The Productivity Pro® Blog by Laura Stack - Time Management, Getting Things Done, How to Be More Productive

I received an email from a reader today asking what *is* productivity.  While that’s a perfectly legitimate question, I thought I’d post a definition, just in case others wanted a understanding of how to measure productivity.  Some people just *know* intuitively whether they’ve had a productive day and don’t need to measure it.  And while there are different methods and views on productivity measurement (white collar, manufacturing, farm, economic, etc.), I use the following as my working definition of white collar business productivity (my niche):

The efficiency with which goods and services are produced,

as measured by the value of the output produced (result)

per person,

per hour,

divided by the unit of inputs used to produce it (hours).

Or—simply— a measurement of output per hours worked.

For example, if two people completed the same task (output), and one person took two hours and the second person took four hours, the first person would be more productive than the second. Indeed, one person could work an eight-hour day, and the second person could work a twelve-hour day, and the first person could be more productive than the second.  Productivity doesn’t measure how many hours we work; it measures what we were able to create in that time.  If you’re surfing the Internet all day, you won’t be productive, regardless of how many hours you work.

How do YOU measure your productivity, or if not measured, how do you just KNOW when you’ve had a productive day?

Here’s a blog I like called Daily PlanIt.  Has a great list of top ten time management and personal development blogs/sites.  I trust his opinion…mine is listed ha.

Get Organized with Home Helpers cites two main time management resources: Work Wonders and Home Helpers.  Check out http://dailyplanit.wordpress.com/2006/10/28/get-organized-with-home-helpers/ for a helpful list of resources.

My article "7 Ways to Leave the Office Earlier" was posted in the Microsoft at Work newsletter at http://www.microsoft.com/uk/atwork/work/leavetheoffice.mspx

I’d love to hear your strategies, secrets, and tips for how you get out of the office earlier and keep from working late nights!  Ideas?

I asked my newsletter readers "What do you do to keep your energy up during the day?" and received the following replies.  Please comment if you have a tip to add!

Hi, I do little ’sprints’ through out the day, especially if I am feeling tired. I will get up & run in place or walk quickly around the house for 5-10 minutes (I work at home) it gives me just enough of energy bursts to keep me going. Thanks, Misty

Misty Kenner- creativity coach

www.pictureperfectscrapbookco.com

I live in the

Midwest

. I work for a larger company in a smaller town.  I am fortunate that the parking lot at work is not that large. When I feel tired, during my lunch break I will go out to the car (truck), recline the seat and catch a short "catnap".  15-20 minutes does it for me.  I know that some folks feel they need 1-2 hours to feel rested. 

Another tip I read someplace was to drink a caffeinated beverage, then take a short nap.  I takes that long for the caffeine to get into your system and take effect. So you benefit from the nap and you have the caffeine buzz to keep you going.  It has worked for me, my son lives a 1000 miles away.  Sometime when we go to visit my wife and I will drive through the night.  I have tried it a few time, it seems to work well for me. 

Mark Keehr    

I realize this won’t work for a lot of people but I work out on my lunch hour.

I am up at 5 to get myself and two small children ready.  My 5-year old son gets dropped off at a sitter to go to school while my 2-year old daughter rides with me on the 45-minute commute to get dropped off at preschool at 7:20 so I can get to work by 7:30.  Then at 4:30 it’s hit the highway time to get sissy picked up and then hightail it home to get brother picked up before 5:30.  Rush home to get supper fixed – get homework done - get the kids in the tub – go clean up the kitchen - start a load of laundry – finish the bath - read a story – finish the laundry - fall into bed to do it all over again.  I was always complaining I didn’t have time to work out until I finally just decided something had to be done.  Our park district has a full fitness center (at a very reasonable rate) just 5 minutes from work so I can hop over there – work out for about 40 minutes and rush back to work.  I feel so much more energized in the afternoons – I have also lost 46 pounds out of 100 to boot!

I also try to eat healthy fruit snacks and yogurts in the afternoons to keep my blood sugar up.

