14 Productivity Tips for 2014

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productivity tips to help you be more efficient and effective

A new year means a fresh start! Each year we want to be more efficient, effective and productive so we can be more balanced and be our best.  It’s the combination of many tools, tips and techniques that help us with our productivity.  Review this list of 14 productivity tips for 2014 and see the strategies you are already using  and those you would like to use to create a new habit.

1.  Commit to a calendar you love.  A calendar not only helps you keep track of meetings and tasks, it also helps you create a plan for your week, month and year.

2. Record recurring events on your calendar to remind you about important dates.  These can include credit card and bill paying dates, expense and health flex plan due dates, and birthdays.  Using your calendar as a tool for tracking doubles its value to you.

3. Lists make life easier. Write stuff down to be free up your mind and be ready to work.   Use a spiral notebook or Evernote for lists.  Move tasks from email, post-it notes, voice mail or texts to one list to keep track of all you need to accomplish.

4.  Create checklists for weekly and monthly activities at home and at work.  Checklists are a great way to not re-invent the wheel.  It keeps you on track for projects and tasks that occur regularly, as well as getting things done throughout the week.  Easy to use checklists include grocery lists, travel lists, bill paying ledgers, and end of the month work checklists.

5. Choose the top  three of your Most Important Tasks (MITs) each day to accomplish.  How do you know what’s most important? It is the priorities you set.  In business it is usually about finances. Personally it is about family and values.  Choosing just three MITs a day ensures your success.  Whatever is the first task of the day is the one task you can be sure will be accomplished.

6. Set up a Power Period each day, as least once a day, without distractions.   A power period helps you get tasks done, helps you be more creative, and helps you complete difficult tasks and projects.

7.  Triage email three times daily and add tasks from email to your action list.  It’s easy to spend too much time on email so keep to a schedule to use your time more effectively.

8. Create a command center for your papers.   Triage papers daily and set a one hour weekly admin time for paper at home.  Having a center where papers that require action are altogether makes it easy to find them and do what is required.  Spending a little time daily and one hour weekly helps make sure nothing falls through the cracks.

9. Establish weekly routines at home and work.  At home these include what days are grocery shopping and laundry.  At work these include weekly reports and staff meetings.  You can assign days like Money Monday, Wash it Wednesday or Financial Friday to keep it fun too! Write these on a checklist where you can see your assignments for you and your family.

10.  Leave a little white space in your calendar for relaxation and rejuvenation.  Many tasks do not go as planned.  Back to back activities wear us down.  Having a little time between tasks and activities lowers your stress.

11. Declutter your purse, satchel, backpack and your car weekly.  Declutter your purse at your command center.  Declutter your car while you are getting gas.  Help your kids declutter their backpacks into their binders.  It takes just a few minutes to do. Sometimes it is just trash that needs to be tossed, addresses and contacts to put in your smart phone, and cosmetics to put away.  Just five minutes makes all the difference.

12.  Host a weekly family meeting.  Family meetings are when everyone shares what is going on and what they need to accomplish.  It creates family cohesiveness and a team effort.

13. Post a family calendar in the kitchen for everyone to add their activities and remind everyone of upcoming events.  Your family calendar helps everyone work together and be on top of upcoming activities.

14.  Create partnerships at home and work.  We are all especially good at some things and not very good at other things.   When you are partnering, both you and your partners strengths come out, work gets accomplished more quickly and its more fun.  Partnerships at home include making dinner, doing the laundry and doing the dishes. Partnerships at work include all types of project management, weekly meetings or monthly or annual reviews.   The key is to communicate clearly and work together cohesively.

Nothing feels better than getting things done!

Want more ideas on productivity? Check out my pinterest board!

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5 Ways to Use Your Daylight Savings Time Extra Hour

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productivity

This weekend daylight savings time ends and we fall back. We all love that initial daylight savings time extra hour and that extra hour of sleep! What if we keep appreciating that extra hour as a daily bonus? Here are 5 ways we can use that extra hour for our priorities.

1. Exercise

We never feel like we have time to exercise! Think about adding one hour of walking, cardio or other exercise to you day. You can break this into 2 segments, morning and evening too.

2. Reading

How many magazines and books are accumulating in your  home? Take one hour for your reading pleasure.

3. Family Meal

Life is busy and we seldom have time for a meal together. Family meals promote communication and cohesiveness.

4. Sleep

Keep heading to bed early so you can rise and shine with an extra hour of sleep each night.

5. Planning

Use your extra hour for planning time. Whether it is your weekly planning or family meeting, adding in planning time makes your life less stressful and more meaningful.

How will you use your extra hour?

Join me on my pinterest board, Time is on My Side!  Learn loads of time management ideas.

