The Ultimate Guide to Personal Productivity

Personal Productivity is an elusive creature. We are constantly pushing ourselves to be productive, increase productivity, stay in the zone, and get things done.

But somehow, no matter how much we do, we often never reach the finish line – and that is both stressful and frustrating.

This situation is often referred to as a treadmill – where you never really reach your destination.

If you are ready to get off this endless ride and start accomplishing things, then this guide is for you.

As a productivity consultant, it is a process that I teach to clients with good results. And you can use it for any aspect of your life:

The strategy is simple:

• Set long term goals for the different areas of your life
• Identify the most pressing goal
• Commit to doing the work
• Work with your big goal to create an actionable plan
• Prioritize your actions so that you are working on the ones that deliver the biggest results
• Be consistent in your effort and use strategies like time blocking
• Eliminate distractions
• Regularly evaluate your progress and adjust accordingly
• Stay organized to avoid repetitive action
• Create systems and habits for other areas of your life

In theory, I know the process sounds a lot easier than it actually is, so I am going to go into each step in more detail and offer up some tips that can help you to stay the course.

Before we dive in, I want to say that a lot of these concepts are covered in depth in one of my favorite personal productivity books called The ONE Thing by Gary Keller and Jay Papasan. If you have a chance it is a very informative and easy read. You can see my book review of The ONE Thing here and also explore other titles in my personal productivity library here.

Set Long Term Goals for the Different Areas of Your Life

You may be used to setting goals for your work life. Depending on where you work, this might be easy because you are accountable to other people. 

But when it comes to the other areas of your life, setting formal goals may seem unusual. We all have these goals like “I want to lose weight.” or “I want to clean out the garage.” in the back of our minds but without creating an actionable plan, these projects just stay on the back burner.

So at this initial planning stage of the personal productivity process, set a timer for an hour, and brainstorm all of the projects that you have collected in your mind for the different compartments of your life. Here are a few of the typical ones – but you may have other areas you want to focus on as well:

• Work
• Home
• Social
• Health
• Finances
• Family

Be sure to set your timer for this exercise because your list can become endless. For me, it’s like turning on a faucet, the ideas just start flowing and suddenly I am overwhelmed by all the things that I need to do.

Identify Your Most Pressing Goal

The next step is to identify your most pressing goal – and this is the hard part. There are so many areas that need your time and attention but realistically you can only focus on one at a time.

Trying to do more than one thing at the same time is a recipe for failure.

However, it doesn’t mean that things are mutually exclusive. You can certainly exercise regularly and work towards your health goal  even if your main priority is an important work project.

The distinction is that if you choose your work project as your most pressing goal, then you are prioritizing your time and attention towards accomplishing that goal and exercising becomes a routine and habit outside of work hours.

Let’s flip the script and say that exercising is your main goal. Then you would focus on intensifying your efforts towards exercise and have your work schedule run on autopilot.

It’s a fine line and very slight distinction but when you recognize where you need to focus then you are not trying spread your attention equally to all the things going on in your life.

The benefits of this thought process is that you will see the success in what you focus on much quicker and once you achieve that, you will free up mental space to focus on the next most pressing thing.

Commit To Doing The Work

At this point most personal productivity guides will have you jump right in with planning out  your strategy for accomplishing your most pressing goal. But I actually have you take a step back at this point  and ask yourself if you are seriously ready to commit to accomplishing this goal.  Because if your heart is only half in it – you won’t stick to it.

Be honest with yourself here. Are you in a position to put in the time and effort needed to make significant progress on a consistent basis.

For example, if your goal is to lose weight – are you ready to create and stick to an exercise routine and a healthy meal plan? If you are leaving on your dream vacation tomorrow – maybe the exercise goal is not the best one to focus on right now.

It is important to think it through before you start.

A good exercise here is to make a quick list of the reasons why you are ready to commit to this goal, and a second list of what might get in your way.

Dive Deep With Your Big Goal and Create an Actionable Plan

Once you have made a commitment to your goal – it is time to pick it apart and dive in deep.

You may have heard of the SMART Goal framework (if you are not familiar, you can read more about how to set SMART goals here). This is an excellent framework that you can use to make your most important goal actionable.

In a nutshell – for a goal to be SMART, it must be:

• S – Specific
• M – Measurable
• A – Actionable
• R – Relevant or Realistic 
• T – Time Bound

So, now it’s time for  you to take your big goal that you have identified and make it real. 

For example, “I want to lose weight” is not a good goal – it is not SMART.

To make that goal smart you need to define your parameters more like this:

 “I want to lose 10 pounds by the first of the coming year. To do this, I will exercise for at least one hour at least 4 times per week on M, W, F, and Sunday.. Two days will be aerobic exercise and 2 days are strength training. On the weekdays I will go to the gym at 5pm on my way home from work. And on Sundays I will go at 9am. I will also plan healthy meals and meal prep every Sunday. I will make my meal plans on Saturday morning and go to the grocery store on my way home from the gym on Sundays. After lunch I will do my meal prep.”

That goal is very specific. You could even drill it down further if you want.

One of the big advantages to having such a detailed plan is that you know immediately if something gets in the way and you can adjust accordingly.

If friends want to go out for happy hour on Friday – you can easily say no because you have an appointment with yourself to work out. Or you can say yes, and adjust your workout schedule to hit the gym on Thursday or Saturday instead.

Take your biggest goal and break it down using the Smart Goals framework.

Work backwards – at what point in the future can you realistically expect to accomplish your goal? What do you have to finish by the end of each month to get there? What do you have to finish by the end of each week to hit your goal for the month? Each week? And down to each day?

