3 Simple Steps To Increase Your Productivity With Time Blocking

Time blocking is one of the most powerful approaches I am using to plan my time. I have also witnessed it working successfully in the lives of many other people. You too can try this approach to planning your weeks and days for greater results and less stress.

A time block is a pre-established amount of time scheduled into your daily plan to allow uninterrupted, focused work to be accomplished.

Why is Time Blocking effective?

1) Enough time to complete important tasks

People often don’t achieve results at the required level of quality, simply because they don’t plan in enough time for accomplishing a specific task. They usually plan many things into the day, thus breaking the day into smaller, more ineffective periods.

2) Improved focus and quality

To creatively solve problems or accomplish an important task, a person often needs a larger block of uninterrupted time, as smaller periods of time are simply not enough for the required focus.

Without distractions during a specific block of time, your mind stays focused, which leads to faster completion and better quality.

3) Less stress

By scheduling blocks of time in advance, you keep making steady, daily progress on the highest priorities instead of procrastinating or stressing out about important projects and tasks at the last minute. (Related post: 5 Effective Steps To Reduce Stress And Avoid Burnout)

4) Improved overall results

The fact that you accomplish the most important things each day and constantly move forward with them also helps you to reach your business goals or life goals faster.

How can you implement this in your life?

1) Divide your day into 3 major time blocks

I suggest you divide your day roughly into 3 major time blocks:

Most important tasks

This is the most important time of your day that needs to be protected and planned in, every day. Start with having one block of 1½ -2 hrs each day. You will see better results right away, whether you are CEO, department manager or just an employee.

During this time you focus on the most important tasks and priorities, difficult projects and complex issues, which also might include reviewing the big picture and your goals, designing preventive actions, etc.

Protect this time and do not allow any disctractions. Your mind needs to focus.

Routine and administrative tasks

There are many routine tasks that do not require much creative thinking, but completing them takes time. Checking and answering emails, returning calls, preparing reports, etc might be on the list.

Group as many similar activities together as possible, as you’re actually several times more productive when you can focus on one type of task rather than switching among different types of tasks.

Try to plan routine tasks into the part of the day when you are not as productive based on your individual biological rhythms.

Meetings

If you absolutely have to have a meeting, then as much as possible, try to schedule several meetings close together, eg., late afternoon or late morning. It will allow you to focus on meetings and not break your day into smaller, ineffective pieces.

2) Start each day with the “Most important tasks“ time block

This is your most important time period. Start your day with it. Find a place where nobody and nothing could distract you. Yes, even your boss From my experience as a CEO, usually there are very rarely urgent situations when your boss would need you right now and could not wait for 2 hrs when you are available. So, no worries Plus . . . if your boss is managing his/her schedule well, he/she is also focusing during this time, so he/she is not likely to be looking for you to respond to some crisis.

For example, John Reed, the former CEO of Citigroup, kept his office door closed from 7am to 10am every day, refusing to take any calls or visits until he opened his door.

After finishing your “Most important tasks” block you can do other things on your list and feel you had a great day, because the most important things are already done.

3) Schedule “flexibility” time and plan “fun” time after each block

Plan about 30 minutes of “flexibility” time after each block or every couple of hours. This will enable you to handle an emergency without adjusting your schedule.

Also, schedule in some “fun” activities between tasks to have a rest and switch your mind onto something enjoyable.

Try it out tomorrow for several days and see the positive impact it has on your days and how you feel Let me know in the comments how it worked for you.

A Recipe for Successful Data Analysis

Data is everywhere. Big data, micro-trend data, real time data, social-media and web tracking data - everyone is talking about it, and I get why.

The power of data is immense, and the desire to learn from your data is strong, but when faced with the mountain of data now available, it can sometimes be overwhelming. If you don’t know how to work with data you can feel like your sitting on the side lines of the big game, wishing you could play but not quite sure what to do.

To me, analyzing data is a lot like cooking a gourmet meal. It requires allot of prep work, and planning, you have to keep in mind your audience’s tastes, you need to test your ingredients and at the end of the day, its hard work. But like any good meal, the output is delicious, and better yet – no dishes to clean! So here is my step my step guide to gourmet data analysis.