 

Back to School Checklists

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back to school check lists

I love checklists! Back to school can be stressful and often we forget some of the most important, simple items.  Here are a few sample back to school checklists to cover your back to school needs.

Real simple back to school checklist

Real Simple Back to School Checklist

Real Simple Back to School Checklist

http://www.realsimple.com/work-life/family/kids-parenting/back-school-essentials-checklist-00000000000242/index.html

mom agenda back to school check list

Mom Agenda Back to School Checklist

MomAgenda Back to School Checklist

http://www.momagenda.com/printable/back-to-school.pdf

Container Store College products

Container Store Back to College Checklist

Container Store College Checklist

http://www.containerstore.com/pdf/college/checklist-2009.pdf

professional-organizer.com back to school checklist

Professional-Organizer.com Back to School Checklist

Professional-Organizer.com Back to School Checklist

https://professional-organizer.com/WordPress/tag/school-checklist/

 

6 Summer Organizing Strategies

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summer organizing

 Summer time fun begins with being organized!

 

Summer organizing

 Gather your family together and get all the dates on your family calendar. 

summer organizing

Be sure everyone is charged up to go!  Keep all the technology charged in a public spot so everyone gets a great night’s rest. 

Load up your ipod with summer tunes and your Nook, Kindle or ipad with great summer reads. 

Add kid friendly books too to encourage summer reading. 

summer organizing

Pack a summer bag for each activity and for extra car time for your kids. 

Checklists for travel make packing easier too! 

summer organizing

Set up a healthy, organized snack station with kid friendly stuff.  

It will be easy for everyone to grab a snack whenever they want to and you will be sure you and your kids are keeping on track with fruits and hydration. 

summer organizing

Keep a cooler for water in your car or in case you need to drop by the grocery. 

summer organizing

Treat yourself to some fun summer flip flops as a reward for your organizing efforts. 

Summer is more fun with preparation and organization. 

What will you be organizing this summer? 

Work at Home: Organizing Your Home Office

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Working at home requires setting up a space that will work for you! It can be a challenge to carve out a spot to get your work done, just because there are lots of distractions. 

  • Decide on what works best for you! Some families relinquish the dining room to become an office, some families work well in the midst of the media area.  Decide if you need quiet or not, paper management and printing capability, and what tools you will use to work.  You are ready to set up your space after thinking this through.
  • Set up office hours.  With a start and end time, your time will be most productive. 
  • Paper and work go hand in hand.  For portability from the office, there are products suited just for this! You can also set up a command center for work at home and work at the office with the same tabs keeping paperwork consistently.  A file cart is a great option to slot papers in, keep them close by, and keep them organized.
  • Decide on a time you will shut down for the evening. Working at home can interfere with a good night’s sleep.  Sleep is the best way to work efficiently and effectively!

Check out my Work At Home pinterest board! http://pinterest.com/EllenDelap/work-at-home/

Organize to Revitalize Blog: Yours, Mine and Ours: Tips to Communicate with Your Blended Family and Stay Organized

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Connecting, collaborating and consolidating with a blended family can be a challenge! Check out my guest blog post on Organize to Revitalize

Yours, Mine, and Ours: Tips on How to Communicate With Your Blended Family and Stay Organized

http://dallisonlee.com/blog/2013/02/05/yours-mine-and-ours-tips-on-how-to-communicate-with-your-blended-family-and-stay-organized/

Plentiful Powerful Productivity= Success

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productivity

 

Powerful productivity come when we create an environment that works with our strengths.  Improve your effectiveness and efficiency with these tips.

  • Your planner is the visual guide to your productivity.  Use it like a map, writing in what your destination is for your day, your week and longer.  When you write tasks and projects into your planner, you are making yourself accountable and breaking the job into smaller, manageable pieces.
  • Use paper management skills to go from overwhelmed to in control.  Break down the flood of paper by eliminating first what is junk and recycle this.  Create a command center where you drop recycling in and separate the paper into actions. Your command center should be at the spot where paper comes to you and you drop it in a pile. Create a fun and inviting command center using color!  Not sure what decisions to make about paper?  Be brutal and just keep what you absolutely need to work on, not maybe, someday projects.
  • Turn overwhelming email into 10 in your inbox by taking time three times a day to sort and clear email. Color code  your email and important email stands out.  Designate a power period to work on email that needs lengthy responses and relates to projects.  Your paper and email folders should be named the same to keep consistent and find what you need.
  • Add routines to your week to consolidate activities. Even grocery shopping is less stressful if you tack it on to an existing weekly activity.
  • Too much to do and too much on the brain? Use a notebook to capture your lists, dating the top of the list.  Then choose 3 – 7 tasks to do that day.
  • Use technology to help you increase your productivity.  Turn off alarms, email, texting and more when you really want to focus on a project.

