Sapience- Workforce Management workforce analytics software

THE ULTIMATE GUIDE OF OVER 100 PRODUCTIVITY TIPS

Contents

01

02 - 04

05 - 06

07 - 09

10 - 11

12 - 13

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Introduction | Who is this guide for?

Email Productivity Tips

Personal Productivity Tips

Tips to make your On-PC time more Productive

Tips to Help You Be Mindful


Tips for Effective To-Do Lists

15 - 16 Productivity Tips for Mobile and Tablet Users

17 - 18 Tips to Help You Be Mindful

19 - 21 Productivity Tips from Industry Leaders

22 About Sapience

© Copyright 2016 Sapience Analytics www.artofworking.net [email protected]

You are reading this guide because somewhere at the back of your mind, you have this nagging feeling that things are not getting done. You are spending long hours at work, but the to-do list just doesn’t seem to end. You get this feeling that probably you need to give more time to your family or to your hobby but…there is no time!

Who is this guide for?

This guide offers some quick hacks and tricks to help you in your journey of being productive. We are sure it won’t be possible to apply all these 100+ suggestions in your daily lives – but why not start with a few?

There is no particular sequence in which you should read this guide. Just pick a section where you think it will be useful for you to apply these tricks, and just get started with the journey of being super productive! Well, if we think about it, all of us in the world have 24-hours

in a day – be it the President of the United States or a factory worker. Then why is it that some people just seem to achieve a whole lot in the day as compared to the others? The answer lies in being mindful and therefore, more productive in whatever you are doing at a particular time

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This guide offers some quick hacks and tricks to help you in your journey of being productive. We are sure it won’t be possible to apply all these 100+ suggestions in your daily lives – but why not start with a few?


Establish a well-set routine for checking emails. Instead of always keeping the Outlook app or browser tab open, set up specific times during the day when you will check emails.

Set a fixed duration to process the emails – knowing that you have a limited time will auto-matically make you prioritize.

Turn off the notifications which can tempt you to check emails. It typically takes 10-15 minutes to refocus on a task following an email interruption.

Process the emails in a way that each email should have one of the follow-ing actions - Respond immediately if it takes less than two minutes, delete it, archive it, mark it for later response, or generate an action.

Even if you check the emails often, set up specific times when you will process those you don’t need to process each email as soon as it arrives.

Have folders and labels in the inbox to make it easier to search for emails and keep all the relevant emails in one place.

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Use the rules engine in your email client to automatically move the emails to specific folders based on the set rule.

Unsubscribe from those news-letters and feeds which you don’t read regularly.

Use technology to your advantage - Use tools like MailTags or Taglocity for email tagging, use Google Desktop or Windows Desktop Search for faster desktop search, or use SpeedFiler, Mail Act-On or MsgFiler as Filing Assistants.

Be careful with your selection of the email notification settings for each social network you sign up for – reduce the number of emails as much as possible.

Instantly unsubscribe from junk email.

Consider using text expanders like PhraseExpress, Texter or AutoHotKey, which will allow you to assign predefined key-strokes to complete certain words and phrases.


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If there are certain messages that you send again and again (like confirmations or sign-off messages), instead of repeating the task, reuse a sent message from the last email of that kind.

Let your colleagues know that you only answer emails during a certain time in the day – this will ensure that they call you or find some other way of communicat-ing with you in case there is any-thing urgent which needs your attention.

Use EOM (means “End of Message”) effectively – Insert “eom” at the end of an email subject line to indicate there’s nothing in the message. This will help in quickly conveying the message without taking too much time of the recipient.

Set up a dedicated workspace to work in a focused manner without the average household distractions.

Don’t check your email first thing in the morning, make it second – after you have done your most important task in the morning.

Ensure a stable internet connection, a dedicated phone line for work and all the other paraphernalia to make your o�ce smart.


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Keep your phone on silent, turn off all email and social media notifications when you want to get something important done.

