How to Accomplish More in Less Time

Dan Ariely is a behavioral economist who teaches at Duke University and is the author of three best-selling books on irrational behavior.   He recently developed a smart calendar application, Timeful, to help people improve their productivity.  Ariely found there are six keys to improving individual time management.

 

Step 1. The first step is to recognize that the world is working against you.  Traditional advertising interrupts and encourages you to purchase products and services.  Internet links encourage you to click.   Text messages make you stop in your tracks.  If you responded to every email, beck and call, Ariely claims you would quickly be broke, obese and constantly distracted.  His advice is to develop a plan to reduce distractions.  Set aside a certain amount of time each day to read emails and texts. 

 

Step 2. Control your environment or it will control you, claims Ariely.  Your environment truly matters.  Create an environment that makes things that you need to do easy and the things that you should not do difficult.  Google conducted an experiment at its New York headquarters where it offered M&Ms in a basket.  When the company switched containers to a bowl with a lid, the consumption of M&Ms declined by 3 million a month. 

 

Step 3. Develop a daily, weekly and monthly to-do list.  That seems like it should be a "no brainer", but few employees document what they actually need to do. 

 

Step 4. Take advantage of the most productive hours in a day.  Ariely found that not all hours in the day are equal.  Most people are more productive in the morning, approximately an hour after waking up.  So if you get up at 6 a.m., your most productive time of the day would be between 7 a.m. and 9:30 a.m.  Schedule your most important to-do list items for those hours.  Ariely found that most people miss this opportunity, instead focusing their attention on email and Facebook.

 

Step 5. Avoid the biggest productivity drains: meetings, email, multitasking and structured procrastination.  The latter is defined as focusing on tasks that give you the feeling of progress instead of focusing on deep work that really makes progress.  Ariely explains that crossing off items on your to-do list may give you a sense of accomplishment, but real achievements take time. 

 

Step 6. Reduce the amount of time on email and texting.  A University of London study found that constant emailing and texting reduced mental capacity by an average of 10 points, five for women and 15 for men.  This is the equivalent of working after missing a night's sleep.