Contract Worker - Freelancing Experiences

18 Ways to Stay Focused While Working, Part 2

by Rico on March 15th, 2007

This continues my discussion on Dave Cheong’s 18 Ways to Stay Focused at Work:

1. Find the best time to do repetitive and boring tasks. Yes, they are unavoidable. Just make sure you do them only after you’re done with everything that involves creativity. Because I’ve found that trying to come up with that kick-ass design is pretty hard after you’ve spent the last hour mindlessly encoding contact info.
2. Bring your lunch and have it at your desk. Dave Cheong suggests this is a great way to stay productive and avoid the momentum-breaking one hour break. But I’ve found that this is the perfect time to deal with urgent personal matters and to get the repetitive tasks out of the way.
3. Don’t make long personal calls. Exchanging mushy affectations with your girlfriend (something I do not do!) may be great, but it gets nothing done. Unless you’re a master multitasker, which I’m not.
4. Clean up your desk. I have to respectfully disagree. Conventional wisdom says a neat desk is crucial for productivity, but I’ve found a cluttered desk does the opposite. It keeps the mess is in front of me, not in my head.
5. Get a good chair. Thanks to a laptop, I can actually get some things done without a table. But only if I’m comfortable in my chair.
6. Use shortcuts on your computer. Everything I need to access regularly has its own shortcut right on my desktop and Start menu. I’m sure the same can be done on a Mac or Linux system.
7. Close programs you’re not using. Even my powerful laptop slows down when over twenty programs are open. And from my Mac experiences, even the vaunted Exposé becomes quite confusing when you have to sort through tens of thumbnails.
8. Limit time on Digg, Delicious, news sites and blogs. This also applies to Wikipedia. Following links are real fun, and before you know it, you’ve wasted an hour finding out that Robert Mugabe is somehow related to the Holy Roman Empire. Something nice to know, but not when you’re on a deadline.
9. Change your mindset and make work fun. You’re halfway there when you concentrate on what you really like doing.

What are your experiences with Dave Cheong’s great advice?

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POSTED IN: Great Advice, Ways to Work Faster