Take smart breaks - Try the Pomodoro technique where you work for 25 minutes and then take a 5-minute mini break. After four Pomodoros, reward yourself with a longer, 15-20 minute break. This will ensure that your mind is focused and it will minimize the distraction time.

Automate everything that you can - use key-board shortcuts, try out music apps that can help you cut out noise, download apps that can block certain websites during your work time and apps to improve your typing speed. You’ll be surprised at how much you can accomplish with these simple hacks.

Schedule your most important tasks during the ‘Golden Hours’, hours when you are at your productive best. Measure and quantify your work habits to understand and identify your ‘Golden Hours’ and review them regularly.

Exercise in the morning – Studies have shown that exercise can improve your mood for up to 12 hours following the workout. With less stress and more e�ciency, you can greatly improve your productivity.

Ignore the news – Browsing through news can take up a whole lot of time. Most of the news today are repeated, unreliable, or trivial. If something really important happens, you will find it out in some way.

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Drink water - Drinking more water gives you more energy and keeps you healthy.

Say no – Don’t be too kind to say yes to everything and then get things over your head. Instead of missing deadlines, feeling stressed, and disappointing others, some-times just say no.

Effectively use your commute time to make phone calls or use the travel time to listen to the subscribed podcasts.

A messy desk can make you feel over-whelmed and anxious so keep your desk clutter-free.

Get a good night’s sleep of at least seven to eat hours – it’s absolutely important for your productivity.

Stay positive – it keeps you happy, healthy and productive.

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Invest in a faster PC. Your big-gest productivity boost will come from a fast PC – your pro-grams will load faster, the web pages will load faster and you will end up saving hours.

Use a computer mouse even when you are working on a laptop.

Make sure that your computer screen is at the same level as your eyes.

Intensely concentrate on a task for at least 25 minutes without any distraction. Once the task is completed at the end of 25 min-utes, take a short break and go for a small walk or grab yourself a coffee.

Track how you spend your time on PC to know what takes up most of your time and how much time you really spend on your core activities. After a few days, you will have concrete data in front of you which will help you bring in positive changes in your work patterns.

Place your computer screen at least at an arm's length from your chair. Always keep the knees bent at right angles (do not sit crossed legged). Try to keep your feet flat on the floor. Rest your arms and elbows on the chair. Make sure that you are not straining your shoulders.

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Use keyboard shortcuts – they save a hell lot of time! Even if you save only 10 seconds on a task, you could end up saving 8 hours a month and up to 12 days a year. Check out the section on email shortcuts in this guide.

Follow mindfulness – focus on one task at a time. Check out the section in this guide on tips to help you be more mindful.

Listen to music if you get distracted because of the loud voice in open workspaces. Music apps can help you concentrate better and thus, improve your overall productivity.

Set up the optimal temperature in the room – studies have found people tend to make more mis-takes at low temperature (around 20 degree Celsius) than at optimal room temperature(25degrees Cel-sius).

Use dual monitor if you need to open several windows to do your work. Instead of switching between the win-dows, fitting the most frequently used window permanently on another monitor and just pivoting the eyeballs to another monitor is way too produc-tive

Avoid direct glare on your computer screen and don’t work under direct light.


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Use technology to your advantage to break bad habits – Download apps which block few sites for you at specific times or sign out of chat when you are work-ing on something important.

Learn to type faster – if you are someone who spends much of your day in typing (emails, blogs, or even coding), then improving the typing speed by even 20% could save more than 2 hours of your day!

Do nothing when you are angry, anxious, paranoid or tired.


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Ctrl + Back/ Forward Arrow → Move the cursor one word at a time

Minimize all the windows with Window Key + D. Use the same shortcut to restore all the win-dows

Ctrl + Shift + T → Reopen an accidently closed webpage

Window Key + L → Lock the PC

Press Spacebar in any Browser window to scroll the page and Shift + Space-bar to reverse the action

Use Shift + Ctrl + N create a New Folder in Windows Explorer

Use Backspace to go one page back in your browser history

Use Alt + PrntScr to take a screen shot of only the active window

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Keyboard Shortcuts for Windows PC to Improve Your Productivity


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Press Shift + Delete to permanently delete a file (instead of moving it to Recycle Bin)

Use Ctrl + Z to Undo any change and use Ctrl + Y to redo the undo.

