I was involved in a project that required me to function as both a team lead and at the same time given modules that of a programmer to accomplish.

It seemed very easy during the start of the project. But later on I realized the amount of modules given to me was bigger than anyone’s’ module and had to be accomplished half of the project timeline since it was supposed to be implemented across all modules. Furthermore, I could only spend half of my daily time since I had a lot of other tasks as a team lead.

This is Part II of Supercharged Productivity. The first part showed a list of common sense productivity guidelines that will help us get that first step.

Today we shall be discussing the things we can do in a business environment to charge up our productivity. All these minor things make the difference of going home early or staying late making up for unproductive hours during the day.

On our desk :

Shoot and shoot—I am fun of playing basketball. Every time I feel a non-confidential document will not be needed anymore I crumple and shoot them straight to the trash can.

Archive Files—I make sure I archive the files that would prove useful in the future. Most often I scan and keep them accessible for easy searching.

Sir yes sir. Sir no sir. Sir permission to speak sir.

I remembered that was how we answered our officers back in high school when I was a model cadet. No frills. No beating around the bush. My school Don Bosco Makati is still one of the best cadet competing units in the country. We won in four major cup competitions during my senior year despite having both academic and technical subjects in school.

We had to increase our productivity in every minute we spend to accomplish our tasks and leave nothing hanging.

Cut the chase. Straight to the point. If you want to produce results in lesser amount of time then get to business right away.

Alec Mackenzie is right on target with this quote—

Got a minute? never means just one minute. Before you answer, always ask, What’s this about?

In your experience. Was it really a minute?

I find myself organized in a lot of ways—from my life’s objectives, dreams, career path and progressions, education, etc. But I also find myself de-organized in a lot of things—my desk, my clothing cabinet, my drawer, etc. Come to think of it the things I am not organized are the things just in front of me. These are the day to day things I encounter—the basic things in life.

Do I really need to get these basic things Organized?

Yes. I found out throughout the years when things are organized things are easier to accomplish. Clutter becomes eye sore. This eye sore drain your emotions by making things appear complex, bigger and more difficult to handle. It’s like having a mountain of task right in front of you. This may also cause delay especially when looking for something that is buried right under the pile of things we have. By causing small minor delays everyday it may lead to stress and loss of a large amount of considerable time.

Furthermore, the appearance of unorganized things around us makes the load appear heavier. How about the lost opportunities? I have found discount cards, coupons, and redeemable items having expired a week or two later because they got buried under a pile of paper.

By being organized we free ourselves from chaos, gives us control over situations, gets that extra minute or so everyday from getting the things as soon as we need them, and also showing a good example that everyone may imitate. By getting organized the people around us would usually be compelled by following our leadership since they do not want to be the cause of delay either.

How do I get organized?

I have come up with a three step process on how to go about it. This is simple and easy to follow.

1. Look around you
2. Rank the areas based on the importance on what needs to be organized first
3. Do it one area at a time

What next after getting organized?

After getting organized the next step is staying organized. This is very important because no matter how we organize things we will always go back into a cycle if we do not stay organized. This should be a daily activity for us. Do not wait until there is a pile of things in front of us before we realize we need to get organized. By putting this into our daily activity it becomes part of our system already. The more it gets part of our system the easier we will be able to do it without even noticing the effort we put into getting organized.

Roadblocks to getting organized

On a day to day activity we find ourselves being hampered from our goal of being organized because of a number of reasons:

1. The possibility that it may be forgotten
2. We become mechanical

Often times we do not want to organize ourselves because we might keep the important documents in places that become inaccessible. Worst we may forget them and not be reminded later on the need of these documents. The solution I have for this are:

1. Organize in such as way that the most important documents are the most accessible ones for us.
2. We may keep a calendar to remind us of these document files. I use outlook to oversee these things for me.
3. We may just throw away the least important documents we feel will not be used for the next three years.
4. We may also scan these documents and keep them inside our hard disks.

The next issue is about being mechanical. I have heard a number of times already that the most intelligent people do not have time to organize. Their creativity cannot be hampered by being organized and they need to keep their things just where they are.

Phew, do they realize how much more information they could feed their brains by being organized? Do they realize how much time they could spend from being organized? By saving more time we are able to boost our productivity by using the daily additional time we have in other personal development activities.

Getting organized is something we need to commit ourselves into. It is not easy at start but once we reap the benefits of it we will surely stay organized all the time.

The next time you feel throwing your things around saves you time, think again.

Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity

I stumbled upon a site who talks about how IM and productivity rarely mix which is exactly the opposite on how I view instant messaging. He says something like this:

Unfortunately it seems that more than anything else it’s a constant distraction that eats time…

The only true way to avoid this problem is to turn it off.

This is a big surprise for me since IM has saved me in a lot of ways throughout my young career. It has boosted my productivity level to enormous heights that I can’t seem to imagine what life would have been without it.

By reading the article and sweeping through the comments page people had different views and purpose on how they use their instant messenger.

This is a powerful tool that used correctly can actually speed up your progress in life.

What are the instant messengers I use?

I first had Yahoo Messenger a few years back and have recently gotten MSN, GTalk and lately AIM.

How to avoid distractions?

I actually don’t . Looking at the list of people I added to my messenger I came to realize that the people I have added are those who share the same interests that I have. They are people I have met in work, hot contacts, college and high school friends, and family members who were in the same wavelength as I am. When I say the same wave length this means we are a group of serious achievers.

This only means one thing. The hundreds of people I have added are busy career minded people. They do not pop for any reason at all than business. Yes, they could disturb and eat up your time whenever they need help or career advice. On the other side they are also the people you can pop in anytime if help is needed.

My IM is my 911 emergency call number. If I am stuck in a technological problem then a pop is all I need. If I need resource or advice on a certain decision then an IM pop is my first option. Countless of times the messenger saved me a lot of hours and gave me the answers right when I needed them most. The amount of help that was given to me was more than what I have given.

It’s not that I am selfish but it’s just the way it goes. Probably a statistician could explain the numbers behind it.

Anyway, to conclude; IM is an extremely powerful tool. Do not use it against you but rather use it to your advantage.

Internet Annoyances : How to Fix the Most Annoying Things about Going Online (Annoyances)