Work Productivity Techniques That Actually Help You Do More (In Less Time)

Things I actually use every day in my day job & in my Part-Time Creator Career

👋 Hiya, how’s it going? I’m Eve and I run the Part-Time Creator Club.

Each week I write about advancing your 9-to-5 career while building a successful side business. That means growth, building, communication and anything else that helps you work better (and happier).

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There are lots of productivity hacks out there that ironically become procrastination. The reality is, you don’t need a long complicated system to make you more productive. You just need a shortlist of the top hitters.

Below are the top tactics that have stuck with me. They are the things I use every single day. Have a read-through and try a few, see if they work for you.

1. Face hard conversations head on

One of the biggest time sucks I’ve found is thinking about a thing and trying to do something else. Case in point: the other week, a situation brewing distracted me. Day by day, it was getting worse — until it was soaking up precious time just thinking about the thing.

Often things on your mind distract you from focusing fully. Instead of being consumed by the task at hand, you find your mind wandering to the thing you are hopelessly avoiding.

You can’t fully immerse yourself —  you are half in half out. Instead, the best option, really the only option, is to face the hard thing ahead and get it sorted.

AKA facing the tricky conversations that you’ve been avoiding.

These days I make a rule, if I need to talk to someone about a thing and it’s not a good conversation, or it’s going to be a little bit awkward and a little bit difficult I try to schedule it as soon as possible.

Less time to ruminate, less time for the thing to get worse, less time worrying about the thing that will, in all likelihood be fine anyway. If there is something you are avoiding, put it on your list for the first thing tomorrow morning — you will thank yourself for it.

2. Pick three ‘big’ things you’ll do today

I hate, really hate, spending any time deciding what to do.

In my mind, it’s a waste of time. Time spent planning could be spent doing but, and there’s a big but, whilst there is a law of diminishing returns that applies to planning (sit planning for four hours what you’re going to do today and you’ve already wasted all the good time you had) there is a sweet spot.

For me, that’s 5–10 minutes at the start of a working day deciding what I will do. My day starts for the Part-Time Creator Club between 5:30 am and 6 am and the first thing I do is look through my ‘to-dos’. The same is true for my day job which starts at 8 am.

These things on your list don’t have to be huge, in fact, I encourage you to pick 3 big(ish) things. And by that, I don’t mean ‘write a book’ should go on the to-do list (because that’s obviously way too big) but ‘write 2,000 words’ could absolutely go on the list (depending on how quickly you write and what’s normal for you).

I write a list in Notion and I structure my working days like this. Each day, a checkbox of three things. If I tick off those, I’m happy. Over time, you train your brain to focus on the most important things first.

You start to spot the things a mile away that make your ‘top 3’ list and start to disengage with anything that is busywork.

3. Email as a follow-up

One thing that doesn’t get spoken about enough is time that you might waste in the future if you don’t take proactive steps now. How many times have you had to go backward on a project, ask questions that you’ve forgotten the answer to, or re-visit things you’ve already done because you didn’t keep an accurate log of what’s going on?

Now, after every meeting (except little meetings or catchups that aren’t product-related) I write an email to summarise what was discussed, and what the key action points were and give everybody an opportunity to contribute if they would like.

That way, I remember what we’ve discussed, I’ve got a log if I forget or anybody else does and it keeps everybody accountable. If we get to the next meeting and find ourselves questioning whether we made a decision, I can go back to the meeting and revisit what we agreed and make sure we’re all on the same page.

It’s a huge time saver. It’s one of those things that takes a bit of extra effort each day but it really goes a long way and saves you if something goes wrong.

4. Build a moat around your 2 hours

I protect my 2 hours a day to write.

For me, those are my sacred hours for concentration, to explore my thoughts, digest the world, unpack, unpick, and meditate my thoughts.

I find my days are exponentially better if I’ve had my 2 hours of uninterrupted writing time. It’s a magic that I try to kindle every morning at 5:30 am-7:30 am. It doesn’t always happen, sometimes it’s clunky and awkward but maybe 6/10 times, it’s this glorious heaven of peace and joy.

I protect those 2 hours with everything. Those two hours, for the last 4 years have been my safe space, they’ve allowed me to build a business and writing career on the internet while working full-time.

