When your projects keep piling up, it's easy to develop a less productive mindset if you're starting to feel overwhelmed and stressed out on the job. To improve your daily outcome and hone in on your objective, set some realistic milestones and boundaries that will be sure to take you far.
If you're pushing your way through a massive to-do list, then here are 13 best practices, courtesy of Forbes Human Resources Council members, to help you (and your team) achieve individual and departmental goals across the company in a reasonable time frame.
Forbes Human Resources Council members share their insight.
Photos courtesy of individual members.1. Share Documents In Microsoft OneDrive
Microsoft OneDrive and shared documents have certainly revolutionized productivity for the better. Instead of hosting several meetings or chasing down managers for valuable information or feedback and then compiling it, individuals can conveniently add their feedback at their convenience to a document that updates in real-time. This makes the actual follow-up meetings and brainstorming sessions a lot more productive. - Tiersa Smith-Hall, The Hartling Group
2. Focus On Process Improvement
One thing that I recommend is that managers always keep a mindset of process improvement. Whenever you're working on something, take a step back, map out your process and ask if there is an easier and more efficient way to accomplish the goal. For example, can this be automated? Is this step really necessary? Having this mindset will help teams move away from creating endless spreadsheets, duplicating their steps and adding unnecessary manual work to their to-do list. - Katya Daniel, Golden Hippo
3. Carve Out Daily Calendar Focus Time
Many of us are guilty of flooding our calendars with meetings to complete tactical or administrative tasks. This can leave us feeling as though we don't have enough time in the day to play catch-up, strategize or plan proactively for upcoming or anticipated work. For this reason, I believe it is critical to own your calendar and carve out some focused time, daily, in order to stay organized and plan ahead. - Aparna Ranganathan, Smart Energy Water
4. Be Intentional With Your Meeting Agenda
Being intentional about meetings and the tools the team uses will form the foundation for team productivity. Ensure that your teams' time spent in meetings is focused on highly valued activities that include decision making, brainstorming and disagree-and-commit discussions. Move low-value activities, like status updates, to asynchronous formats via shared docs, pre-reads or collaborative work management platforms. - Megan Barbier, Jumio
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5. Get Rest, Eat Breakfast And Exercise Each Day
To focus, one must be engaged and present. Engagement and focus begin before you go to work—it starts the night before. Here are my three tips to get the most out of the next day. Get a good night's sleep by going to bed at a reasonable time and getting seven to nine hours of sleep. Have a hearty breakfast and exercise before work. Check for emails after all three tasks above are accomplished. - Richard Polak, American Benefits Council
6. Utilize Your Technology Tools Wisely
Establishing intentions for how technology platforms are used to communicate is a great hack for productivity. Use bay functions for quick responses, not long exchanges. Leverage your chats directly to email for your extended information. Then once an email has been sent, any follow-up needed is handled via a meeting, which is kept to 25 or 45 minutes maximum. - Kim Blue, OpenExchange
7. Be More Thoughtful About Your Metric Systems
A productivity hack to help achieve the best project outcomes is to be more thoughtful about which metrics are used for predicting project success. Setting lead measures—activities that drive the project towards success—rather than lag measures—metrics that report the results of those activities—may be more beneficial. This is because lead measures can be directly influenced whereas lag measures cannot. - Dr. Timothy J. Giardino, BMC Software
8. Prioritize Communication
We use a quick daily video stand-up to check in on hot items for the day. In addition to our weekly team meetings and one-on-ones, we use tools like Slack to improve our asynchronous communication, which can be a challenge for distributed teams. This meeting and communication cadence helps us collaborate and stay on track with projects. - Jennifer Marszalek, Revolution Global
9. Work In Mental Breaks
Step away to take a break sometimes because it's easy to get stuck. Between emails, instant messages and meetings, the time flies by. To be at your best, work in mental breaks. Leave the computer, go outside and breathe. Call a friend that you have been missing, make that doctor's appointment or schedule that massage. When you take care of yourself, everyone and your work quality will be better for it. - Dedra Ward, Conduent
10. Develop A Digestible Strategic Framework
Ruthless prioritization with a strategic framework mapped out in digestible bites is what is truly needed. Develop realistic milestones that include high and low impact timelines, incorporating business analytics optimization, development and project time. - Britton Bloch, Navy Federal
11. Reduce Your Meetings
With meeting fatigue at an all-time high, introducing 25- and 50-minute meetings helps to avoid back-to-back meetings. Another productivity hack is embracing a once-weekly universal block of time during which internal meetings shouldn't be scheduled. This focused innovation time will be reserved for innovative thinking, completing a deliverable or advancing a project. - Kevin Silva, Voya Financial
12. Brainstorm Using A Miro Board
Using a Miro board during a department discussion is a helpful digital collaborative tool. It keeps engagement up when dealing with large virtual teams. - Mofoluwaso Ilevbare, Primary Connect
13. Set And Track Department Projects
Set an agenda for team meetings so your staff members will stay on schedule and people are prepared to speak when it is their turn. In addition, managers should take notes and send them out after the meeting so people are aware of their tasks. Create a project tracker and keep it updated. It seems like extra work, but it streamlines responsibilities in the future and everyone knows where they stand in regard to the work. - Erin ImHof, CertiK
