Have you been working for a long time, but you still haven't achieved results? The fact is that we don't know all the factors that affect our productivity. We miss a lot of important details during our work.
Content:
2. Factors that affect the productivity of mental labor
3. What should you do to minimize procrastination and increase productivity?
General classification
We can identify specific reasons for low productivity, but first we will highlight the main groups of factors. There is the following classification of factors that affect working productivity:
- organizational factors;
- material and technical factors;
- factors related to personnel management;
- objective factors that affect productivity.
Factors that affect the productivity of mental labor
1. Sleep
The quality of sleep directly affects our productivity. As banal as it may sound, without a proper rest, we have no energy. The body does not have enought time to recover. The efficiency of our work will be much lower. Staying up late is not worth it to make you feel like a squeezed lemon the next day.
Sleep is a factor that affects memory productivity. With constant lack of sleep, you will find it difficult to concentrate and remember even the most simple information. There is a risk that later you will forget what you were thinking a minute ago, become distracted, or take too long to complete mission. Productivity is out of the question.
2. The daily schedule
To do everything in time, you need to plan your day well. You will agree that it is much easier to follow a plan than to come to work and spend another half day gathering your thoughts and forming a to-do list.
Let's compare two employees. One person makes a plan for the next day every night, and when he comes to work, immediately begins to complete tasks. The second doesn't know where to start, and does everything simultaneously. Multitasking in this case only hurts, because it is obvious that the first employee is more productive.
By setting a daily schedule, you don't lose time to tune in and finally get to work. Take into account all urgent business, plan the working hours, and do not forget to provide small pauses for lunch, snacks, or just a short rest.
3. Time tracking
Taking time into account will have a positive impact on the day's planning. You will be able to keep up more time by knowing how much time you spend on a particular task. A productive person takes into account the time spent and completes their tasks as quickly as possible.
There are many ways to keep tracking of worked hours. Many modern technologies make it possible to simplify people's lives. Simple time tracker Checkiant makes it easy and convenient to track your working time.
4. Organization of team work
Proper organization of work and distribution of responsibilities is what affects the productivity of each employee individually and the team as a whole. A person who is “in his place” will work much more effectively than an employee who is like square peg in a round hole.
The Manager should consider how much time each employee needs to complete one task. It is advisable to avoid situations when one employee is loaded with work for a week ahead, and the other has managed everything in a couple of hours and has nothing else to do with the remaining working time. It is very important to control the time spent on projects and correctly formulate tasks for each employee.
5. Workplace
Take a responsible approach for choosing your workplace. There is nothing worse than an uncomfortable chair and a desk that is too high or too low. You should be comfortable sitting in the workplace. Take into account the characteristics of your body, adapt to working time so that you do not worry about anything for a long time. Otherwise, You will always be distracted by how to sit more comfortably and will not be able to concentrate on your activity.
This is hard to believe, but even the location of the desk in the office can greatly affect your productivity. If possible, place your workplace closer to the window.
6. Extraneous noise
Everyone has to work with extraneous noise: office workers, remote employees, and freelancers. Conversations of colleagues, phone calls, ventilation, printers and scanners, the noise of computers, the sound of cars outside the window, the radio - it all surrounds us every day. And distracts from work.
If possible, the company director should consider these factors and reduce the level of unnecessary noise. To move the equipment to a separate room to create individual working places, and to divide the departments of employees into different offices.
7. Communication with colleagues
A factor that can be called a consequence of the previous paragraph. A large amount of time during the day we can spend talking about nothing with a neighbor, not noticing it. When You don't have personal space, any colleague can talk and distract you from your work. After a long conversation, it is difficult to immediately return to the interrupted task. So the amount of work that you actually did is much less than you could have done.
8. Distraction on the Internet
No job is now performing without using the Internet. Searching for new information on time management allows you to significantly increase the level of completion of tasks. However, unlimited Internet access can seriously interfere with our work. At first, we just check our email, then turn on music. Instagram, Facebook news feed after a few minutes of watching your friends' new posts, frequent distractions on the Internet dramatically reduce your productivity. The solution to this problem is only self-control.
9. Working equipment
It is difficult to work with a computer that often freezes and, frankly, is outdated. You will spend a huge amount of time just setting up working tools. The computer and other equipment you need to work with must be well configured, free of viruses, and free of unnecessary files that take up space on your hard disk.
It is important to note that the screen, keyboard, computer mouse, headphones must be ergonomic, because you need to work with them for 8 hours.
10. Working software
All apps you use must be up-to-date. It is important to take into account the capabilities of your computer and install the appropriate software versions. If the computer has too little RAM, it will freeze too “heavy” applications.
At first glance, this does not seem to be a factor that affects productivity, but after working with unsuitable programs for a long time, you will notice that you take a very long time to complete easy tasks.
What should you do to minimize procrastination and increase productivity?
Analyze your working day. You will probably find at least one match with the mentioned above items. Get away from the distractions. Improve your workplace according to your body's desires and needs. Even after small changes in your daily routine, you will notice that you are more disciplined and perform more amount of work in the same time.