how to be more productive | List Producer

A Scientifically-Proven Recipe For Achieving More

April 9, 2017/0 Comments/in Benefits of List Making, Increase Productivity, Learning With a List, List Making, Tool for Success, Webinar/by Paula Rizzo

Think back to your most productive day this past week. Now ask yourself: On that morning, what did you do differently?

What did you eat for lunch that afternoon? What strategies did you use to silence distractions, eliminate procrastination, and stay focused all day long?

The truth is, most of us don’t pay nearly enough attention to our daily routine.

But what if you knew precisely the right formula? What if you had a scientifically-proven recipe for achieving top performance? What if you could bottle that one perfect day, and uncork it at will?

If you’ve ever wondered how you can take your performance to the next level, I have something that I know you’re going to love. It’s an incredible event called the Peak Work Performance Summit, and I’ve been excited about it for months. Read more

Eat The Frog to Get More Done

April 2, 2017/4 Comments/in Decision Making, Fellow List Producers, Increase Productivity, Reduce Stress, Saving Time, Tool for Success/by Paula Rizzo

Do you ever get that feeling when you first wake up, the fear of knowing that today you have to do THAT task.

The thing you’ve been putting off for weeks now and the deadline has finally arrived. Maybe it’s paying your bills or deciding which contractor to sign with.

I’m a natural procrastinator myself so I will try to do these kinds of tasks at the last minute and if it has to be done on a particular day then you know I’ll be dreading it.

But there is another way.

A few weeks ago during my Listful Thinking MasterClass my web designer and media strategist Cass hosted my class because she has a very unique way of looking at productivity and I thought they would learn a lot from her. And they did! During Cass’s talk, while discussing the perils of procrastination, she explained her belief that you have to “eat the frog”

What?

Eat the Frog is a productivity concept in which you do the tasks you want to do the least first. By getting the awful tasks out of the way your burden for the day is lifted and you can actually enjoy the remainder of it. And be more productive because you crossed off something that was looming large.

This simple concept really resonates with people and the fact that it frees up the rest of your day is a built in reward that encourages you to banish those procrastination habits!

Ok so what task will you use to Eat the Frog today?

Bringing Back “Old School” Productivity Hacks

March 5, 2017/0 Comments/in Benefits of List Making, Books, Decision Making, Home, Increase Productivity, Learning With a List, List Making, People, Reduce Stress, Saving Money, Saving Time, Tool for Success/by Paula Rizzo

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As technology gets more and more advanced, we tend to forget how we used to do things.

Think of how shocked kids are when they hear how you did homework before the internet. (No one appreciates the dewey decimal system anymore!)

But are we becoming too reliant on technology? While it certainly makes our lives more convenient, we now bypass certain steps that helped us to stay on top of our organizational game.

Here are some ways kickin’ it “old school” will make you more productive:

Remember the Typewriter – This old piece of tech is symbolic of a whole generation, you’d be hard pressed to find a black and white movie that doesn’t include a typewriter. One of the downsides to the typewriter was that if you made a mistake you had to start over again. As much of a pain as this may be it made you more conscious of what you were typing. Read more

Guide to Getting Last-Minute Tasks Done Right

February 12, 2017/0 Comments/in Apps, Benefits of List Making, Increase Productivity, Learning With a List, List Making, Reduce Stress, Saving Time, Tool for Success/by Paula Rizzo

Whether you make a regular habit of it, or you get caught unexpectedly and have to change plans – at some point we will all have a project or tasks that get left to the last minute. So how do you deal with these last minute changes? If you’re a person who’s used to having everything planned out well in advance, (like me) something like this can really throw you off your game.

But it doesn’t have to.

Even when it feels like it’s impossible to get everything done in time, you can still manage your time most effectively.

So what do you do? Read more

Why You Didn’t Get Everything Done Last Year and How to Change That

January 2, 2017/0 Comments/in Benefits of List Making, Decision Making, Happiness, Health, Holidays, Increase Productivity, Learning With a List, List Making, Tool for Success/by Paula Rizzo

The new year brings with it hope for the future but also a little guilt as well. Guilt because we look back at the previous year and think “oh I didn’t get to do as much as I set out to do.”

It happens and it’s disappointing. And nothing reminds us more of this than looking at that unfulfilled bucket list. Or starting yet another day with the best of intentions only to get sucked into your old roommate’s vacation photos on Facebook and then getting nothing done. We all promise ourselves that next year will be different.

However that’s quite statistically unlikely, given that only 8% of people achieve their resolutions!

So how do you break out of the vicious cycle? It’s all starts with how you make these goals. Here’ are the steps you need to finally cross off some of the most difficult tasks on your list!

Imagine next year’s Christmas letter – Every year people will send out Christmas letters detailingall the exciting trips they’ve been on t and all their new jobs/houses/kids/etc. Whether or not you regularly write one of these, productivity guru and author Laura Vanderkam explains in her TED talk about time management how you can use them to focus your goals. Laura suggests you imagine what you would write on next year’s letter today. That vision includes the 3-5 key things that would have to happen for it to be a successful year. Once you have picked those things you have goals for the next year – now you just need an action plan.

Prioritize – Once you’ve picked your goals you don’t need to roar ahead, all guns blazing trying to achieve everything at once. Write out the steps you will need to take to achieve each goal and create a priority list of what is more urgent. Things that need to be started on right away, like training for a marathon, take top priority. You will need to start carving out time in your calendar for training and book your place in the race. Less important things like cleaning out the garage can wait until a later date (but this doesn’t mean you should ignore them altogether!) For an easy way to figure out how to prioritize your new goals, sign up for the FREE PDF I created for you called “Prioritize Like a Pro.”

Find the why – I wrote recently about a talk Julie Morgenstern gave, where she explained how she always used to hoard cookbooks. And she couldn’t throw them away until she understood why she kept them. The reason — she kept them because they represented the mother she wanted to be. (Isn’t that heartbreaking?) Similarly you can’t successfully do-over your goals from last year until you understand why you failed. Perhaps they were too big, or you didn’t give yourself enough time to do any of them or any research that would have helped. Sometimes you have to realize that maybe you won’t ever do it and toss the goal all together. We’re not all perfect, sometimes you have to let go of those goals you’ve never quite gotten around to and be OK with it. I, for instance will never learn to speak French. That’s one goal checked off by default!

What are some of your goals for 2017?

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