1) Get to know your customers

Before you even plan the menu (i.e. analysis) – get to know your audience. You have to know their wants, their needs, and their challenges to plan an analysis that works for them. Just like cooking, if you serve someone something they are allergic to, or just plain don’t like, they will not take the time to really taste and consider your work.

2) Plan your output

This is one of the most important phases in the process. Taking the time before you even touch a data set to think about what you are trying to understand, and what problem you are trying to solve will save you when your head is stuck in a million rows of numbers. The plan will serve as your compass to help guide you when you feel like everything is getting very complicated by keeping you grounded in your objective and driving towards success.

3) Find for the right ingredients

Like any really good meal, the analysis you are doing may need a fair amount of “prep work”. In most businesses it is very rare that the data you need to get a full picture of the situation will sit with in one person’s, one department or even one countries data warehouses. Asking the right questions and chasing all the people you can to find what you need to will help differentiate your analysis and bring it from nice to know to need to know. Think of truffles – not exactly easy to find, but they add the perfect flavor to many gourmet meals.

4) Clean your tools

A grubby pan and a mealy tomato will make a very poor bolognaise sauce. The same goes for your data. Looking at your data and understanding your variables and how you need to structure your data sets will be vital to creating valid results. For example, if you have monthly data but need to look at overall y-o-y trends, it may be worth taking an average of the months and collapsing them into one variable so that you can do a range of comparisons of this variable with other non time-related variables. However, if you are looking for monthly changes, you may not want to do this.

5) Cook with calm

If you have ever seen a kitchen on Christmas day, you know, cooking is stressful. Well, so is analysis. Sometimes things just don’t work and instead of scrapping your whole menu, you need to adapt and remember the end goal. Get creative think of other analysis methods, or variables that can help you get the answers you need. No matter what – you will get something, and if you keep your calm, you are more likely to get there quickly and effectively.

6) Keep it simple

There is a reason salmon truffle soufflé with lavender ice-cream is not a popular dish. It’s just too much. The same goes for data analysis, when you overcomplicate the equation you end up with a confused and not relevant story. Always remember your plan and take the simplest, most effective route to get there.

7) Plate it beautifully

A little carrot flower has certainly never hurt anyone. The more you think about the visualization of your analysis, the presentation and the communication style you the better. To put it simply we are visual creatures and the more attractive and intuitive a presentation, the more receptive the audience. Even though you have found the ‘answer’ the only thing that matters is if your audience finds it too!

Inspiring Quotes To Help You Get Through Your Work Day

If you find yourself in a little mid-week or mid-day slump, take a few moments to re-energize yourself with these inspiring quotes from some of the world’s greatest thinkers. Sometimes, all it takes is a little reminder to boost your spirits and refocus your day.

Happiness is an attitude. We either make ourselves miserable, or happy and strong. The amount of work is the same.

Francesca Reigler

When one door of happiness closes, another opens, but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us.

Helen Keller

"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself, any direction you choose."

Dr. Seuss

Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.

Steve Jobs

Instead of wondering when your next vacation is, you ought to set up a life you don’t need to escape from.

Seth Godin

The problem with the rat race is that even if you win, you’re still a rat.

Lily Tomlin

A man should never neglect his family for business.

Walt Disney

Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Pasteur, Michaelangelo, Mother Teresea, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein.

H. Jackson Brown Jr.

Someone once told me that 'time' is a predator that stalks us all our lives. But I rather believe that time is a companion who goes with us on the journey and reminds us to cherish every moment because it will never come again.

Jean-Luc Picard

It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.

Charles Darwin

Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.

Thomas Edison

You miss 100 percent of the shots you don’t take

Wayne Gretzky

Do or do not. There is no try.

Yoda

Those who say it can not be done, should not interrupt those doing it.

Chinese Proverb

Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve. Thoughts are things! And powerful things at that, when mixed with definiteness of purpose, and burning desire, can be translated into riches.

Napoleon Hill

You are not your resume, you are your work.

Seth Godin

Far and away the best prize that life offers is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.

Theodore Roosevelt

Even if you are on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.

Will Rogers

Yesterday’s home runs don’t win today’s games.

Babe Ruth

If you work just for money, you’ll never make it, but if you love what you’re doing and you always put the customer first, success will be yours.

Ray Kroc

When writing the story of your life, don't let anyone else hold the pen.

Harley Davidson

A professional is someone who can do his best work when he doesn't feel like it.

