Sometimes it feels as if there are not enough hours in the day to get things done. How does one manage to complete daily work tasks without feeling overwhelmed? Here are three tips to help employees seize the day and their daily to-do list:
- Start early and establish a routine. Some of the best ideas come to us in the morning. Encouraging employees to start early enables them to get ahead of issues, especially before the e-mails come pouring in. Establishing a routine will help stabilize day-to-day tasks. A routine also will help employees navigate more easily when work starts to get chaotic and unpredictable.
- Apply the 80:20 rule to day-to-day tasks. This may be slightly counter to the popular “inbox zero” approach, but sometimes it is more effective to focus your energy on the most impactful activities vs. making sure you respond to every task that comes your way.
- Outsource. Being able to delegate tasks to external parties can double your productivity with lower-value tasks. For example, many of General Assembly’s clients have limited internal resources, and we work creatively with them to design and present customized digital training programs.
Michael Robson is enterprise lead/general manager at General Assembly (http://generalassemb.ly).
