My Top One Productivity Tip

There are endless techniques one can try in the world of productivity to work more in the same designated time, or work less overall to spend more time on leisure. Keep reading to learn my one tip that I return to after years of testing different things to be more efficient when completing tasks!

If It Doesn’t Take Longer Than Two Minutes…

…finish it immediately! This is a nugget of wisdom from “Getting Things Done” by David Allen.

Instead of spending time documenting and planning all those small tasks, get the job done in the same—or shorter—time. It is a particularly useful rule if we have a tendency to get overwhelmed, stuck even, when a to-do list expands to significant proportions.

Maybe it isn’t possible at work to drop everything when we recall yet another nagging tiny task, in which case it indeed needs to be captured, but at home, sometimes it is much more efficient to literally pause what is happening, to move a short and simple task from Doing to Done.

An Example Of A Two-Minute Task

I enjoy the practical element that brings life to a theoretical blog post, so in this case a simple example will illustrate the point nicely.

This year has been a busy one, and at times I have made progress without using my calendar at all, so my productivity muscle feels particularly flexed on the big tasks. The result is that my home has been quite neglected ever since moving in almost three years ago.

Recently, I made the shocking realisation that after opening a small box of q tips in summer, I have been taking them out of the box whenever I have needed one. The next thought that popped up was “Why am I doing this? Why haven’t I moved the q tips to the acrylic jar in the mirror cupboard above the sink?”

This prompted an internal discussion in which I recalled the two-minute rule by David Allen. A quick analysis of the estimated task length created two scenarios in which the longer, approximately two minutes long, option involved cleaning and drying well the small lidded jar, should there be some lint etc. inside. And then completing the task.

What Ignoring The Two-Minute Rule Leads To

When we consciously notice these simple tasks, but make active decisions to postpone them, the developing scenario is a to-do list of doom. The unfinished tasks, whether big or small, grow so much in numbers that it can feel easier not to do anything.

A peskier situation is when we know of stuff that should get done, without being fully aware of them. Autopilot mode engages and we have created a q-tip scenario, which can change only after conscious thinking and subsequent work has happened.

So why care about the literal q tips? Because it is more cumbersome to use them from the lowest drawer below the sink. The path of resistance is greater. The box they come in is also more of a temporary storage, so they risk falling out and getting dirty in the process. That would annoy me, but as long as autopilot is on, I don’t recall these things about the complete picture.

A Solution To Wobbly Productivity

Allen’s two-minute rule is a wonderful tool even when we have a shorter attention span, or have days of feeling off. Not only can we quickly create a sense of completion, but the effort involved is minimal compared to that of the big tasks.

Since the tasks are indeed tasks in our lives, they will need to be finished eventually. Active postponing is brutal, especially if it comes with no decision when to tackle the looming to-do. In such a case, we create an environment in which documenting two-minute tasks causes overhelm, and not documenting them forces us to remember them. It is a lose/lose situation.

My example illustrates how easy it is to fall off the wagon, so mindfulness can help as a general tool to increase presence and awareness in daily life. Perhaps put a timer on your device to alert after two minutes, too, to get a physical and mental idea of just how short that time is?

Wrapping Up

The reason for declaring the two-minute rule my top productivity tip is because the accumulation of tiny, unfinished tasks can get totally out of hand if we ignore them, these tasks are easily dismissed when we take on quest-like big projects, and yet there could actually be more headspace for the big stuff, when we get the tiniest tasks out of the way, regularly like supposedly Swiss trains.

As with all change, improvements take practice, repetition is necessary for habits to form, and setbacks are to be expected. I like pragmatism rather than building unrealistic expectations.

Keep testing what works, when it works (or not!), and be prepared to flexibly adjust your process. Maybe you could add an element of fun, such as creating a small challenge of say a week and adding a reward at the end of it? Positive psychology is established as a well-documented field and its message to put a positive spin on things works.

Have you tried the two-minute rule by David Allen yet? Please share your thoughts in the comments below!

 

Photo credit: Allec Gomes.