Charyle Smith

The best way for me to stay up, maintain a good attitude and fee energized all day is:

I begin my day at 4:15 am with a 2.5 mile run/walk on my treadmill, with some meditation and prayer along the way.  After a quick shower I dress for the work day, have my coffee, vitamins and a light breakfast of dry cereal and or cheese toast.  During my 30 minute drive to work I use this time to meditate again and have short breath prayers.  All of this ensures that I am wide awake when I get to the office and ready to face the day and my co-workers.  I also try to get in some form of physical exercise each evening to relive the day’s stress.  I try to keep to this same schedule on days off as well as week ends. 

K Meekins CPS

I recently visited my grandparents (ages 81 and 86) and discovered a treasure trove of old family photographs.  Especially precious were the ones of my mother as a little girl (none of which she had seen before) and my great-grandmother, whom I vaguely recall visiting before she passed away.  With seven children, my grandparents had no idea how they were going to split them up after they passed, since many were one-of-a-kind.  My easy answer was to scan them, save them as .jpg files, and make CDs for each of my six uncles and my mother.  So I packed my precious cargo in my suitcase and headed home.  Then it hit me…what exactly did I get myself into?  I counted the photos: 282.  I quickly realized the huge time commitment and realized I was of course able to handle this task but shouldn’t handle this task.  I pulled up my favorite freelance-for-hire site: www.elance.com.  I posted my project requirements and received 18 bids on my project, ranging anywhere from $.25 to $1.00 per scan.  I awarded the project to a woman who took the time to email me directly, tell me about her scanner, offered to complete a couple of test scans at different resolutions to test what printed best, etc.  She quoted me $.75 per scan, which was higher than some of the bids, but she suggested an enhancement to my project specs: upload the scans to a photo site as well, so my relatives could order their own prints directly, and I wouldn’t have to send them CDs myself.  Even better!  Less time for me.  Bottom line: if you’re overburdened, you might not be delegating properly.  If you try to do too many jobs at once, it’s like spinning china plates on sticks: the longer you keep it up, the greater the odds of a crash.  The great philosopher Virgil said long ago, “We are all not capable of everything.”  Never do anything that can be done just as well by someone who is paid less.  If there is another person who can handle something you’re doing, stop doing it.  If someone can do the job 80% as well as you can, let that person do it!  We mistakenly believe only we can do it correctly.  Be open to new, innovative ways of tackling projects, and you will be pleased with the results.  And you can focus your time on higher-value activities.

In this society, you’ve likely been brainwashed to believe that you aren’t a good parent unless your child plays competitive soccer by the time she’s ten, she’s active in the Girl Scouts, can play the piano masterfully, and swims beautifully…and, by the way, leases a horse. Hear a little sarcasm in my voice? For years, I bought into this notion as well and dutifully enrolled my little girl in ballet, piano, church programs, choirs, Girl Scouts, basketball, and more. I used the rationale that “she has to try everything so she can find out what she likes.” 

Many children are so overscheduled, their stress levels race sky-high and the entire family comes apart at the seams. Many parents feel guilty because of the number of hours they spend at work. As a result, they overcompensate by signing their children up for myriad activities to show their commitment. When they aren’t working in the evenings and weekends, they shuttle their kids back and forth between activities, never realizing any quality time together. Your children don’t want all that activity—they just want YOU.

Still, parents tell themselves that all these activities are good for them. Yes, you may see long-term benefits—but at what cost? What cost to your children’s stress levels? What cost to your relationships with them? What cost to the sanity of your family? What cost to your spouse—the person you never see anyway because soccer games are held on complete opposite ends of town? Can simply spending quality time together strengthen your relationship?

Having made big changes in my thinking in this area, I offer these suggestions that might work for you:

One activity at a time. Sometimes it’s easy to make excuses for why your children are involved in so many “good” programs. For example, we have a Wednesday night program at our church that Meagan joined for a year. “My goodness,” I thought. “We have to be able to make time for her to learn about the Lord.”  Forget that she was already participating in another program on Sundays that required her to study lessons during the week. Forget that she had Girl Scouts every other Monday, piano lessons on Wednesday after school, and soccer practice on Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday evenings, with games on Saturday morning. AAAARRRGGGHHH! I soon realized that it was easy to “justify” the need to participate in yet one more thing because it was a church function. So we gave up going to this program and felt good about the additional family time we’d gained. The benefits of that time are arguably better than what she’d get from attending the church program. The key is to achieve a good balance.

