L is for Letting Go
Improving productivity isn’t all about tech and tools and shortcuts. Those can often help around the margins. But for sustainable effectiveness, a mindset shift along with an understanding of how the human brain works will bring bigger rewards and help you reclaim your time.
This is the first step in the framework for lasering in on the important tasks business owners need to focus on. There are many cultural and workplace norms that get in the way of being productive, because they don’t play well with the human brain. That’s why it’s critical to let go of those practices that don’t serve you or your business.
Improve time management by being in control of your time
You can block off your calendar all you like, but if you keep moving your time blocks around due to other people’s desires, you’re no longer in control.
Did you start your own business to be at the whim of other people’s agendas? Most entrepreneurs are determined to create their own hours and schedules. Yet, due to others’ desires, they find themselves without even an hour to do their own important work: the tasks that will move their business forward.
That’s because so many of us were taught to answer emails or phone calls right away. To drop whatever we’re doing, even if it’s important, because someone has a question. Even if that question should be answered by someone else… including the questioner themselves.
Our culture makes us feel important when we have a lot of emails coming in. When the email inbox is full. When we say “I’d love to but I’m SO BUSY!” When people are constantly asking for our answers, wisdom, or to “pick our brain”. When someone likes or comments on a social media post.
And of course, since we have not tried to slow down the pace at all, even at the cost of burnout for business owners and their team members, we believe everything has to be answered immediately. Or else!
Or else, what? is the question we should be asking.
Allowing all these interruptions and enjoying the dubious honor of being busy doesn’t help you accomplish anything. It doesn't move your business forward. Worst of all, you’re allowing other people to dictate your schedule – which was one of the reasons you didn’t want to work for anyone else.
But now, everyone else’s agenda runs your schedule.
An email marketer whom you might not even know now has control of your time, because you dropped the work you were doing to read the email.
Your team members, rather than trying to solve problems themselves (which would help them develop personally and professionally), take control of your time by coming to you any time they want.
Some rando on social media commented on your post to promote themselves and their work, and you gave up your own time and agency to check the notification.
If all that’s cool with you, no one can help you be more productive or effective. You’re not giving yourself the time and space to truly focus on what matters. That means you will always be fighting fires and trying to catch up.
I’m not shaming or judging. This is the way it is, and if that’s OK with you, then have at it. (Bonus: you can stop reading right now!) If that’s not what you want, then it’s time to think about some of these cultural norms and decide how much of it you want to allow.
Blocking ALL distractions during your focus time (up to four hours a day) will turbocharge the amount of important work that you can accomplish in one day. The more distractions you let in and the more you do that runs counter to the way your brain wants to work, the less you’ll be able to do. However, a happy balance between the two might be what feels right to you.
More hours does not mean more results and does not improve time management
Certainly, if you add more hours to a computer or calculator, you’ll get more output. A computer working twice the hours will generate twice the results, assuming it’s charged or plugged into a power source. Machines can run 24/7 with minimal downtime for maintenance – but machines do need maintenance.
As do human brains and bodies, but we need a lot more on a regular basis in order to deliver peak performance. Up to a certain amount of time, you will get more results when you work more hours. If you’re currently working two hours a day and you double that to four, then you probably will see more output.
But after about six to eight hours, depending on how well you do with breaks and refreshing during the day, performance from the human brain drops. You’ll still get some output, but it will be lower quality. You’ll start to feel worse, and may use drugs (including caffeine and nicotine) to try to stay at capacity.
If you try to go for too long, you might end up with worse outcomes than if you had just stopped after six to eight hours of work and gone home. Better to spend time with loved ones and doing activities that you love once you’ve hit the wall.
That’s why it’s critical to understand how the human brain works, where it's different from machines, and how you can leverage yours. A machine will do the same job no matter what time of day it is (again, assuming charged/plugged in) but humans don’t work that way.
You get tremendous power from simply doing your important work during the time that your brain is best able to do it and ensuring that all other tasks are scheduled for a completely different time, when you don’t need your brain to be at its sharpest. E.g. meetings, emails, phone calls, socializing.
The sequence of work affects productivity in the workplace
Machines can do a bunch of different tasks in any order because switching from one to another doesn’t cause energy drain like it does in human beings. We didn’t start working crazy hours until the Industrial Revolution, so there was no need for our brains to rapidly shaft back and forth between a variety of tasks while we were developing as a species.
That’s why every time you go from one task to another, it’s tiring for the brain. It’s much easier for the brain to work on similar tasks rather than flipping around between different ones.
In other words it’s not just inefficient but draining for you to read emails as they come in. If you’re working on a task, drop it when that email notification pings, then go back to it, then pick up the phone, then go back to an email, and so on, you’re really draining the energy your brain has for the day.
One of the biggest cultural norms is literally impossible, and yet people still talk about it. I’m referring, of course, to multitasking. That’s when you’re trying to do two cognitively demanding tasks at the same time. For example, listening to a speaker on stage or even an audiobook while you’re trying to check your email.
Listening to an audiobook while you’re doing chores isn’t “multitasking”, because chores aren’t usually cognitively demanding. Wearing different “hats” as an entrepreneur isn't multitasking, unless you’re trying to jam two of those hats on your head at the same time.
Actual multitasking isn’t possible. Researchers have looked into the brain to see what’s happening and the brain is switching between the two tasks rapidly. Which is of course draining. You might feel like you’re multitasking because the switches are happening so fast, but you’re not.
The other thing that’s happening is that you don’t have your full focus on either task. They will both take longer when you’re trying to multitask than if you paid full attention to one and then worked on the other.
So let go of the idea that you either can or should be multitasking. Your brain wants you to pay attention to what you’re doing. You can squeeze out more results when you batch similar tasks together.
Instead of answering emails as they come in, disable notifications during your focus time. All day is even better, but at the very minimum do it during the time you’ve set aside for your most important tasks. Choose specific times during the day that you’ll read and respond to them.
You can set up an autoresponder that lets the sender know you’ve received their email , which takes care of the immediacy for most people.
Instead of letting team members interrupt you during focus time, let them know that the door is closed. They need to wait until focus time is over. Or they can come in during designated “office hours” that you hold for the purpose of helping your team and answering any questions or issues they have.
Giving team members time to try to solve things on their own helps them build confidence and skills. If they truly are stuck, then they can come talk to you outside focus time. You can help them, just not during the time you’ve set aside for you to focus.
Take charge of your schedule. That doesn’t mean you’ll never help anyone or answer an email or return a call. It means that you do these things at appropriate times during the day. Yes, you’ll need to communicate these boundaries, especially if you haven’t had them before.
But letting go of the norms and practices that don’t serve you and your business are what set you up for accomplishing more at work and the resulting success.
Recap (tl;dr)
Being more productive means you have to let go of things that don’t serve the goals you have for you and your business. Understanding how your brain works, which is not the same way as a machine works, will help you better leverage what you’ve got and let go of the things that hold you back.
Do you feel like you can (and maybe should) get more done as a business owner, but don’t know where to find the time? I can help. Click here to schedule your free consultation.