In Windows Explorer, change the View Type (List, Detail, Small, Large etc.) by using Ctrl + Mousewheel

Keyboard Shortcuts for Windows PC to Improve Your Productivity

In Windows Explorer – Use Num Lock + Plus Sign (+) to dis-play the contents of the selected folder. Use Num Lock + Minus Sign (-) to collapse the selected folder

In a browser, to open a link in a new tab, hold Ctrl while click-ing on the link

Double-clicking the word selects the whole. Click the mouse button three times on any word if you want to highlight the whole para-graph or sentence.

Use Ctrl + T to open a new tab and Ctl + W to close the active tab in any Browser


Avoid unnecessary meetings – if some-thing can be done over a call or through email, just get done with it instead of organizing a full-fledged meeting for that.

Prefer stand-up meetings – stand-up meetings tend to be shorter and more productive.

Set meeting agenda – Do not set up or attend any meeting if the agenda for the same is not pre-circulated. Meetings without agenda tend to get diverted in all directions without any conclusive out-comes.

Invite only the necessary people - Be care-ful about who is invited for the meeting. Several research and studies have pro-vided that meetings are the biggest time wasters in the corporate world.

Tips for more Productive Meetings

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Tips for more Productive Meetings

Stick to the agenda – Absolutely do not discuss any item outside the agenda. This will ensure many things - people will be careful about the agenda items, they will be more prepared for the meeting and there can be concrete action items at the end of the meeting for each of the agenda items.

Stick to the meeting times – Respect the time of the people by not waiting for the late comers. Preferably stick to 30-minute meetings.

Ban technology – Don’t allow laptops or mobile phones during the meetings. These distractions can be a big wastage of time for the other attendees.

Assign action items – At the end of the meeting, for each of the agenda item, have concrete action plan along with the clear delegation of the responsibility to one person. This helps in having effective follow ups and actions.


Tips for Effective To-Do Lists

Be elaborate – Make the list-making a thinking job. Imagine as if you are making the list for your assistant and you need to make it easy for her to execute the tasks. Use active verbs and be as specific as you can.

Differentiate between Projects and Tasks - Tasks are small and focused things which you can act on whereas projects are collec-tions of tasks. When you make a to-do list, make a list of tasks and not of projects. Vague items on the to-do lists lead to pro-crastination.

Prioritize - Prioritizing the tasks based on importance and date by when those need to be completed is a good method for narrowing down the task list and getting the essential tasks done.

Frequently update the list - A long list of unfinished tasks can make you jittery and stop you from getting anything done. It is, therefore, important that you carefully study, analyze and reprioritize your to-do list frequently.

Be realistic – A more realistic to-do list should contain no more than 5 items – 3 main things and 2 small tasks. It helps you be more focused on a particular task, helps you be more mindful when you are doing the task, and you will need to switch between the tasks possibly only 4 times in a day!

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Productivity Tips for Mobile and Tablet Users

Shake the phone to undo the last action

To quickly take pictures when the phone is locked, slide the camera icon located in the lower right on the screen upward.

To instantly scroll to the top of any page, just tap on the top bar

To set Reminders based on your geographic location, tap the “i” icon in Reminders and toggle “Remind me at a location.”

To take a screenshot on your iPad, hold Home Button + Lock Button. It will save the screenshot in your camera roll.

Double tap the space key to insert a full stop.

When the camera app is open, use the volume up button on your headphones to take a photo (great for taking selfies)

Productivity tips for iPhone and iPad Users

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Productivity tips for Android Users

Swipe Left or Right to call or text the contacts instantly

Long press the home button to get the recently used apps pop up window

Turn your Android phone into a mobile HotSpot® by using Menukey► Settings ►Applications ► Develop-ment ► Select the box “USB Debugging,” and press “OK”.



