How to Boost Productivity at Work from Home with a Click
Work from Home is very overwhelming with no personal & work boundaries. As a result, lousiness kicks in & we spent 10 hours to complete a 5-hour job. We can not deny that!
We sit down to work, start scrolling Instagram (social media), or take odd-hour showers and naps. We all do that.
But don’t we hate how the maximum of our day just passes by & almost every task is incomplete? So, we spend more hours trying to decode “How to Boost productivity”? Honestly speaking, there is no productivity hack, magic, or secret.
We all have limited hours & endless to-do lists. You just need the right practices & tools to reach your goals. Imagine that feeling of striking all the tasks complete & left with time to spare. Wow! Goosebumps.
So, how about a deep dive into best productivity practices & tools?
Best Practices & Tools to Increase Productivity at Work from Home
It all starts by building a lifestyle. No, you don’t need to wake up at 4, get into hustle mode to be productive. Just instill these habits & changes to get on the top of your long to-do list.
Plan your Day Ahead
The key to increasing productivity is having a plan for the next day. We all read quotes like:
“Planning a journey without a map is like building a house without drawings.”
It’s as simple as making a timetable we use to make in school. But, we need more flexibility and utility.
- Start your day by jotting down all the tasks you need to get done in a day.
- Then, specify the time required to complete them.
- Now on a sheet or some application arrange these tasks to fill in your day. This acts like your productivity planner.
So, does that mean I need to spend another hour planning my day? Absolutely not!
Firstly, It does not take that much time. Secondly, we have many applications and tools for assistance. One of them is Any.do, which helps in creating to-do lists. Additionally, you could integrate with google calendar & encounter a streamlined experience.
However, if you use Trello for personal workflow management, you could use Planaway. It comes as a chrome extension where you add Trello cards & get a calendar view. Our team uses it for planning their weeks while keeping the tasks synced with Trello.
Moreover, We recommend using applications like Due. If you are one of those with a long list of tasks & need to multitask, Due will be your best friend. It is a reminder application with auto snooze, repetitive tasks, concurrent timer features. Additionally, It comes in many themes.
Email Management
An average professional spends 28% of their day juggling through email, McKinsey research shows. Are you one of those? Well, we all are. We check emails, open one, keep staring screen, think of replying later, forget, and there is a loop we all know.
So, email management or inbox zero concepts help us in productivity improvement. But how?
- Don’t Procrastinate. Instead, either schedule, delegate, delete or do it right away.
- Use folders, filters, tags, labels to organize your emails & prioritize the crucial ones.
- Use the right tools like Spark, which provides email prioritization, noise reduction, and advanced email tools.
Organize your Work Space Effectively
An organized workspace helps in clearing the mind and increasing motivation. (Unless you are one of the mess lovers who need mess to work) Well, the organization does not restrict to your work table or room. But, the way you organize your work and personal data will impact overall efficiency.
So, what is the solution? Choose a single platform to arrange all the notes and important data. Instead of balancing many applications, pick one and stick to it.
Our Pick? Workflowy and Notion. Both of them help with data organization & collaboration at the same time.
Yes, We have google suite to support all of it as well. But, Both the applications provide much more:
- Supports web, iOs, and android
- Allows search within documents
- Upholds kanban boards and live copy (sync text at multiple places)
- Sharing with an instant link without any login
Well, we love both equally. This website is also Notion made without any coding!
Enhance Team Collaboration & Project Management
Don’t we hate when someone else’s delay leads to work interruptions? So, it becomes essential to have a framework & standardized platform to boost team productivity. It requires assigning, working together, reporting, and collaborating.
Yes, there are some practices, but without a powerful application or tool, it is impossible. The constant back and forth via email or phone calls is not a sustainable method. So, here are the top 3 picks for team collaboration and project management to boost team productivity.
The first one is Freedcamp. It helps in team management, from streamlining projects, processes, workflows to tracking time and issues. It supports Kanban board, subtasks, Gantt chart, and private tasks.
Although the maximum of the features are free, some require a paid subscription. It has much more features like creating invoices, project templates, backups, storing contacts, etc.
The next on the list is Doodle. It is not for project management. But it will help in scheduling meetings. Isn’t it irritating when we have to go back & forth with emails to meet up and fix a time?
Well, Doodle helps exactly with that. Whether you need to tackle the problem of time or time zones, Doodle fixes it while keeping your calendar private. Be it 1:1 meeting or group meetings, integrate with google calendar, ms teams, zoom, zapier, and start working.
The last one but definitely something we love is Monday.com. The application builds productive workflows on one platform entirely. Plan, Track, deliver! Do it all together in minutes.
Monday.com provides integration with many applications like Mailchimp, Shopify, Facebook, Google suite, monkey survey, slack, ms teams, LinkedIn, HubSpot tools, dropbox, etc. It comes with various automation and viewing options. It is technically a one-stop shop for team collaboration and project management.
Last Word?
Best productivity tips, hacks, tools will not work until you make changes. “You” need to organize your work lifestyle. Dedicated hours with efficient practices are the biggest secrets to productivity at work from home.
Want to increase productivity? Make tweaks here and there, and follow them religiously. Focus on one task at a time.
Our team was able to work much more with a proper planner and a streamlined workflow. Here is a sum-up of all the productivity tools:
- Any.do: To-do list; Productivity planner
- Planaway: Trello power-up for team collaboration & calendar view
- Due: Daily reminders
- Spark: Email management
- Workflowy: Note-taking & collaboration tool
- Notion: Digital Note Making & Collaborating
- Freedcamp: Project management and streamlining projects
- Doodle: collaborative scheduling app
- Monday.com: Team Collaboration; Streamline workflows
So, which of these practices or tools are you going to use today.
