9 Productivity Hacks For Better Work-Life Balance In 2022
Be it your personal or professional life, productivity plays an important part in making you successful. But with every industry getting increasingly competitive and employees struggling to juggle numerous chores at work and home, attaining work-life balance is becoming continuously difficult for them.
According to a survey 80% of American workers take their work home. In the end, they spend an average of seven extra hours per week, that’s almost one extra day every week.
“Do you want to make 2018 the most productive year and manage work effortlessly? Switch to ProofHub.”
To save you from all the stress and exhaustion, we have made a list of productivity hacks that could help you strike the perfect balance between your professional and personal life.
Here it goes:
1. Make To-do lists
Richard Branson, CEO of Virgin group, has a secret up his sleeve that helps him get more work done in less time. The man who boasts more than 400 companies to his name, makes a number of To-do lists to stay on top of the things and manage time. He went on to say, “Lists not only provide great structure to getting things done but they also help us to set goals and achieve our dreams.”
It may seem a little difficult to make and follow the list, but fret not, we have a tip for you. Try ‘1–3–5 To-do list’ technique where you plan to do one large task, three medium-sized tasks, and five small tasks every day. Our users make their to-do list, add tasks, and set time-estimates in ProofHub to accomplish more and bring structure to their day.
2. Time-box every task
Once you’ve made a to-do list, time-box all the tasks in the list. What the heck is time-box, you might ask? Timeboxing refers to the act of putting strict time boundaries around an action or an activity. When you timebox a task, you stand a good chance to get it accomplished on time.
There’s a little psychological hack you can try while time-slotting your tasks. Try attaching emotions to every task. For example, finishing a big client pitch will make you feel ‘triumphant’ or completing all the listed tasks will make you feel ‘self-assured’ and ‘confident’ about yourself.
3. Make the most of your commute time
People who manage to strike the right balance between their work and personal life realize the importance of every single minute. Each minute you squander away in a day can further translate to hours of overtime. To avoid this, you must make the most of your commute time. How about getting an update on a project so that by the time you reach there, you have an accurate picture regarding the project status. We, at ProofHub, like to make the most of the commute time using ProofHub Mobile app to stay on top of things.
Crystal Paine, the popular writer, sums it up brilliantly when she said, “If you want to be more productive, you need to become a master of your minutes.” Wouldn’t it be great to use your commute time to winnow out time-consuming tasks and make things easier for you?
4. Become proactive and stop procrastinating
Procrastination is one of the biggest enemies of productivity. Some delve into it rarely while others love to procrastinate religiously. You have no idea how messy it can make things for you. The only way to escape it is to acknowledge it and take small steps to be more proactive. It means to be actively engaged and anticipating the outcomes instead of just observing passively.
David Allen, a bestselling author and productivity expert, introduced “Two Minute Rule” to beat procrastination. He advises — if it takes two or lesser minutes to complete the task, do it now. This little hack can definitely help you create a better work-life balance throughout the year.
5. Take regular breaks
Running from one meeting to another and the urge to take up multiple tasks at once can prove downright ‘unproductive’ for you. It not only makes you feel tired but you also lose focus and efficiency. This is why many professionals are taking regular but small breaks to be on the right track.
We suggest you to work for 90 minutes and then take a 15-minute short break. You can utilize this time to go fresh yourself, fill your water-bottle or go for a quick stroll outside your workplace. If you can afford, take a 10–20 minutes power-nap in your lunch time to replenish your energy.
6. Keep digital distractions at bay
There’s one more thing that can come in way of your productivity. Any guesses? No. It’s distractions. There are many distractions out there that can take your focus away. Some of these include phone calls, constant pings of Whatsapp messages and pop-up updates from different social media accounts.
If you add the number of minutes spent on scrolling down your Facebook or Instagram feed, you would find it hard to meet your daily or weekly goals. There’s only one way to fight these distractions i.e. to shut down notifications, minimizing phone usage to as less as possible or only during your break times.
7. Don’t bring work at home
Don’t bring your unfinished work to home. You might ask where would you take it then if it’s not finished yet. If you don’t want come in that percentage of people as quoted in the introduction of this post, thank your stars or your ability to wrap work on time.
Leave your work at the office because if you are working for more than eleven hours a day, you are more likely to suffer from depression. Moreover, it can also damage relationships as you won’t be able to spend quality time with your loved ones. Make a thumb rule to work from home only in exceptional circumstances.
8. Prepare for Monday on Friday
We know that the last thing you want to be thinking on a Friday evening is about the Monday morning. As Mondays are busier as compared to the other days of the week, so a little prep can save hours of hard work and effort for you.
Whether you like it or not, take the last 15–20 minutes of Friday to plan and organize things for the coming week. If you plan a day ahead, you would be able to set the tone for the rest of the week. As you would be clear about your objectives, you’d accomplish most of them (if not all) successfully. As a result, you’d be able to enjoy your professional work as well as spend quality time at home.
9. Relax on weekends
Productivity is not all work, work, and work. Taking some time to ‘not do anything’ is also an equally important contributor to your productive self. And, guess that’s what weekends are for. Make the most of them to rejuvenate and refresh yourself. Go outside, watch a movie, read a book, spend time with your kids or probably just relax.
Make sure you catch enough zzzz’s on a Sunday night to prepare yourself and your body for the coming week. Hit the sack at a decent hour and wake up with a well-rested mind and body.
By making small tweaks in your daily routine you can take your productivity to another level but the key to it is consistency. And those who seriously commit themselves would reap the ultimate benefits. So, it’s absolutely possible to have a fulfilling personal and professional life and anyone can create it.
Now, it’s over to you how do you maintain your work-life balance? Let me hear your thoughts in the comments section.
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Vartika Kashyap runs the marketing team at ProofHub — a project management software for teams of all sizes. She is a seasoned marketing professional who is an expert in digital marketing and entrepreneurship. She’s been featured among LinkedIn’s Top Voices for the year 2016 & 2017. Connect with Vartika on LinkedIn, Medium and Twitter.
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