One season, one sport. Tell your child he/she must choose only one sport to focus on each season. For example, if playing on both volleyball and basketball teams occur in the same season, pick one over the other. If your child really enjoys soccer but also wants to ride horses, take a hiatus from riding during the spring soccer season. Then ride during the summer until soccer begins again in the fall. When it’s too cold to play soccer or ride horses, take a few months of swimming lessons at an indoor pool.

Find activities more than one child likes. My husband and I teach Sunday school. We tend to arrive at church feeling a bit frazzled and thrown-together after getting three kids fed, dressed, and out the door. But one of the other teachers always looks amazingly put together, despite the fact she has four young children at home. So I asked about her family management tips for being relaxed and happy. She told me one of her secrets was to find a single activity that all the children could participate in together, no matter what their ages. That way, she wouldn’t be running around so much. She let her children decide what sport to be involved in, and they chose swimming. Practice times are the same for everyone and the meets happen at the same place. What a great idea!  Now I’m applying the same concept for my boys with piano lessons, karate, and soccer league (not all at the same time!).

Log and limit technology time. Set a time limit for yourself and your children for television, video games, IM time, phone, and Web surfing. Any combination of the above is allowed, but not all. I’d start with a maximum of 90 minutes a day and reduce it from there.  Require each person to annotate the log when spending budgeted time in one area. Keep the log (with a pen attached) near the activity area to make it easy for each person to complete. Review the logs often so you know what’s going on.

Conclusion

From a very early age, our children depend upon us for structure and predictability.  The benefits of organization to children are many: they feel secure when they know they can depend on an outcome; organization helps them gain self-control; it keeps their stress levels in check; and they develop a sense of confidence and independence. 

With a little help from you, children can learn to be organized.  It’s not innate: they weren’t born with this ability.  And it’s an ongoing quest for you and them.  Help your children gain control over their lives by modeling it.  If you make to-do lists, teach your children to do them and explain why you use them.  If you use a planner, get a children’s version and show them how to track homework assignments and schedules and record project due dates.

The key is to organize a little bit every day—not just during the first days of school.  I hope you gained some new ideas in one of the six important areas of organization for your children and can put some new systems in place in your quest to help them become productive citizens.  You can discover many more systems in my book Find More Time: How to Get Things Done at Home, Organize Your Life, and Feel Great About It.

It’s important to instill the values of hard work and fairness in your children. As they gain responsibility and perform chores at home, they learn it’s important for everyone to pitch in and do his or her fair share to take the burden off one person. 

If you live here, you clean. Even my four- and five-year-old boys have chores. I went to the grocery store and bought a big poster board. In the left hand column, I listed a due date for chores. (Each chore may actually be completed any day during the week, but it must be done by Saturday.) Across the top row, I listed the chores. Each child has his or her own chores posted. When one gets completed, the boys put a sticker on the corresponding column (Meagan uses checkmarks; she’s much too cool for stickers). The last column is for “bonuses”: extra chores done that weren’t required. We pay one dollar for each year of a child’s life as an allowance. If something isn’t done or gets done incorrectly or with whining and complaining, the child’s allowance gets docked. 

Meagan completes one of the seven tasks required each week to earn her allowance. Whether it’s emptying the trash containers around the house, bagging up the newspapers, or gathering the laundry from the bedrooms, she performs one task. When Saturday arrives, she’s already finished her weekly chores and can enjoy the weekend. Adults should use the same logic with running errands throughout the week.

Pick age-appropriate chores. As the boys grew older, I let them start taking over some of Meagan’s chores. I’m sure she initially thought she’d have less work to do, until I explained that responsibilities shift, as people grow older. Fathers and mothers of other animal species only feed and shelter their babies, until they’re old enough to fend for themselves, at which point they deliberately stop helping them. Teach them to be self-sufficient, and you will give them important life skills, while at the same time, reducing your workload. Accept the fact that hard work and responsibility are actually good for a child. Allow them to complete the chore their way, as long as they achieve the result you want. Consider complaints a part of raising a child and, rest assured, parents across

America

are hearing: “Well my friend Boo-boo doesn’t have to do this.”

