zen Habits
Readers of the successful productivity blog, Zen Habits, were recently asked to offer their best original productivity hacks. The answers were fascinating and worth sharing. I recommend you read all the suggestions, but here are some of my favourites, which I think really stack up for medicos and those struggling to study.
- A consistent schedule
- Change your word screensaver to something inspirational for you. “Make it work”, “Do what you have to do”, whatever is appropriate.
- Using a timer to break time into chunks of 15 minutes and then deciding at each break whether to “work or play”. A similar suggestion was to time your procrastination time, by setting a limit when you start reading newsfeeds or surfing.
- Never plug in your laptop, so that you can only use it until the battery runs out. This would be a wonder for those that work at home.
- A daily to-do list, written at the start of each session. You could apply the rule of three to this - only have three things on your to-do list, and rewrite it when it is finished. I can imagine flagging three items in Omnifocus and just working until they were done. Nice hint.
- Do the crappy stuff first. In study, this could totally be tweaked e.g.”You only get to work on operative notes once you have done 30 mins of anatomy cram”.
- Deal with unloved tasks by throwing 2 or 5 minutes at them and then moving on to the next. The worst thing that happens is you get 5 minutes further along on a task.
- Make a collage of goals - maybe it would include the picture of a patient, your degree etc. Make it visible above your desk.
- Schedule preparation time. I wish I had known this one when I was first being a Surg Reg - I could schedule prep time the evening before each list, and it would make me check out the cases on the list.
Ask the Readers: Best Off-the-wall Productivity Tips? | Zen Habits: “”
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