Displaying All Posts tagged with Disruptions

Boost Productivity: Kill These 3 Distractions

Boost Productivity: Kill These 3 Distractions

Have you ever been behind your computer, working away in the zone, when you hear a little “blurp” from a Facebook notification on one of your open browser tabs?

That’s the sound of DISTRACTION.

It could be a notification for an email, your cell phone ringing or even someone walking by your desk to chat.

So after you hear the Facebook “blurp,” you stop working and go to Facebook to watch a funny cat video you were tagged in. Then you hit the feed.

You lose track of time and attention, and the next thing you know you’re late for your meeting. The work you were doing before that is now postponed and will have to wait for later.

Today I want to address the three biggest distractions standing in your way of doing real work and how to avoid them.If you want to start using time efficiently, improve your office productively and challenge yourself to break these habits, read on! Click Here to Read Article …

How to be Productive and Still Get 8 Hours Sleep

How to be Productive and Still Get 8 Hours Sleep

Yes, you read that right. Productive people sleep eight hours a day. They also watch tv, go to wine tastings and perform sun salutations in the morning.

Productive people don’t have more hours in the day. Nor do they live perfect lives. What they do well is use their time effectively.

Here’s what I learned from years of going to graduate school while holding a full time job as a journalist and still having a life: Click Here to Read Article …

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5 Productivity Tools for the Busy Freelancer

5 Productivity Tools for the Busy Freelancer

Do you struggle for productivity? I, for one, find it hard to stay focused and productive all the time. It is often easy to lose focus with a ton of buzzing social networks all around us. But the good news is there are tricks and tools to overcome distractions and constantly stay on track of productivity.

Here are 5 great apps I am using every day to efficiently manage my time online. They all help me to get tasks done faster than before. What’s more, their interface and design is super slick so finding your way around these tools shouldn’t take long. Click Here to Read Article …

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Do You Have an Intern from Hell?

Ah, summertime in the northern hemisphere!

If your company takes on interns this is the time of year where you’ve got your share of college kids walking around the office in their only pair of crumpled slacks and inappropriate shoes.

By the average office standards, my “intern shoes” weren’t exactly inappropriate. But by the standards of my employer, a Madison Avenue boutique public relations firm, my shoes and the rest of my wardrobe were offensively unfashionable. But this was the least of their worries. I officially became the intern from hell on the day I unintentionally mixed up the press clippings from 2 brands that had very similar names – let’s call them Soda and Soda A. There were hundreds of clippings! I realized this soon after I ended my contract (as opposed to my contract being ended for me);it must have taken my supervisors quite a while to sort out everything.

How about you, have you been an intern from hell or have you had one in your office? Click Here to Read Article …

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Where Do You Work Best?

Some people need absolute, morgue-like silence to get real work done. Others are content to type away amidst chaos like chattering coworkers or screaming kids. As a work-at-home freelancer, I love being able to vary my work environment. It was tough when I had roommates who watched TV in my “office” (also a corner of the living room), but I managed to bang out dozens of articles, blog posts, and copywriting assignments.

Now I alternate between rocking out to show tunes in my home office (blissfully devoid of coworkers or kids) or heading to the library or a coffee shop to change things up and be among other people. I’ve even been known to type on the subway with my netbook, but that’s far from ideal for me.

What about you? What’s your ideal work environment? Does silence make you nervous? Do you need a little background noise? Or do you prefer peace and quiet? Click Here to Read Article …

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World Cup Productivity Watch

Except in the United States (for the most part), the World Cup is a huge deal.  My brother, for example, works for an American multinational in Brazil and the company had to bring in TV sets for workers to watch games lest half the office be out sick on game days.  It’s just the way it is there – we love football – and foreigners doing business with Brazil just need to adjust.  But if you’re the person trying to get some information from my brother while he and his co-workers are watching a game, you might get frustrated.  Who cares if they’ll make up for the work later, you need the numbers now!

So, is the World Cup affecting your work?  If so, how are you dealing with it? Click Here to Read Article …

Multitasking: Friend or Foe?

Recently, Harvard Business Review blogger David Silverman wrote a piece in defense of multitasking. Studies have shown that constant computer use, jumping back and forth between email and news sites and Facebook can lower our attention spans, decrease our productivity, and stress us out. But Silverman argues that multitasking is inevitable – as important as air.

What do you think?

I’m guilty of multitasking, but I’ll usually take the task into account. When I’m sorting through paperwork or cleaning out my email box, then I’ll often listen to a podcast or have a movie on in the background to lighten the mood. But when I’m working on something to send to a client, I know it needs my full attention (but I’ll keep my email open in case I get an update that’s relevant to that project).

Do you focus on seeing one task through to completion or do you jump around? Do you batch process? Do you juggle multiple spreadsheets, Word docs, and browser windows or try to keep your monitor as simple and streamlined as possible?

Any opinions for or against multitasking? Click Here to Read Article …

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iPhone 4 Adds New Features – and New Distractions

Editor’s Note:  Peter North, one of WorkAwesome’s newest contributors, is at Apple’s WWDC all week.  He’ll provide little snippets for our readers to digest over the course of the week – to pass on what Apple and its developer community has to offer in terms of making all of us more productive.

Apple recently revealed some remarkable new features on the new iPhone 4. Some of the most noteworthy features include sharper images, faster processing, longer battery life and video conferencing. It could clearly be a an asset for increased productivity…or a debilitating source of endless distraction.

Its new innovations are as concerning as they are impressive. Video calls sound like a great tool, but are you ready for impromptu face-to-face conferences with your boss? Having a phone with a longer battery life, a sharper screen and more computing power sounds great, but is having a “pocket office” a gift of a curse?

A phone with a 40-hour battery life, an HD video camera and a screen with over a half million pixels is practically like having super powers in your pocket. But, as they say, “with great power comes great responsibility.” It could help you be more productive than you’ve ever been, but couldn’t it also turn you into a stressed, snarling super villain? Click Here to Read Article …

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