At times a task that should be over in few minutes consumes hours. And we don’t know why! Reason for aforesaid low work productivity lies in our habits.

As life sails by, we keep on acquiring new habits. Our whole personality is a cumulation of all our daily habits. Some of our habits are desirable and some are undesirable. 

Undesirable habits are like those mistakes we keep repeating on and on daily. It’s like we are trapped in a loop and not moving forward or not seeing any growth. 

This blog will make you aware of 7 such mistakes that have been reducing your work efficiency significantly. Also we will discuss all possible solutions.

1  Excessive use of mobile

Reason-for-low-work-productivity

Mobile and social media addiction are distractions that lessens our focus and results in low work productivity. 

Many often I promise myself to use mobile just for few minutes and then voila ! I discover minutes have turned into hours. Now all I am left with is a pile of pending tasks and guilt trips. 

Mobile is also the primary culprit for going to bed late. It hampers my whole day, when I don’t sleep enough. It’s even worse when I wake up and start scrolling mobile right away. It literally burns precious morning hour.

Lately I am following the rule of ‘work-comes-first’ in morning. Also I follow  ‘no-mobile’ principle while carrying out high-priority tasks, if mobile is not an absolute necessity. It shapes my whole day. You should give it a try too, and observe how this habit makes the day run smoothly. 

Here are a couple of tricks how to avoid excess use of phone. 

  • Put away your phone at a place, which is not immediately accessible. 
  • Turn off irrelevant app notifications.
  • Stop scrolling mobile first thing in the morning or in between a crucial task. Instead get back to work. 

2. Snoozing alarm

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Who doesn’t love to snooze alarm and enjoy those add-on minutes of sleep! I was doing the same till one day I resolved to stop doing that. From there on life has been easier and happier.

Morning is the most productive part of twenty-four-hour period. It is when we gear ourselves up for the day. Also morning is when we denote some time for self care. Snoozing alarm ruins a morning.

Here are few tips that worked for me to chuck out this habit. 

To begin with, you need to make sure to go to bed early. Then practice to get out of bed as soon as alarm rings. Switch off AC if you have. Along with open curtains, doors, windows and let sunlight come in. 

At first you might feel like it’s beyond your limit. You just want to give up and doss down anywhere. But hold on for a while. Because after few minutes of activity body and mind both settle down. 

Take it as an experiment for let’s say a week. Imagine getting out of bed promptly as ‘stepping out of comfort zone’. Accept this challenge and notice the transformation it brings.

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3. Not managing time properly 

How-to-increase-your-productivity

Elon Musk once said, “If you give yourself 30 days to clean your home it will take 30 days. But if you give yourself 3 hours, it will take 3 hours. Same applies to your goals, ambitions and plans.”

We often act as if we have infinite time to finish a work. And then that task remains in limbo forever. 

What I do is, when I don’t feel like carrying out a particular task ( that should anyway be done ), I assign time duration to it. That time frame must be logical, reasonable and sufficient. 

Let’s say I allot 10 minutes for a task. It may not get rounded up in 10 mins and take a bit longer. Nevertheless I mostly finish it off. Meanwhile I overcome inertia of initiation. So yeah, appointing time to a task is an important way, how to increase your productivity. 

4. Not taking break 

The other day I heard about “pomodoro technique” from my husband. It suggests to work for 25 minutes and then relax for 5 minutes. After repeating this cycle 4 times in a row, a person should take time out for 15 minutes.

It is so because when we continously stretch ourselves our efficiency wanes gradually. Our body and mind fatigues. Consequently this leads to low work productivity. Hence it’s sensible to take break from time to time.

They say that pomodoro technique is better than best self help books or best motivational quotes. I totally agree on this. Also it’s the best formula out there to increase productivity in workplace.

5. No preplans

How-to-increase-work-efficiency

I just want to highlight this point again and again. Preparations and preplans are extremely essential. I used to be that person who jumped headfirst for an action without any plan in mind. 

I must tell you, spontaneous action without preparation is not a matter of pride or something to boast about. Rather making plans ahead of a task is smart work. 

If I were to accomplish something, I would at least make myself ready the day before. Let’s assume, I have to prepare for a speech tomorrow. Then today I will note down few key points, around which I am going to frame that speech. Also I can come up with an impactful introductory line in advance. 

Significance of ’to do list’ as preplan

Here is one more example. Let’s say I am not able to slot ‘morning walk and meditation’ in my jam-packed routine. In that case I will draft a ‘checklist’ for all morning tasks and assign time to each. The former night, I will stick this ‘morning to do list’ on mirror and set alarm. It sounds silly, but anyway works.

If you are a person who believes in self improvement then you must try out ‘to do list’. It attracts bit of discipline into life. But bear in mind that a ‘to do list’ works only when it’s ‘time-bound’.

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6. Not obeying congruence 

Congruence-improves-efficiency

Lack of ‘Congruence’ leads to low work productivity. But what does ‘congruence’ mean? It means focusing entirely on what you are doing at a moment. The purpose is to stop dwelling on past or future and completely be present at that moment. 

For instance while having food, I will smell, taste and chew it well enough, then will swallow. So, eating ought to get all my attention. I shall put rest other thoughts aside. Same applies to anything that I do throughout the day. 

‘Congruence’ is paramount, in a world full of distractions. Practicing congruence is one of the way how to increase productivity in life. It also keeps mind at ease, peace and stress free.

7. Not taking food and water on time

Lifestyle-changes-improves-productivity-at-workplace

Gone are the days when everyone used to have a balanced work-life. There was definite line of demarcation between work and family life. But now a days this boundary is blurred. 

Now a days there are so many things to take care off, that we often ignore our basic requisites like food and water. Not taking food and water on time has become customary. 

We have acquired certain lifestyle habits like working empty stomach and dehydrated. In these unfavourable conditions, our brain is just surviving to work, but not functioning at its best. Thereby results in low work productivity.

What if we make a conscious attempt to take food on time, whenever possible! What if we always keep a water bottle handy with us! 

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Wrap up :

Many points that I mentioned here for low work productivity might be known to you already. But there is a huge gap between ‘knowing’ and ‘practicing’. Why not take a step forward and narrow this gap down!!