Alistair Cook

Happiness is not something you postpone for the future; it is something you design for the present.

Jim Rohn

Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude.

Thomas Jefferson

I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.

Michael Jordan

People inspire you or they drain you - pick them wisely.

Hans F. Hansen

The Pessimist complains about the wind. The optimist expects it to change. The leader adjusts the sails.

John Maxwell

Whether you think you can or whether you think you can’t, you’re right!

Henry Ford

When you change your thoughts, you change your world.

Norman Vincent Peale

A man is but the product of his thoughts. What he thinks, he becomes.

Mahatma Gandhi

There are two primary choices in life: to accept conditions as they exist, or accept the responsibility for changing them.

Denis Waitley

Just Because It's on the Internet Doesn't Mean It's True

In the height of Hurricane Sandy, I became transfixed with following the real-time progress of the storm. From Google News to Yahoo! to The Weather Channel, I was inundated with updates from across the country. One of my favorite sources was Facebook as my friends shared status updates that gave me perspective on what was happening. Or, in some cases, what they believed to be happening but wasn’t. I refer to several photos that circulated faster than the hurricane’s winds. One of particular note was three guards holding their own against a fierce torrent of wind and rain at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The picture is real; however, it was taken in September during a bad rain storm, weeks before Sandy even formed.

As information can travel at the blink of an eye, so can misinformation. Or as Mark Twain once said, “A lie will go ‘round the world while truth is pulling its boots on.” Actually, I should’ve said, most people attribute this quote to Twain. It was actually said by a man named C.H Spurgeon who attributed it as an old proverb. The mangling of truth knows no bounds. But today, truths and lies have the same value and can travel at the same speeds, often without differentiation, and both can equally shape historical events and create multiple realities. All of these views are valid insomuch as they represent an individual’s experience with events.

Incorrect digital artifacts are a big reality in today’s information society. Flying into Detroit one morning, I did what almost all fliers these days do. Upon landing, I turned on my phone and tapped into social media, in this case Facebook, to update my status. The phone had a difficult time locating my position and thought I was in New Boston, Michigan, an unincorporated township adjacent to Romulus, the town in which the airport is actually located. When I went to check in, over 2,000 people had also checked into the airport in New Boston, thereby creating a new digital reality. After all, 2,000 people can’t be wrong, right? I can imagine historians thousands of years hence discussing whether the airport was in Romulus or New Boston. What would they conclude?

We hope professional journalists, trained purveyors of truth, would help to deter misinformation. And for the most part they do. The reason I know about the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier photo is because of another reporter’s story on Mashable. But journalists get things wrong too, and when they do the damage can be significant. In 2006, famed NFL player Jerome Bettis played his last game in his hometown of Detroit at the Super Bowl. In honor of his accomplishments, the city decided to give him a key to the city. A reporter from a small paper in Pennsylvania asked Jerome how he felt to be in an exclusive club, one that included Saddam Hussein. Jerome made a joke, and an AP writer at the news conference picked up the exchange, included it in a story he wrote, and within 24 hours, the story had gone global. Jerome Bettis and Saddam Hussein were one of only a handful of people (some articles even suggested a number as low as four) to ever receive a key to the city of Detroit. It was on the Today Show. CNN. FoxNews. The New York Times. I worked for ESPN at the time and decided to check the facts. I called the mayor’s office and was informed I was the only person to call and confirm the story. Saddam Hussein and Jerome Bettis had indeed received keys to the city. But Detroit had given away hundreds of keys to a variety of people, and Saddam received his in 1982, a time of prolific key offerings. So where did the reporter get the idea the keys were limited? Apparently, at the time Jerome Bettis received his key, Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick had decided to limit the awarding of the keys because of their cost and because they were given away so frequently that their perceived value was diminished. Two facts collided and traveled the world.

Big deal, I can hear you saying. It’s a minor fact. And the gut of the story is true; Saddam and Jerome are part of a club. Correct. But I was one reporter for ESPN. Did other reporters also follow up on the fact? Did anyone print a retraction? No. The story was less sexy without the exclusivity. And if you type in Jerome Bettis and Saddam Hussein in Google, you still see stories with incorrect information. Part of journalism is a historical record of facts. I am not naïve. I know that throughout history, information has been wrong, and institutions with agendas have changed facts. The issue with today’s crowdsourced world is we’re actually getting closer to one viewpoint, and often that viewpoint is tainted.

