Staying organized at work is an everyday struggle. And sometimes the chaos seems to get into our head and turn everything into a bit of mess. But when you have overloaded your schedule and your to-do items are piling up, it’s a necessity for you to find an answer to “How to stay organized at work?”. Because if you don’t, things will get more hectic and you will start to feel unnecessarily stressed.
Now, if you often find yourself super busy and constantly trying to stay on top of it all, this post is for you. Basically, we’ve listed some simple tricks and tips that will not only keep you organized when you are crazy busy but will also help you pump up your daily productivity.
Just make these tips a part of your regular routine and you just might become that rare example in your team that keeps his/her schedule clear and clutter-free even when their workplace turns into a World War III trailer. So, without more ado, here are some tips on how to stay focused at work when you’re super busy in your schedule.
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Table of Contents
Top 10 ways to stay productive at work when you’re super busy:
1. Stick to your to-do list
Never overestimate the number of tasks you can get done in a day. Instead of adding too many things to your list and feeling frustrated when you can’t finish it – try an online to-do list app, create your to-do list for the day, and most importantly, stick to it. Remember what David W. Ballard once said – “we spend a lot of mental energy trying to keep track of all the things we need to remember.“
2. Learn the “one in, one out” rule
One in, one out rule is basically a method that is used to control the number of things in one place or at one specific time. The rule can easily be applied to your to-do list. It simply implies that for every new task you are planning to add to your list, you must complete one task first. It’s a simple trick that works quite well to help you declutter your daily routine and reduce stress.
3. Break up intimidating tasks
We all have spent our share of time with projects that are too complicated to be completed on time. Breaking such overly complicated projects into smaller, manageable tasks and subtasks during the project planning stage is one of the best ways to deal with such a situation. When an overwhelming work becomes something smaller you can focus on, it is much easier to keep your mind focused and get it done quickly.
4. Never let things pile up
As you’re thinking about all the things you need to get done, there is a chance that you may end up piling things on your plate instead of getting them completed one by one. This is basically how most people waste time at work. But it doesn’t have to be that way for you. Just recognize the urgency of each task and activity at hand, set clear goals, and above all, stay productive throughout your day.
5. Be deliberate with the time you have
Effective time management plays a crucial role in keeping things in their proper place when you’re super busy. Productive people understand this fact very well and act smart about how they spend their time across all the assigned tasks and activities. You’ve got 24 hours in a day, make sure that you’re doing what matters to you the most.
6. Make smart decisions faster
If you really want to finish what you have started, speed up your decision-making process. Quit the habit of procrastinating at work. The longer you will wait to do something, the more difficult it will be to get it done. If you want your work life to be less stressful and more productive, then keep yourself up-to-date and do what needs to be done as soon as possible.
7. Strive for inbox zero
To prevent yourself from facing a super busy day at work, you’ve got to practice the habit of removing things that you need. For example, unnecessary email threads. emails may have been a productive business tool in the past but today they’re just getting you down. Opening every email that pops up in your inbox, taking time out from your work schedule to check your inbox twice a day, or replying to unnecessary email threads – dealing with emails is not much fun, right? Then why don’t you keep its usage to a minimum throughout the day.
8. Maintain a calendar
Most people are afraid to use calendars, but how about online calendars. Since we are living in a world of technological advancements and automation, using a cloud-based calendaring application is a choice that makes complete sense. Fortunately, there are plenty of powerful tools and apps available in the business world that simplify the way you manage your projects, tasks, meetings, events, and almost everything else that you need to manage to make your day successful at work. Figure out the kind of tool that will work best for you and your team and make sure you include it into your daily work routine immediately.
9. Make sure everything has a home
When you get super busy at work and have clashing deadlines, keeping things in place is certainly the last thing on your mind. But if everything around you is in its proper place, there’d be no reason for you to put them back into their place. Just think about this – if you’re not going to keep your desk organized, would you be able to find what you need without wasting any time? Clearly, the answer is no. So, make sure that you treat your workspace well and everything on your desk has a proper home.
