Improve My Business

We all know that the hours in the day are numbered and that we need to make the most of them. So here are some tips that I have been using to increase my personal productivity.

1. Batch your E-mails. If your like me and most of the people in my office you have an almost constant stream of E-mails coming in. The temptation is to open them all as soon as they arrive. I realized that for me at least this meant stopping what I was doing and shifting my focus on average once every 15-20 minutes throughout the work day. This was very disruptive, particularly when there was something I wanted to read further in the E-mail and it wound up being a long distraction from the task I had been working on. The solution I have found is batching my E-mail reading into groups. Basically I keep my E-mail open, but don’t read any messages unless something urgent comes in that needs immediate attention. Instead I let things build up and then just before lunch and again just before I sign off for the evening I read through everything. I find this gives me longer blocks of un-interrupted time to focus on getting the important things I need to do done, without completely ignoring what is going on in my E-mail.
2. Pick one big thing every day and do it first. For me if I have a lot of things on my to do list I find that I often avoid the big ones and do all the little “quick wins” first. While this does shorten the list, it still leaves those big projects out there looming, and by the time I have done all the little things I often don’t have the mental energy to tackle a big project. To combat this I have started coming into the office each day, having picked out one large item from my to do list to tackle that day. I start my day off by first checking to make sure no urgent messages came in overnight, then getting right to work on my one big thing for the day. I don’t check E-mails, or make phone calls, or do anything else until I have knocked out my one big task. This has two benefits for me. First it gets those big tasks off the to do list in a timely manner, and second, I find myself having more energy throughout the day because I know that I have already accomplished something big and don’t have the stress of trying to find the energy late in the day to do a big project.
3. Have a defined plan. Beyond picking your one thing, I have also found it helpful to have a defined plan for the week. In other words I try to look at what I need to get done and slot it all into my week. This way I am not sitting here on Tuesday afternoon or worse on Thursday staring at my to do list and wondering how I am ever going to get it all done. I know how it is going to get done because I have already budgeted the time in my head. Of course my schedule gets shifted around a little bit as things come up, and it is important to remain flexible, but knowing what is on your list and what kind of time commitment it takes, then figuring out where you can make that time commitment can help overcome the feeling of overwhelm that comes with big to do lists.
4. Attitude is everything. Having a better attitude at work makes you more productive. If you feel like you have been productive you will continue to be more productive. This is what is really behind the other tips I have listed here, they all help me feel productive, which improves my attitude, and makes me more productive. Sometimes you even need to go so far as to force yourself to change your attitude, even if it seems superficial at first. If you tell yourself you have lots of energy and are ready to get something done, before you know it, it will be true. On the other hand if you sit around all day dreaming about a nap, you’re just going to make yourself more tired. So take a minute every now and then to check in on your attitude towards work and adjust it as needed.

Technorati Tags: efficiency, email, goals, improvement, managing your time, Planning, Time Management, working smarter

Do you feel overwhelmed with your to-do list? Is it something that can be compartmentalized, or delegated? Consider doing so… here’s some ideas:

1) Can you delegate some of the chores? If you have willing spouse/children, can they handle some of the chores for you? How about neighbors who offer services - petsitting, lawn services, etc. - can you free yourself up sharing the load?

2) Can you hire someone to take over the responsibility full time? First, decide what’s important to you. Second, analyze your calendar. What are you doing that is NOT important to you, but you continue to work on? Third, find someone else to do these tasks for you. In my case, I found a couple of someones, who can each focus on areas that they are strong in. (After all, if I’m trying to be efficient, I should play to my team’s strengths, right?)

3) Can you eliminate the task altogether? I’ve been doing this with my email account - weeding out the information, either unsubscribing, or auto-filing the notes for future reference. I used to subscribe to several ‘gurus’ in the field… now I’ve cut that down to 2 or 3. And only one of those is left in the inbox - the others are filed automatically, bypassing the inbox.

Any of these should help you divide and conquer - let me know which ones work for you!

Technorati Tags: efficiency, email, mcdonald consulting group, process improvement, working smarter

Several years ago, I was copied on an email from an irate manager that still sticks with me to this day. In the email, the manager was basically venting his frustration with the habit of everyone in the department sending “fire and forget” emails, not following up, and assuming that sending an email is an acceptable solution to practically every problem.

It sticks with me because it is so true! Email is such a part of our lives that we hardly think about it. All to often, we send an email then mark a task off our list. But emails often require further elaboration. We don’t take the time to express our feelings in email, and if we do, we can get sucked into spending an hour writing an email that “sounds” right. We don’t want to be accusatory, or demanding, but sometimes we need to relay importance and urgency or just make a point. In return, we need confirmation of understanding.


How often have you received a reply that led you to think that you are being ignored, brushed off, or worse, by the person you sent it to? What does it mean when you have sent out a 5 paragraph email and get a reply of simply “ok”?


Everyone is occasionally guilty of bad email etiquette, both senders and receivers. I encourage you to take a moment to read this short article titled 14 Email Do’s and Don’ts, from Amit Asaravala at TechSoup.org, then consider your own email habits and how you can improve your email communication.

Technorati Tags: communication, efficiency, email, Streamlining, working smarter

OK, so you found a newsletter you think may be interesting… or, you want the free report and agree to get the newsletter or ezine as part of the package… or, well, you get the idea.

And all of a sudden, a few months later, if you’ve signed up for a few free offers, you are getting DOZENS of newsletters. All of them may have one interesting article, or one new way of doing something, so you don’t want to stop getting them… or do you?

In preparation for my trip to Shanghai later this week, I am culling out my newsletters and ezines. And it’s amazing how many I get. You don’t really notice if you’re a skimmer like me how many come in since I handle them on a daily basis; but if you sit back and realize you’ll only have 30 mins/day for the next two weeks, and what do you want to spend your time reading… you look back over the past week and notice with shock and dismay that you’re getting a boatload of these suckers. Suddenly you’re looking at the bottom of those marginal ezines/newsletters for the ‘SafeUnsubscribe’ or the ‘opt out’ tag. And hitting it. And realizing that you can survive perfectly fine without their helpful tips. I think.

If you find you can’t live without them (or at live without them as well) you can resubscribe, which I’ve dubbed ‘opt out remorse’. Oh, and let me know how many you’ve unsubscribed from and if you’ve resubscribed to any after ‘opt out remorse’ has set in. I’ve unsubbed to nine so far and probably will double that number before the end of the month.

What can you live without?

Technorati Tags: email, newsletters

It’s the last Friday of the month - time for a fun Friday question:

What’s the most annoying or interesting of the spam mail you get?  If you look at my previous post on spam, you know I recommend to clean it out daily.  While doing so, there’s always a few that make me chuckle –

So for this month, tell me about the one that you found to be the most inventive, humorous (intentional or not), or annoying, and which category it’s in.  For me, it’s the “Grow your ‘male member’ 12 inches larger!” ones as an annoying one…

Technorati Tags: email, humor