DO NOT multi-task - You will end up messing several things at the same time.

Make a to-do list of all the items (personal as well as profes-sional). You will be in a better position to prioritize and execute things.

When you are tired, take a break to refresh and renew your body, your mind. You will feel more energetic when you get back to work.

Eat well – Always carry some healthy snacks with you.

Have your priorities clear – Instead of just taking the to-do list and starting to execute the items, prioritize the tasks before you get into execution.

Follow a routine – you can make yourself more productive by avoiding the decision fatigue and when you don’t need to decide on what to do next, every now and then.

Take out some time to have some fun, spend time with family, give time to your hobby and relax.

Do only that work which you enjoy.

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Don’t dwell on the past or have regrets about the past. Have the end goal in mind and live in the present

Meditate – Take out at least half an hour for meditation every day.

Instead of doing it fast, concentrate on doing it well.

Have self-discipline – it’s a crucial trait to accomplish goals and lead a healthy life-style.

Respect time – yours as well as others. Don’t be late for meetings, don’t have lengthy talks on the phone and don’t send unnecessary emails.


Productivity Tips from Industry Leaders

Dustin Moskovitz, Co-Founder of Facebook and Co-Founder and CEO of Asana, prefers “No meet-ings Wednesdays”

Matt DeCelles, Co-Founder and Partner of William Painter, sug-gests writing the three most important tasks on a Post-It note and keep that readily in sight.

Mark Zuckerberg prefers wearing identical grey t-shirts and hoodies through his work week to stay focused and spend as little energy as possible figuring out what to wear every day.

Alok Bhardwaj, the Founder of Hidden Reflex, starts his day by doing the least desirable task first.

Bharath Kumar, a Co-Founder at Pugmarks.me, suggests working on Sunday night to get some extremely productive, thoughtful and non-interrupted time.

Paula Rizzo, Founder of listproducer.com, suggests not answering the phone unless you are expecting the call.

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Greg Archbald, Founder of GreaseBook, suggests identifying one thing that would make your day a success.

Schedule fun activities outside work to motivate you to finish on time,” – suggests Tim Halberg, founder of Tim Halberg Photography.

Thomas Edison,Winston Churchill and John F. Kennedy believed in the power of taking naps during the day to recharge their body and mind.

Richard Branson believes in taking care of the body through regular exercise to be more productive.

Donald Trump believes in getting up early to think and read.

Arianna Hu�ngton has said, “My single most effective trick for getting things done is to stop doing what I’m doing and get some sleep.”


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J.K. Rowling prefers eliminating all those things that can sidetrack her so that she can focus on what really matters.

Great leaders like Nelson Mandela and Beethoven often employed the method of “walking while working” to get more things done.

David Pogue, the famous New York Times columnist, uses typing-expansion software and dictation applications to speed up his creative process.


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About Sapience

Sapience is an innovative People Analytics solution. At an individual level, it empowers users to own their productivity and wellness through mindful work. At the enterprise level, managers and CxOs get accurate Workload and Capacity Utilization insights across every business dimension of interest, enabling them to align their talent pool to strategic needs. Sapience is helping over 100,000 users at 70+ enterprises across 10+ countries to move the needle on employee engagement, employee wellness, organization productivity and business profitability. Sapience also owns the Art of Working platform (http://www.ArtofWorking.net ), that brings together several of the world’s leading productivity experts and working professionals interested in improved personal effectiveness at work.

Gartner recently recognized Sapience as a Cool Vendor, and Sapience is the recipient of several industry awards for its innovative product and fast growth, including TiE50 (at TiEcon, Silicon Valley, California – 2014), Frost & Sullivan (Product Innovation - 2014), Dun & Bradstreet (Best Emerging India SME – 2013), NASSCOM (India’s Top 10 – 2013), IDG Channel World (50 Hot Global Companies – 2013).

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