Those 2 hours are the reason I changed jobs, decided not to quit the 9-to-5, decided to go full ambition mode at my day job, and (at the same time) fully committed to my writing on the internet. Every good decision has come from having those two hours to explore, dream, create, think, and decide what I want to do with my time.

I protect them with everything I have.

In those 2 hours, I:

• Close all tabs, I try not to have any distractions.

• Put noise-cancelling headphones on so I can fully engage.

• Turn my phone upside down or put it out of sight so I can’t go on it.

• Make sure my dogs are settled and snoozing before I decide to start typing.

5. Jump on calls to solve problems

If it’s a big thing, I’ll schedule a meeting, and write an agenda — all the ‘proper stuff’. If it’s multiple people I need and it’s a big thing we’re working through, I’ll schedule the thing for as soon as everybody can but usually it’s not a ‘today’ thing.

But when there’s a small problem that I can solve right now by calling someone and sorting it out, I try to do that as much as possible. Usually, tiny things like organizing something, running an idea past someone, double checking an assumption all of that can be a message or a quick call.

It’s not unusual for me to have 4–5, 5-minute calls in a day. If it’s something quick that I can just explain over the phone (rather than going back and forth over Teams a hundred times) I type ‘you free for 5?’ and usually the answer is yes.

A quick conversation helps resolve a problem and hey presto, it’s off the list. If it’s a tiny thing that can be sorted in a 5-minute phone call, I always opt for that.

It works for a few reasons:

1. I’d rather speak to people than go back and forth over Teams (it’s way quicker and way nicer)

2. I get an accurate and immediate answer which is refreshing, I know quickly if it’s not the right thing by listening to somebody’s tone or watching how they react

3. It means it doesn’t go on a to-do list for later

Small problems that can be solved quickly — should be.

6. Close-loop emailing

Emailing gets out of hand quickly.

It’s why your inbox fills up overnight, it’s why it’s an endless task to get to the bottom of them and it’s why the fight is better off approached a different way — what’s the different approach you may ask? Well, it’s to ‘close-loop’ the conversation.

Instead of engaging in endless open-ended conversations that often have a load of indecision and never-ending back and forth, look for opportunities to close the loop.

Here’s a typical exchange:

“Hi, let’s set up a call, when are you free?”

“Hi, I’m free on Wednesday, when works for you?”

“Wednesday is no good for me, what about Thursday?”

You can imagine how this goes, on and on, endless and pointless — instead, look for the opportunity to close the loop. Here’s an example:

“Hi, happy to set up a call, here are some dates that work for me: Wednesday 1 pm, Thursday 10 am or 3–6 pm, or Friday 4 pm. Can you let me know if any of those work or suggest another few times?”

This works for scheduling meetings (when you can’t see other people’s calendars) but losing loops is about getting to the outcome in the quickest way possible, so you’re always asking yourself ‘What is the blocker here?’ Another example is when people are going back and forth on email and not resolving the problem because they’re not clear on what they want. Instead, you can cut through that and say something like:

“Happy to get involved, what is it that you need support on?”

Simple — gets straight to the point and highlights the problem to be solved.

7. Systemize anything you are doing more than once

It would be rather odd to write out your email signature every single time you write an email. It would be 20 seconds of your life you would never get back every single time you send an email. Every single time you send an email, you are going to sign it off with your signature so it makes sense to create a ‘system’ to write it for you.

The thinking: write it once, use it forever.

That same methodology can (and should) apply to your life. Case in point, don’t write out a new to-do list every week, write out a to-do list template for each day of the week and use that every time. I do this for food shops, house jobs, work jobs, everything.

But there are tonnes of opportunities to do this each day at work — I do this for a whole host of things, I have templates for:

• Meeting notes

• Next step logs

• Standup updates

• Objective setting

Everything that I will repeat in a day, week, month, or every few months I try and create a system for, that way it saves me a tonne of time and there is something quite therapeutic about having a system for something that I do often — there’s a little sense of joy and satisfaction in it.

8. Block-booking meetings

I have a daily standup that I can’t move. Apart from that (and a few other things) my calendar is mine to do what I please with. So I try to make it work as efficiently as possible. I try to make sure that if I’ve got lots of meetings to get through, let’s say I’m in the early stages of a project and I need to talk to lots of people, I’ll try to squeeze those meetings together as much as possible. That’s because time in-between meetings creates ‘dead’ time that I struggle to work with.

