Improve your Productivity Through Morning Isolation
April 24th, 2007 by Michael Petrov
Have you ever had the feeling of being on a roll, the world aligned with you, and creative thoughts are flowing directly from the frontal lobe into your fast moving fingers. The adrenaline has kicked in, you feel unstoppable! Just a bit more of this, and by the end of today you will have finished that project that has been lingering on for 3 months, with time left over for a peaceful evening… Then the unthinkable happens, yes it is the dreaded ringing of your phone, a ring later you see the caller id and recognize it as one of your top prospects - you pick up the phone…
We are all too familiar with what happens next: a short conversation ensues and you have another project lined up, you feel good and productive. Then you go back to the 3 month old project and get back into writing the code, ahh yes, that project you felt so good about just a few minutes back. By now the adrenaline rush is long gone, your inbox has new messages, and it’s time for lunch. What could have been a couple of productive hours ended up being 30 minutes of productivity and then a wasted morning.
Can that situation be avoided?
I find that personally I work best between 7am to about noon on tasks that require lengthy concentration such as writing code or long documents. Therefore I have made a series of rules for myself in order to help me use that time each day, ensuring profitable and enlightening workflow:
- do not schedule meetings before noon (exceptions are clients overseas)
- do tech support calls and forum postings after 2 pm
- minimize internal communication in the mornings, let everyone be productive
- during the morning, avoid checking the email more than once an hour, and even then addressing and responding to only the emergencies
This might go against the widely cited principle of the customer comes first and being always available to accept new business. However, without having a system in place and time to work productively, serving customers becomes meaningless when your projects perpetually stall.
Please use the comments to share your time management and communication techniques that allow you to maximize productivity!