10. Find the right tools to use
A key aspect of creating a productive routine is having the right kind of tools at your disposal. Whether it’s a project management tool, a project planning software, a time tracking tool, or a file-sharing software solution, you must to have the right kind of tool to do your job the right way. Plus, be sure to keep yourself updated about all the latest trends and tools so you can use the best one to get your work done.
Tools & apps that can help you organize your life
Now that you know a few tricks that can help you get your life organized and on track, it’s time to explore the resources that you will need. Below, we’ve compiled a list of tools and apps that are specifically designed to help individuals and teams get organized and get things done faster, efficiently.
#1 ProofHub
ProofHub is basically a tool that helps you organize your work-related stuff. From projects, tasks, shared calendars, reports, timesheets, to team discussions, ProofHub creates a central place for everything and everyone in the workplace. Here’s how ProofHub keeps your life sorted (even on a super busy day):
- ProofHub eases the project planning and scheduling part of the project management process. It gives you instant access to the information you need so you can make smart decisions faster.
- ProofHub puts an end to last-minute surprises at work. It provides a transparent timeline where you can see your projects progressing in real-time.
- With ProofHub, workplace communication is a lot of fun. Finally, you won’t have to deal with countless, messy email threads.
- ProofHub gives by-minute details of how you spend your time at work and what you can do to become more productive with your day.
- ProofHub’s file management feature allows you to store, organize, access, share, and proof files online in one central place. Additionally, it allows you to collaborate with internal teams and clients directly on the shared file.
#2 Agorapulse
It’s a well-known fact that social media channels bring significant value to the business world. However, spending too much time on these channels or failing to manage them at the workplace can also be a huge drain on your productivity. This is where tools like Agorapulse come to your aid.
Agorapulse is basically a social media management tool that allows you to save time and efficiently manage your accounts across various social media networks. With Agorapulse, teams and agencies can monitor and manage their social activities across networks like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and Google+ using a single dashboard.
#3 Evernote
If you love to capture and organize your ideas at work, you’ll definitely love Evernote. Evernote is a simple note-taking app that allows you to keep your creative ideas synced so you can access them whenever you need.
With Evernote, you can create notes (audio and text) on the go and turn your ideas into action. Additionally, you can set reminders, upload attachments, organize task lists, and save interesting links to your account for later reading using Evernote. The tool is available for both desktop and mobile devices, allowing you to keep your notes and ideas centralized and save a lot of time.
#4 Feedly
Feedly is a business productivity tool that helps you streamline the way you consume content. We all want to excel in our chosen careers – this makes reading and learning the two most important aspects of our work life. However, we all have tasks and projects in our to-do list that can easily take away hours of time that we’d probably invested in our “self-development”.
Fortunately, there are tools like Feedly that gives us our one ray of hope. Feedly is basically a news aggregator application that helps you organize, read, and share what matters to you. The application supports various web browsers and mobile devices, allowing you to collect content from all your favorite sites and organize them in one place for reading at a later time.
#5 RescueTime
RescueTime is the kind of tool that teaches you how to maintain a perfect work-life balance. It’s a great tool for anyone who is looking for ways to improve their productivity and focus. It gives you an accurate overview of how you invest your time across various tasks and activities, spot inefficiencies in your current time management strategy, and what you can do to achieve your goals faster.
With RescueTime, you can ensure that you’re wasting less time and investing more on doing what’s most important. The tool also provides a weekly email report that allows you to keep your goals in check and summarize your activity and weekly productivity score in one place for later insights.
Getting organized and staying on top of everything might seem impossible at first, but when you stick to the above habits, you will definitely be able to keep things in order. These are the simplest, smallest steps that make the biggest difference in the end.
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Bottom line is – if you get organized, you’ll get successful.
So, go ahead and grab success.
