My System for Increasing Productivity (Taught to Me By a Psychologist and Grad School Professor)

This month, I’m focusing on increasing productivity. (I polled readers here for my 10×10 monthly challenge, and productivity was the winner–let me know if you have any suggestions for future months)

Back in grad school, a friend and I were on the verge of a nervous breakdown at the thought of doing a thesis while taking 3 other classes and working at the same time (all that stuff really cuts into the time you can spend at happy hour).

So, we talked to one of our professors, who is a clinical psychologist (I’m still not sure why he was teaching in the design school, though…). He suggested that we do a “special topics” course with him on productivity and mindfulness.

For those of you who don’t know, “special topics” just means that you think all the other classes that the school offers suck and so you make up your own class with your favorite professor.

So, for our class had to implement David Allen’s Getting Things Done system and also meditate for 5 minutes every day while recording our experiences.

So, I can say that “I studied productivity and mindfulness in graduate school under a clinical psychologist.” It is technically true, but I think it gives an impression that is different from the reality of the situation.

Here Is the System I Used Then for Increasing Productivity (And Started Using Again Now)

In Getting Things Done, you need a series of 43 folders to keep all your stuff organized. Yes, that is a lot of folders, but let me break it down for you.

• You need one folder for every month of the year (that’s 12 folders).
• Then you need another 31 folders for every day of the month.

Add that up and you have 43.

Plus, you’ll also need a folder for every project you are working on. So, if you have a blog, one folder might be for that blog. You might have another folder for a product you’re making, or a personal project you’re working on.

Then, you’ll need an “inbox.” This can be anything really that you can basically just dump ideas, tasks, and other things into. Since I am a pretty mobile person, working out of coffee shops and such, I like to keep things small and portable. My inbox is a small note card holder.

Step 1 – Do a Brain Dump

This may all seem extremely complex, but follow with me here.

The point to all this is to get all the little things that are lurking in the back of your mind out of your mind and into a trusted system for increasing productivity. This will free up your mental resources to focus on the task at hand without having to obsess over all those other things like, “damn, I need to remember to pick up a geoduck at the store on the way home.”

Instead, we want to just get everything out of your head and into this system so you don’t even have to think about it.

So, the first thing you do is sit down with a stack of 3×5 note cards (I use note cards because they are small and fit into my “inbox,” but you can use sheets of paper or whatever you want). Then you just write down one thing you need to do or one thing that’s in your mind on each card. Keep going until you can’t think of anything else.

These might be things like:

• Pay phone bill
• Pay the rent
• Set up affiliate program with 1ShoppingCart
• Guest post on Tim Ferriss’ blog
• Set up RSS feed on my blog
• Write an article for my DIY surgery site
• Create YouTube video on how to amputate your own leg
• Get the Book The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing
• Download photos from digital camera
• Do laundry
• Go to the gym
• Buy birthday present for girlfriend.

And so on until you just bottom out and can’t think of another thing at all.

At this point, you’ll probably feel an enormous sense of relief from just getting all of these thoughts out of your head (added bonus: you’ll also sleep really well the night after doing this).

Step 2 – Sorting Out Everything

Then you sit down with your massive stack of note cards and you start to sort them out.

If they need to get done this month, then put them in a numbered folder for what day you want to do them. For example, I would put “pay rent” in the folder marked “1” because rent is due on the first of the month.

If something is a few months out, just put it in the folder of the appropriate month. So, if you were sorting out the note card “buy birthday present for girlfriend,” but her birthday wasn’t until July, put that card in the July folder.

If something is specific to a project, put it in the appropriate project folder. Only do this if it isn’t something that is directly actionable and it is something that needs more elaboration (directly actionable = “go to the gym”; not directly actionable = “lose 20 pounds”)

Step 3 – Using the System for Increasing Productivity

Now that everything is in place, all you need to do is take the appropriate folder at the beginning of the day and do the tasks inside of it.

Tomorrow is the 6th, so I’ll grab the folder marked “6” and do the things inside of it that day. I don’t have to think about what to do or try to remember the important things. It’s just there for me, no thinking or remembering involved.

Once you finish a task, just rip up the note card (it will feel good!).

In case you’re still not getting how this whole things works, here’s a video that explains it pretty well:

Step 4 – Actually Doing Things

Once you have your daily tasks in front of you, it might be hard to actually start getting them done. If procrastination or distraction is holding you back, this is what I’ve done to overcome these obstacles.

Keep a log of how you spend your time in 15 minute increments. On a sheet of paper, write down the time that you’re setting aside for work in blocks of 15 minutes. For example:

8:00 – wrote an article
8:15 – wrote an article
8:30 – wrote an article
8:45 – wrote an article
9:00 – wasted time watching videos on Youtube
9:15 – looked for an image for a blog post
…
4:30 – thought about eating dinner
4:45 – looked for bloggers to JV with
5:00 – looked for bloggers to JV with

You can download a sheet for this right here :)

Anyway, if you sit down to write an article at 8:00 and it takes you one hour, you’d just indicate that on each block of time from 8:00 through 9:00.

If you happened to spend 2 hours playing Angry Birds or looking at Animals Being Dicks, then mark that time down too.

Reviewing these time logs can reveal where a lot of wasted time goes. From here you can get an idea of what distractions you need to eliminate or block out from you work time.

However, I personally find that I get a lot more done just by logging my time in the first place. I guess I just feel vaguely guilty at the thought of writing down that I spent an hour watching stupid videos online.

Step 5 – Maintenance

As you go through your life, you’ll undoubtedly think up other things to do. When this happens, take out a 3×5 note card and write it down put it in your inbox. Do this as soon as possible so that you don’t forget about it later on (this is also another reason why I prefer using note cards and having a portable version of this set up).

Then at least once a week, go through your inbox and sort everything into the appropriate folders again as you did in Step 2 (it can help to have a beer while you’re doing this). Review the tasks in your project folders and in next month’s folder as necessary as well to see if you can work them into your daily numbered folder system.

Other Thoughts – Increasing Productivity by Choosing High Leverage Activities

Sure, just getting a lot of things done and moving through a lot of index cards will probably make you feel great and that you’re getting a lot done.

But there are some things that are more important than others. For example setting up a split test on a sales page will probably be worth more money than designing a favicon for your website.

One thing you might do to pick the highest leverage things to focus on is to reverse engineer your desired outcome.

So, if your goal was to make $5000 / month in your business, you need to realize that over the course of a 30 day month, you’d need to make $166 per day to earn that $5000.

Start by asking yourself “What is one thing I can do today that will be worth $166?” You may not get that $166 immediately today, but if you can do something that will eventually be worth at least $166, that counts as a high leverage activity that will take you to your goal.

Some examples might be:

• Sell an hour of personal coaching (assuming you charge $166 or more per hour).
• Send out an email to your list (you have an email list, right?) promoting something that could earn you a commission of $166 or more.
• If you know that the value of the average person who subscribes to your list is worth $5, then you might do something to get 34 people onto your list (34 x $5 = $170).

You get the idea, right?

Closing Thoughts

Okay, so that’s the system that I used in grad school for increasing productivity and getting things done while being completely overloaded with other classes, a job, and a massive thesis project.

I’ll admit it takes a bit of work to set up, but once you get things going and put your trust into it, you’ll be a lot more clear-minded and able to focus on what you need to do. I’ve been slacking on doing this since grad school, but I’m getting back into the swing of it.

Have you ever done anything like this before? If so, how did it work out? If not, why not try this out and see if you can get more done :)

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