Now you know exactly what to do today to get you closer to where you want to be a year from now.

Prioritize Your Actions

Not all goals are as straightforward as an exercise goal.

Most goals have multiple steps and multiple courses of action. When a goal has a lot of moving parts, it is hard to know what to work on first.

This is why prioritizing your actions is so important. You want to make sure that you are putting your biggest effort into the items that are going to give you the biggest results.

For example, one of my goals is to grow my website. There are many things that I can do to spread the word that I exist here on the internet. However, to simplify,  the most important thing is adding content that is relevant and useful to my readers. Unfortunately, at least for me, this is also one of the most time consuming and tedious parts of having a website.

I would much rather play around on social media or tweak my website logo or colors – neither of which is a good use of my time. Yes, social media and web design are things that I need to do – but they are secondary and can be either be done at lesser productive times of day or possibly even hired out.

When you only have 24 hours in a day – you must be extremely disciplined and strict with yourself on how you use your time.

This is not a new concept – Arnold Bennett wrote a very insightful book called How to Live on 24 Hours A Day – back in 1910. And many of the concepts still apply today! You can read my book review of How to Live on 24 Hours A Day here and see it along with other titles on my personal productivity bookshelf here.

Be Consistent in Your Effort

It goes without saying that in order to accomplish your goals, you have to put in consistent effort and work at them.

Some goals like weight loss are highly personal – only you can do the exercise or eat the right foods.

Other goals may require involvement from other people. But you still need to put in the time to manage the process.

In the book The ONE Thing, Keller and Papasan say that a good rule of thumb is to put in 4 hours a day on your big goal to make significant progress. This is very goal specific and especially comes into play if you are trying to build a business or acquire a new skill. 

But the more time you put in, the quicker you will get to the finish line.

The thing that will trip you up are all the distractions in life. So be judicious with your time. Make sure you set aside adequate time daily to work on your goal. During this time – stay focused and eliminate any distractions.

Once your focused work time is over, give yourself permission to deal with everything else.

I have a lot of difficulty with this step in an unusual reverse way. I get so involved in working towards my goal that I don’t stop at the designated time and keep working. Then the everything else starts to pile up and eventually the day comes where I cannot work on my goal because the everything else is too pressing.

So, not only is it important to stay focused during the time allotted – it is also important to stop and deal with everything else so you can pick up where you left off tomorrow.

Time Blocking Exercise

Time blocking is a great strategy to keep yourself on track. You can do this on a blank sheet of paper or using a daily planner.

Simply look at the day ahead and block out your non negotiable items – work or appointments that cannot be changed. Then identify the most ideal time for you to work on your goal. 

Lastly, use any remaining available time to schedule in your everything else.

This system works especially well to help you set up a regular schedule for each day of the week. The more your day to day schedule becomes predictable, the more likely you are to stay focused.

Eliminate Distractions

Distractions, even welcome ones, are the biggest things that will get in the way of your progress.

A coworker stopping by your desk, a call from an old friend, a ping from an email landing in your inbox, a trip to the coffee maker – all of these things that should only take a minute can end up keeping you away from your goal work for an hour. Your attention wanders and it is a little harder to get back into the zone.

As I was writing this article, my husband came by and asked me about some plans we have coming up – and just like that, I was headed down a rabbit hole.

Thankfully, I was able to pull myself out and refocus. But this situation highlights the fact that we need to be uncompromising in our commitment to our goals. Other people will be all too happy to pull us  away to help them solve whatever it is that they need help with. And sometimes we are all too happy to do it – because we are tired of doing the hard work at hand.  

I am not heartless, and I am not saying you shouldn’t help – but often their request is not urgent and you can simply ask if you can help them at a bit of a later time after your work is done. 

Examine your motivation for wanting to help them in the moment – are you looking for a welcome distraction? 

Evaluate Your Progress Regularly

As you start working towards your important goal, it is important to take a step back and evaluate your progress on a regular basis – at least do this weekly.

Are you on track, ahead of schedule, or falling behind? Does your plan need to be tweaked? What did you work on during the week past – did those actions get you closer to where you want to be? What can you do better and what should you work on next week?

These are all questions to ask yourself consistently. You need to keep your eye on the prize and make sure you are headed in that direction.

Stay Organized to Avoid Repetitive Action

I mention this here because a lot of what we do is repetitive and can be streamlined to save us time.

Have you ever looked up a website that you might need to revisit and not bookmarked it? It is so frustrating having to search for the article over again.

Or have you created a note or document on your computer and can’t figure out where you saved it?

To save yourself time in the pursuit of your goals, create a reliable system for organizing your work.

Whatever tools you use – online or off,  make sure you devise an easy way for you to find your work.

I use an app called Standard Notes that works with the way my brain thinks. With everything in one place, I know exactly where to go to find my research.

At the end of the day, staying organized will save you huge amounts of time.

Create systems and habits for other areas of your life

Finally, as you work towards your goal, create systems and habits so the rest of your life can run smoothly as well.

Morning routines, nighttime routines, cleaning routines, can all help you to knock out the mundane day to day stuff that also must get done.

Personal Productivity Is About Prioritization

In my mind personal productivity all boils down to setting priorities.

You create a list of goals but give priority to only one at a time.

Then you make a list of actions and prioritize the ones that have the biggest impact.

You prioritize your goal work over everything else.

Then you evaluate your progress to assess if you are prioritizing the right things.

Where you choose to aim your focus is what you end up accomplishing.

I hope you find this Personal Productivity Guide to be helpful on your journey to accomplishing your most important goals.