Productivity among all the G7 countries has deteriorated since the recession, but according to the ONS Britain was hit the hardest and it’s still struggling to catch up. Understandably, its poor performance has been a source of consternation to policymakers. But the problem is that nobody really knows whythe UK has done so badly at improving output per hour, which makes it tough to fix.
Whatever the reasoning behind the nation’s current state, some believe longer business hours and indeed working harder is the best method to increasing the Britains productivity once more. But is that truly the answer to our woes As it stands, more and more of us already find ourselves unable to juggle overwhelming demands and maintain a sustainable pace. As such, many look for hacks in order to afford more time and concentration, however, the simple fact is that theres not one single way to be productive.
Weve seen it all, with advice spanning around eating better and sleeping more, and while they they may work, we figured wed present you with some, well, controversial advice.
(1) Become the hulk one TED talker really said that and conquer your fears
Bren Brown once gave a TED talk called The Power of Vulnerability she’s not the one that mentioned the Hulk. While she may have first started talking about her fear of giving that very speech, her main message was that she was able to separate her fear from her abilities and didn’t let hesitation get the best of her.
Similarly, productivity guru Tim Farris maintained in a TED talk that by smashing fear, you could learn anything and in so doing boost your own productivity. He said: I want everyone to feel like the Incredible Hulk and do some smashing.
He explained that his knowledge of productivity grew in large part due to studyingParkinson’s Law, which claims “the perceived complexity of a task will expand to fill the time you allot it”. It means thatif you give yourself a week to complete a two hour task, then, psychologically speaking, the task will increase in complexity and become more daunting so as to fill a week. And while it may not fill the extra time with more work, you’ll gain extra stress and tension about having to get it done. This means stepping out of your comfort zone, and facing your fears is perhaps the best way to overcome them.
Shoma Morita, a Japanese psychiatrist also once claimed the key was to first give up and attempt it again: Is it accurate to assume that we must overcome fear to jump off the high dive at the pool, or increase our confidence before we ask someone out for a date If it was, most of us would still be waiting to do these things.”
As such, instead of trying to get motivated, embrace your fear, the negativity and dreading of doing the next task ahead.
(2) Do a little procrastinating
When the pressure from work hits it’s important to find time to do nothing at all. The purpose of doing nothing is to put your mind at rest, helping you to think clearer and be more efficient. It gives you the time you need to catch up with events and comprehend to whats really going on.
Lets face it, creativity runs out pretty quickly and at some point throughout the day exhaustion will catch up with you. This lack of creativity leaves you nothing to work with and you’ll end up pushing yourself too hard only to cause more damage. So when is it the best time to do nothing According to author James Altucher, you should avoid doing anything when you are angry, anxious or tired because thats when you are more likely to act on impulse and make mistakes.
This was highlighted byNassim Taleb in his book Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder,” in which he said throughprocrastination you could see whats really important.
And what do we do while procrastinating Watch cat clips on YouTube apparently but oddly enough this act too boosts productivity. Jessica Myrickof Indiana University’s Media Schoolclaimed even if people watched cat videos to procrastinate or while they should be working, the emotional pay-off actually helped them take on tough tasks afterward. In other words, watching cat videos couldmake you a force to be reckoned with in the office and it’s all because watching cats fall, chase things, or get humiliated by being dressed in shark suits, make us happy.
Cat videos will make your employees more productive No, really
(3) Cut back on your working hours
Working overtime doesnt mean that you are being more productive, it merely means that you are working more hours. In his book “Your Brain at Work”, author David Rock said the average office worker is interrupted every three minutes, and recovering from this disconnect is costly. In fact, it takes usAn average of 23 minutesto fully return to a task after an interruption. That being said, it comes as no surprise then that our brains arent wired to concentrate intensely for eight hours straight.
As such, economists have suspected for some time that longer work hours could eat into productivity. John Hicks, a British economist, suggested that probably it has never entered the heads of most employers that hours could be shortened and output maintained. He reasoned that with longer hours, output per hour would fall as by working overtime meant quickly losing energy.
The research of John Pencavelfrom Stanford University has also linked longer hours with absenteeismAnd employee turnover. And adding to the cycle of overwork is the fact that employees are trading sleep for work, which in turn isAproductivity killer.
This was further echoed in Tony Schwartz book The Power of Full Engagement , where he said: You should learn how to manage your energy, not your time.
Read on to find out how learning to draw toast could increase your productivity.
