How to be more productive: tips for designers
Organisation and productivity is all about systems, so I thought I would share three ideas to help you make your weeks more productive.
1. DON'T RELY ON YOUR MEMORY
Get things out of your head and in to your notebook or a notes app on your phone. Keep your head clear and decluttered as this will help you focus on important tasks. Here's what I do.
If I'm at my desk I will put ideas in to Asana as soon as they come in to my head - just to make sure I capture them somewhere (I have a system for this that I talk about in the course).
If I'm out on a walk or not near my desk my system is to email myself anything I need or want to remember and then I file this away in different places when I'm next back at my desk. A great app for automating this process is 'Braintoss'.
2. OUTSOURCE WHAT YOU CAN
What can you afford to outsource to free up some time? Examples might be cleaning, meal preparation (e.g. by services like Marley Spoon), ironing, garden or pool maintenance, administrative tasks, book keeping. Outsource as many things you can afford - and especially the tasks that you don't enjoy or that drain your energy.
When you can afford it a Virtual Assistant is also a great asset to both your time and your business - to work out what you might give a VA think about the tasks you don’t enjoy doing in your business but that take up a lot of time - those are the tasks to outsource first!
3. CREATE FORCED DEADLINES FOR HIGH VALUE TASKS
If you're someone who is prone to procrastination then start to think about how you can create forced deadlines around tasks and activities that are going to move things forward. One way I got over my own procrastination was to pre-sell my first ever SketchUp course. I had created part of the course but not finished it and so to give myself the kick up the bum that I needed I put up a sales page and started taking orders for the course.
There's nothing quite like paying customers to get you to finish something off!
So where can you apply a similar idea to the tasks you want to get done but you are putting off?
Take action on the ideas this week by writing a list of organisational systems and processes you would like to put in place.
Once you've made your list, put the creation of these systems on your calendar! Because, as I teach in the course, if it's not on the calendar, it won't get done :)
Courses and Templates for Designers and Architects
DO YOU WANT TO….
Improve your professionalism?
Find more clients?
Bring in more revenue?
Create better systems and processes?
Then check out my business courses and templates for designers and architects.
These courses and templates leave you with work done - not just a long list of things you need to do next. We have a really strong focus on taking action and getting things created that improve your business.
Enjoy the rest of your day!
Clare x
Dr Clare Le Roy