At ages four and five, we know from experience that boys can:

·        Put away silverware from the dishwasher.

·        Set and clear the table (put milk in small pitchers, so they can pour it themselves).

·        Empty small trashcans around the house into a big bag.

·        Put dirty laundry from the hamper into a black lawn bag and haul it downstairs into the laundry room.

·        Pick up the playroom (especially if you’ve made it easy for them to know where things go).

·        Keep their bedrooms clean.

·        Brush their teeth.

·        Get dressed on their own (you’d be amazed how many people still dress their four-year-olds). By the way, if you wet your child’s shoelaces before your child ties them, they won’t have to be re-tied all day. Better yet, get shoes without laces.

At age ten, children like Meagan can:

·        Clean the cat litter.

·        Gather Mom and Dad’s laundry.

·        Wash the dishes.

·        Load and unload the dishwasher.

·        Wipe off kitchen counters.

·        Pack lunches for school.

·        Tidy the living room.

·        Do homework without being asked.

·        Get out of bed and get ready for school while parents sleep in.

Make it easy for children to succeed. Keep a stepstool in the kitchen so they can reach the drawers and lower cupboards. Use paper plates so they don’t drop and break them and can throw them away at the end of the meal. The time saved is far worth the extra money spent on the paper plates. Ditto on plastic cups. (Of course, when we have company, we do use regular dishes.) We buy milk in gallons and pour a small amount into a small Tupperware container within easy reach, so the children can pour their milk themselves. 

Remember, parents are not servants; they are teachers. You won’t be around forever.  Being slaves to children when you can teach them independence undermines both your life and theirs. Stop it as soon as possible.

Organizing Children’s Keepsakes

One of the common complaints I hear from parents is about all the stuff that comes home from school.  Where do you put all those great art projects, mementos, and clay handprints you just have to keep?

Create a treasure box for each child. When each of my children was born, I wanted to save all the little things from the hospital: the nametags on their cribs, the bracelets from their wrists, their “going home” outfits, and all those things. Add to that their first pair of shoes, their favorite (now cast-away) blanket or stuffed animal, their first lost tooth—what a bunch of stuff! So I got three of those sturdy plastic bins with a lid and designated one for each child. I keep each treasure box on the shelves in their closets and add to them as I come across a “must save” keepsake.

Collect your children’s art projects. Get a three-drawer rolling storage cart, cardboard chest of drawers, or large plastic storage bin to store your child’s art projects and schoolwork.  Each of my children has one of these craft chests in his/her closet. The trick is to make sure you’re only keeping the most special papers: original creations, “firsts,” and items that weren’t mostly created with the help of an adult. Or you can use an art portfolio, which stores flat and can only hold so much. Just remember that you can only keep as much as the chest, bin, or portfolio can hold. When you run out of room, you have to purge. Fawn over your child’s projects as you should, but then secretly throw most of them out when your child isn’t looking. I have a single large envelope of very special art projects I created as a child that my mother saved; as an adult, I wouldn’t want to own any more than those. Remember, you’re saving for your children, so don’t burden them with unnecessary clutter.

Set up a baby book for each child. Ideally, you would have started each child’s book upon becoming pregnant, kept up with it as the child reached milestones, and completed it before you forgot everything that happened. If you didn’t, don’t despair. It’s not too late to get a baby book, fill in the blanks, and gather as much information as you can. For me, my baby book is a real treasure. I love feeling the lock of my baby hair and looking at the little bracelet that had been placed on my wrist at birth. Your kids will certainly love to know the details of their births, as they get older, especially when it’s time for them to have kids of their own.

Create a school memories book for each child. I found an excellent school memories book from Lillian Vernon. It has two pages for each grade K through 12. In addition to giving lines to record activities, signature, friends, dreams, and vital statistics, the book has a pocket for each grade to store the most important documents: report cards, photos, letters to Santa, and small samples of artwork. To keep up, I wait until the school pictures come in from that school year. I paste the photo, fill in some of the blanks, and (the trick) give it to my child to fill out the rest. I keep them handy on the bookshelf in my office and throughout the year, I put important items (report cards, a special drawing, a letter to Santa, etc.) in the keepsake pockets.