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(4) Learn how to ignore things
As was suggested, one of the reasons it’s so difficult to stay focused is that humans are naturally prone to interruption. This was implied by Maggie Jackson in her book “Distracted: The Erosion of Attention and the Coming Dark Age”. She claimed people naturally jump to react to new information as a built-in survival instinct.
It’s a fact of life that we’re drowning in information, but there’s a trick people can use to ensure they quickly complete whatever it is they need to achieve: simply ignore things. That’s right, ignoring the background noise around you we don’t mean the people in your office is a tactic that increases productivity.
Despite previous studies having concluded that attempting to ignore irrelevant information will only hinder people more, it’s recently been suggested that when people are given time to learn what’s possible to ignore, they’re able to complete tasks faster and more efficiently. In fact, those explicitly ignoring distracting information improve their visual search performance, according toJohns Hopkins University’s latest research.
Read more about increasing productivity in your business:
- Here’s how you can plug your productivity gap
- How three UK firms upped productivity with three simple investments
- Seven time-saving apps entrepreneurs use to boost productivity
Although trying to disregard distractions might initially slow people down, the researchers concluded that over time, people are more efficient when they know what’s not worth paying attention to. The ability to ignore is a key part of the ability to pay attention.
(5) Try to get rejected a few times
Welcome being rejected, according to John Hopkins University’s Sharon Kim, who claimedsocial rejection can inspire imaginative thinking. She said: Were seeing in society a growing concern about the negative consequences of social rejection, thanks largely to media reports about bullying that occurs at school, in the workplace, and online. Obviously, bullying is reprehensible and produces nothing good. However, exclusion from a group can sometimes lead to a positive outcome, such asgreater creativity.
In order to prove this, she carried out some research involving two groups people each beinggiven a set of personality type questions. They were told, that they might be considered for future exercises again. When both groups returned two weeks later, the first one was told to complete a few tasks before joining the next group. The other group was being told to complete tasks, but wouldnt join the next group again.
They needed to complete RAT tasks, whereby which they got a few unrelated words like cottage/swiss/cake and needed to combine each one with the same word to build a useful connection. For example: cottage cheese , swiss cheese and cheese cake .
The people who were rejected consistently outperformed those that were included. And those, that were labeled as independent by the researchers outperformed everyone else even more in the tasks.
(6) Scrap digital meetings and instead use post-it notes and learn how to draw toast
One Poll research revealed while companies that plan with the use of post-it notes are the most disorganised, the post-it note can fundamentally increase the creativity and collaboration of your team, as well as boost your company’s innovation and productivity.
In his book, “Change by Design”, Ideo CEO Tim Brown recommended the post-it as the perfect tool for brainstorming. He specifically proposed brainstorming sessions, during which each idea is written on a single post-it note and then stuck to a wall. Each participant is then given a stack of post-its and told to stick a note on each idea they like. The ideas that accumulate the most post-it votes progress to the next stage. This process continues until consensus emerges.
Furthermore, Tom Wujec, a fellow at 3D entertainment software firm Autodesk, allegedly stumbled across a simple design exercise that helps people understand and solve complex problems by drawing toast. Most drawings, he claimed, have nodes and links. Nodes represent the tangible objects like the toaster and people, and links represent the connections between the nodes. And it’s the combination of links and nodes that produces a full systems model, which presents how we think something works. What’s interesting about these systems models is how they reveal our various points of view.
Now imagine if you were to drawsomething more relevant or pressing, like your organisational vision, or customer experience, or long-term sustainability There’s a visual revolution that’s taking place as more organisations are addressing their wicked problems by collaboratively drawing them out. Clearly, those who see their world as movable nodes and links really have an edge.
(7) Dont visualise your goals
Ironically, visualising your goals actually makes youless likely to achieve them, according toAForbesArticle. It cited research from Heather KappesAndGabriele Oettingen, who had published their findings in theJournal of Experimental SocialPsychology. Itsuggested that not only was positive visualisationineffective, it wascounterproductive.
By imagining yourself attaining a certain goal, you unintentionally trick your mind into thinking youve already accomplished it. Of course, if your brain thinks youve already reached your goal, your motivational switch is going to get turned off.
Positive fantasies of success drains the energy out of ambition,” they said.
Instead, keep your goals to yourself and in your head. There is also a Ted Talk by Derek Siverson the subject of not telling others what you hope to accomplish, presenting research dating back to the 1920s.