At a recent speaking event a question from the floor, well... floored me. The question was: “What are your top three tips to achieve Productivity Ninja status?” The question threw me because Ninja thinking is not really about a couple of tweaks applied to your life that can turn it around; it is about an underlying approach to our “stuff” that pervades everything we do. All well and good, but I had to answer the question. The answer I offered was as follows:
- A Second Brain. However well organised we are, we will end up with a lot of stuff on our plates. We need to answer the question “Can I be certain that what I am doing at this moment, is the most appropriate thing to be doing out of all the things I could be doing?” The development of a Second Brain allows us to have a comprehensive overview of all our stuff, so that we can quickly and easily steer our attention to the appropriate activity.
- 80:20/Impact Thinking/Saying No. OK, this sounds like three things but is really all the same. We need to accept that we cannot possibly take on and complete - on time to a good standard - all the things we are asked to do. So we have to do an 80:20 exercise; filter out the 80% of stuff that has no impact on anything (and say No to it) and focus on the 80% of stuff that has a big impact. This leads us to Impact Thinking. If we cannot define what “impact” means for us, our jobs and our organisations, we cannot hope to achieve it. So, defining “impact” is critical and steering in that direction on a day-to-day basis will get us to a productive, high impact life.
- Context. One of the biggest impacts on my Productivity has been a relentless focus on working in Context. This means focussing on tasks that need me to be in a certain place – or with certain tools to hand. So, I will make six calls in a row (across a number of different projects), do all my errands at the same time, process emails in a batch. Switching Context frequently is a drain and inhibits focus. Stay in Context and only switch when you have to.
These are my Top Three. What are yours?