I present these facts as a warning, and as a suggestion. In this digital age, there are no greater skill sets than a healthy dose of skepticism, common sense and basic research abilities. Truth is comprised of attribution, perspective, context and facts. Any of these can be wrong. And one cannot be too inquisitive. We build our realities one truth at a time. 

Feeling Stressed? 11 Things to Avoid Doing

Workplace stress is, unfortunately, extremely common. According to the third annual Work Stress Study by Harris Interactive on behalf of Everest Collect, 83 percent of Americans are stressed about work. This was a 10 percent raise from the year before, when the stress level was still high at 73 percent.

We’re all more stressed than ever. Another poll, this time by NPR, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and the Harvard School of Public Health, found 49 percent of people dealt with a stressful event in the last year. In the poll, workplace stress ranked third, directly below death of a loved one and illness and disease.

In the workplace, you need to keep your cool. Especially if you’re in a position of leadership or one where others look to you for guidance and advice. When things get stressful, you don’t have the option to fall to pieces if you want to move forward in your career.

If there’s one group of people who know about stress, it’s entrepreneurs. These entrepreneurs share their insight into the 11 things to avoid doing, no matter how stressed you feel:

1. Getting Emotional

Emotion can kill clarity. The only way through a stressful situation is to gain clarity by removing emotion. Then, as one of my mentors says, you can do a 360-degree walk around of the situation and determine the best way to handle it. This mindset has been instrumental in handling tough decisions in our companies. – Peter Awad, GoodBlogs

2. Reacting Too Quickly

Your first reaction is not always the best one. You can really do some damage by reacting without thinking. Situations that are stressful are usually complicated and can take some time to sort through and really get to the root of the issue. – Laura Land, Accessory Export, LLC

3. Taking It Out on Employees

As a leader, it's very important not to take out stress on employees. When you're under a lot of pressure it's easy to snap at people, especially if they've created the stress. But employee morale mirrors that of leadership, so it's important to remain calm and in control. Blowing up at an employee will cause negative ripples through your whole organization. – Jared Feldman,Mashwork

4. Not Thinking Before You Speak

Think before you speak. In these situations, you need to take a deep breath, gather your thoughts and choose your words carefully. – Sean Marszalek, SDC Nutrition, Inc.

5. Playing the Blame Game

When a stressful situation arises we often have the knee jerk reaction of lashing out and looking for someone to blame. Instead, take a moment to reflect on how you contributed to the situation. What assumptions were made? What processes were undocumented? Where did communication fail? See how you can step up, take responsibility and guide your team to a better outcome next time. – Laura Roeder, MeetEdgar.com

6. Dwelling on Your Stress Level

Don't dwell on your stress level. Put your head down and work toward your goals. If you’re overwhelmed, do a handstand! Yes, I'm serious; it's hard to think about the stressful event when you’re on your head. Stay there for a minute, then get up and get back at it. – Matthew Moisan,Moisan Legal, P.C.

7. Going to the Candy Aisle

In a stressful situation it may seem like chocolate, ice cream, or a large piece of cake is just what the doctor ordered! However, stress eating only leaves you feeling sluggish and off-balance from your normal routine. Before you pick up that much deserved candy bar, think about going for a long walk instead. Exercising releases endorphins, leaving you energized to conquer your stress. – Kim Kaupe, ZinePak

8. Working Extra

Don't just keep working. If you feel stressed, take a break. Whatever you are doing is probably counterproductive anyway. – Charles Moscoe, Earners Group

9. Letting it Show

As a leader, you need to demonstrate a level of calmness and clarity for your team -- they look to you for that. However, it is important to vent this stress somehow. Confide in one of your personal relationships, such as your significant other or friends. They will be impartial to it and will be more than happy to cheer you up without expecting anything in return. –Andy Karuza, Brandbuddee

10. Panicking During Delicate Situations

During stressful moments, I step away from the situation and do something to expel the negative energy. Playing sports is very therapeutic for the mind, directs your attention toward performance and puts the stressful situation in the past. – Timothy Schmidt, WebsiteRescue

11. Trying to Do it Alone

Don’t shoulder the burden all by yourself. Ask for help! –Robert J. Moore, RJMetrics