If I’ve got meetings 9:30–11 am then another at 11:30 am, that time between 11 am-11:30 am ends up being dead time (because it’s not 30 minutes it’s more like 20). It’s hard to get into anything enough in 20 minutes, by the time I’ve found the thing and got my head around it, it’s time to snap out of it and start my call. So instead, I try to block-book meetings. Now, I have to be careful to give myself enough time between meetings to grab a coffee but mostly I like to batch meetings so I can get through them and then into my deep work.

Ideally, my deep work session is in the morning. That’s because my mind is fresher in the morning, I’m always clearer-headed in the morning. By the time the afternoon comes around (and especially after lunch), I find myself less able to focus on deep work and it becomes a better time to have meetings.

9. Set a timer

For most tasks, I set a timer. I set a timer for between 30–60 minutes (depending on the task) and it’s my sole job to commit fully to that task in that time. It works wonders because it reduces the task down to something manageable ‘surely I can concentrate for 30 minutes’ and it brings out my competitive nature ‘I wonder how much I can do in 30 minutes’.

It plays into 101 of behavioral science, gand amification. If you can make the thing fun or a competition, you’re more likely to do the thing. Why do people obsess over their streak on Duolingo? Because the human brain loves a game.

I do this all the time:

• Cleaning the house

• Writing a newsletter (I’ve got a timer going now)

• Making my dinner

• Doing research

I find myself way more engaged than if there was no timer. It structures my thinking and encourages me to focus because I know I don’t need to do it for the whole day, I just need to do it for the next 30–60 minutes. It also helps to schedule a reward right after, so usually, if I do the thing for 30–60 minutes (or whatever the time frame is) I reward myself by making a coffee or something to break the day up.

Try it — it works a treat.

10. A ‘pop up’ list

Often I’m working away and something will pop into my head. Completely random but I know if I don’t capture the thought, I’ll spend energy trying to hold onto it (because I am incredibly forgetful) and I’ll spend time later (when I’ve forgotten it) trying to remember it. All in all, a huge waste of time.

It’s just happened to me when writing this — I’m fully invested in this piece I’ve been tapping away non-stop for the last 45 minutes and then boom, I remember I need to order a new dog walking coat. Because I know I’ll forget that, it goes straight into my Apple notes. It takes 2 seconds to do and it means it’s out of my head, somewhere else, safe and I know now, I’m okay to forget it.

I try to be forgiving of myself when these moments pop into my head. It’s frustrating on one hand because it often distracts and snaps you out of the flow state but on the other hand, it happens so I might as well deal with it as effectively as possible, which for me means storing the idea somewhere else.

11. Emotional management

For me, the no.1 biggest productivity killer is my emotions. I really believe productivity is a game of self-awareness and emotion management. If you can work out how to manage your emotions, how to listen to your mind, pay attention to what works for you and work with your emotions to get the best out of yourself, then you often can increase your productivity dramatically.

Case in point, some days when I get up to write, I don’t want to. I’m miserable, cold, it’s dark and maybe I’ve not slept so well so I’m in a mood because life isn’t going to plan. I can sit, stare at the screen fighting against it or I can use that mood to my advantage. I find I’m particularly good at being critical when I’m in this mood so I pick a topic to write about that needs (in my opinion) some stern thinking on.

Other times, I can feel my insecurities seeping into my consciousness, maybe I think I’m not good enough, it’s all getting a little overwhelming, maybe my ambitions are scaring me. Whatever it might be, I think we can all get into a space where we are fearful and uncertain about the path ahead.

In those times, I know I need to take a step back. I need to get my head into a book or to reflect on what I’ve managed to achieve so far. One thing that works quite well is remembering how I felt in my lowest times and more often than not, those lows were a signal for an upcoming high. So if anything, feeling low is a signal that something good is coming. That’s what’s tended to happen in my life. Every time I’ve felt like things were a total disaster and everything was going to be ruined, the following week I made some sort of breakthrough. So now, I try to reframe the negatives into a signal that something good is coming.

But all of this thinking is taught over a long time. Of months of trying and failing, of getting it wrong, of giving up and then trying again. I find I’m my most productive self when I work with who I am, when I try to get the best out of myself, and don’t see my emotions as blockers but something to work with. It’s not always easy but it gets better over time.

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What about you? What are your productivity go-tos that I haven’t mentioned here - let me know in the comments :)

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Much love,

Eve :)