What success tips do you have for plentiful productivity?

 

More ideas on powerful productivity here!

Organizing Tools: Your Calendar/Planner

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There is nothing more important for organizing our time than a great calendar/planner.   You can use this tool to incorporate planning as well.  The strategy of not only recording dates can be the key to making your life more organized and less stressful. 

  • Choose a calendar/planner that works for you.  It’s a calendar/planner that makes it easy to record dates at any time.  It also helps you view time the way you think about time, at a month at a time, throughout  a week, or just in a long string.   Your calendar can be as simple as a yellow pad, very exact like Franklin Covey planners, or with technology on your smart phone.
  • Create a habit of recording dates as soon as possible.  There are always lots of dates swirling n your head for you and your family. By entering these on your calendar/planner  asap, you won’t have to remember them, there will be fewer conflicts of dates and activities, and you will start to grasp a greater sense of due dates and upcoming events. 
  • Refer to your calendar/planner diligently. How often? At least in the morning and evening, but also throughout the day to keep you on track with appointments and projects.
  • Use your calendar as planner for big and little tasks. Breaking down big projects with your own time line, creating accountability dates to complete a project, and adding in baby steps makes your planner a strategy to get things done.
  • Post a family calendar for your kids and partner to add dates.  Keeping everyone in the loop and keeping everyone communicating keeps your family organized. 
  • Have a weekly review to get ahead of the game. Once a week, make a date with your calendar to look ahead, see what is coming, prioritize and get in gear.

 Using a calendar/planner eliminates the mental clutter of remembering dates and times and helps you focus on completion of a project.  The more you use your calendar/planner, the more indispensible it will be!

Image courtesy of The Container Store www.containerstore.com

Setting Your Goals One Step at a Time

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Is making changes in your home or office are at the top of your list for the new year you are on target.  Getting organized is one of the top three new year’s resolutions every year.  Like any change, taking small steps get you to where you want to go. 

Be sure to set positive, specific, measurable, date driven steps to accomplish your goals.  Write it down, exactly how you will go about the change and the deadline you have.  A measureable goal helps you see what you have accomplished and making yourself accountable to a date makes your success assured. 

Here are some ideas to help your organizing and productivity this year.

If your goal is to declutter your home and get organized

  • I will declutter one junk drawer in the kitchen or other small space in my home in 2 weeks.
  • I will keep 10 pairs of pants and eliminate the rest by next Sunday.
  • I will spend 10 minutes every day going through my mail and eliminating paper.
  • My family will have a nightly 10 minute pick up time to get toys and clothes back to their homes.

If your goal is to work smarter and be more productive

  • I will add one hour first thing in the morning to work toward a project that is of primary importance.
  • I will add 10 contacts to my data base this week to grow my business.
  • I will have a 5 minute meeting daily with my assistant to set my plan in motion for the day.
  • I will spend 15 minutes at the end of the day writing my list for tomorrow, putting paper back into folders, and filing emails to get ready for the next day. 

If your goal is to be more organized about money, save money and improve finances

  • I will save $10 a week by automatically withdrawing to a savings account.
  • I will write down every expense for one month by category to determine where I can spend less. 
  • I schedule one hour every week for administrative time to pay bills and work with paper.

 If your goal is to improve your health

  • I will walk 30 minutes a day, five days a week.
  • I will drink 2 glasses of water each morning before I leave the house and 1 glass with each meal during the day.
  • I will be in bed by 10:30 every other evening.

Whatever your goal, whatever your steps, remember to establish these firmly in a spot during the day.  I like to do my baby steps first thing, early in the day, or otherwise the day gets away from me. If you miss a day, just get right back to it the next day.  We can’t do every goal and be successful.  Aim for one big area this year and see what you accomplish.  Tackle your goals in small bites and see the difference for yourself!

Organize Your Life Webinar Series

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Save your sanity and get organized in 2013!

Is getting organized one of your New Year’s resolutions? Then Join me this January for 10 amazing webinars from a dream team of presenters for Get Organized month. These classes will help you focus, plan, and organize your time, space, and information.
http://theprofessionalorganizer.com/events/organize-your-life-webinar-series/ …. get a special facebook discount with code “fbdeal” for 10% off all classes.

Webinar classes include how to organize your time, your paper, your kids, your students, your technology, hoarding and more!

  • Classes offered share specific tools and techniques to impact your daily life. 
  • Nationally known professional organizers and productivity coaches available to you in your home by webinar.
  • Affordable solutions to learn about organizing and take that next step in your home or office. 

 Classes begin January 3 and run all through Get Organized Month 2013.  Take a step to make 2013  your most organized year yet!