During her early thirties, Tanya Dalton was in the midst of establishing her first company while juggling 12 to 14-hour workdays and the responsibility of raising her two young children.
Amidst the familiar struggle of attempting to manage her busy life through extensive to-do lists and a packed calendar, Dalton had a realization – something was amiss. She found herself growing exhausted, drained, and puzzled about her persistent dissatisfaction. “I would lay down at night and feel like, ‘Why didn’t I achieve more?'” she shares.
A pivotal moment came when she reacted with unexpected anger towards her husband for spending an extra five minutes in the car, listening to a radio program, after returning from work. Reflecting on this incident, Dalton recognized that her frustration wasn’t directed at her husband, but rather at her inability to grant herself even a brief respite amidst her chaotic daily routine. “I wouldn’t allow myself five minutes to enjoy the radio,” she admitted.
This revelation prompted Dalton to embark on a journey of deconstructing and reshaping her existing workflow methods. Now, six years later, she follows a schedule that has her working until 3 p.m. on Mondays through Thursdays.
As the founder and former CEO of inkWELL Press, a company that offers planners, Dalton has transitioned into advising businesses on optimizing productivity. Remarkably, she takes every Friday off, maintaining a 30-hour work week. Rather than hindering her progress, this compressed schedule has enabled her to write and publish two books, notably “The Joy of Missing Out” in 2020, and has solidified her reputation as a sought-after productivity consultant and speaker.
Throughout her journey, Dalton has gained insight into which productivity strategies truly yield benefits and which are mere fleeting trends and distractions from genuine enhancements in work quality.
Here are her top three recommended strategies to enhance productivity, as well as the ones she believes are worth letting go of:
Trade your Pomodoro timer for actual breaks
The Pomodoro technique, a widely popular time-management strategy endorsed by figures like Tom Hanks, is known for its alleged enhancement of work output.
The approach involves setting a timer for 25 minutes of concentrated work, followed by a five-minute break. This cycle is repeated four times before culminating in a 20-minute break.
Today, various productivity apps and websites are built around the Pomodoro technique. However, Tanya Dalton holds the viewpoint that it has inherent flaws, as most individuals cannot readily switch their focus on and off.
Dalton emphasizes that a significant drawback is the time wasted when switching back to a focused state after getting distracted. It typically takes about 23 minutes to re-enter a productive state after being interrupted. Consequently, just when ideas start flowing and a state of deep concentration is achieved, the timer signals an interruption.
Contrary to this, Dalton proposes the allocation of more substantial time blocks for work, consequently allowing for more extended periods of rest. She suggests working for 60 to 90 minutes, with a maximum of two hours, before taking a break. This approach provides the mind ample time to enter the coveted “state of flow,” where high-quality work is produced, and it also allows for sufficient recovery.
It’s important to note that Dalton acknowledges the absence of a “magic formula” or universally applicable method for optimizing productivity. She asserts that individuals should heed their personal cues, recognizing when their focus is diminishing.
Dalton underscores that rest is not just a luxury but a requisite for producing exceptional work.
Measure your productivity in tasks not hours
One of the prevalent misconceptions about productivity, according to Dalton, revolves around society’s steadfast adherence to the 40-hour work week.
“The number 40 holds no inherent magic,” she asserts. Dalton urges a shift in focus away from monitoring the hours team members spend at their desks and instead emphasizes the importance of evaluating the quality of their work. She underscores the significance of defining success criteria more precisely.
Upon revising her own work approach, Dalton swiftly recognized that an overloaded 40-hour work week wasn’t essential to accomplishing her most crucial tasks. She acknowledges that while to-do lists and meticulously planned schedules provided a sense of accomplishment, each ticked-off item produced a small “dopamine hit,” these practices ultimately hindered genuine productivity.
The reason for this, Dalton explains, is that the brain tends to gravitate towards the simplest tasks on the list, leading to procrastination of more challenging yet often more significant tasks.
To address this issue, Dalton suggests discarding conventional to-do lists and adopting what she terms a “priority list.” This list comprises only five to seven tasks, meticulously arranged based on their level of importance. The approach might result in completing fewer tasks overall, but it ensures that the truly vital items are successfully checked off. In fact, this method could potentially lead to completing tasks in a shorter time frame by eliminating less important, easier tasks.
According to Dalton, this transition aligns with the idea of shifting the focus away from time constraints and back towards task-driven productivity.
Check in regularly
Amidst the whirlwind of her 70-hour workweeks, Dalton failed to recognize that she was hurtling towards burnout, a distressingly common occurrence in the modern workplace. This realization prompted her to intentionally incorporate self-assessment into her productivity regimen.
Regularly scheduling a personal reflection session has become a cornerstone of Dalton’s routine. Every quarter, she dedicates time to evaluate her current state and preferences. She contemplates the pace of her schedule, the balance between her family and work life, and contemplates potential adjustments for the upcoming quarter.
These check-ins have proven invaluable in shedding light on the imbalances that had infiltrated her life, with work overshadowing her family commitments. Recognizing that she was neglecting her children’s needs compelled her to establish distinct time boundaries and structure her 30-hour work week.
The significance of this practice is profound, as it empowers Dalton to take greater control over her life’s trajectory. It allows her to assume the role of the decision-maker rather than merely a passive participant, imbuing her with a sense of agency.
In essence, this proactive approach to self-assessment empowers Dalton to be the captain of her own journey, rather than merely a passenger on a predetermined route.
Source: cnbc.com