Work Five Hours a Day? That Ought to Do It.
Thinking is that an 8-hour day can be replaced by a 5-hour workday if you do it right. Several Nordic countries rank in the top ten as the most productive countries and generally work less than 40 hours a week. If this worked for you, then you’d have a lot more time to pursue hobbies, spend time with family or just think or whatever.
Rochi Zalani, formerly an employee to Zapier (an automation software company) quit her job at Zapier to write full time for SaaS (software as a service) and E-Commerce but got Covid this spring. After being down and out for a while, she got back to writing a few hours a day and found that the shorter work day was just as productive. In the “old” days she worked 8-9 hours a day and still found that at the end of the day, she was thinking “if only I had more time”.
While now only working 5 hours, she learned to say no more often and be intentional with a to-do list. One must pick a priority, (think deprioritize other things) that doesn’t mean not doing other things, it just means not doing them now. The barrier, it seems is to change one’s mindset because there is no correlation to the number of hours worked and productivity. We only have a few hours a day to be productive. To get started, a time-tracker experiment might be helpful. There is a certain number of hours to be in the “groove” and after that, just sitting there only produces diminishing returns. Time to stop working for the day.
We all have a time of day that we have high energy and motivation, and that time might be early AM, in the afternoon, or late in the evening. Our lifestyles differ as we have different demands on us and personal restrictions. For that sweet spot that works for you, try to set aside time to not have meetings or other interruptions. Silence your phone, turn off notifications, and so on. You really need to manage your energy and be disciplined about rest. Work and rest are not opposites but complementary. As you work out a system that works for you, it might be a time to challenge yourself to increase productivity. Let unnecessary things go (for a while).
Best to focus on one to three things. She says realistic planning means: underestimate how much you can get done in a day; overestimate how long it will take to complete a task; and overestimate the number of interruptions you’ll have in a day. Be really mindful making your to-do list. Build a routine that works for you by experimenting. No system is perfect, and you’ll likely tweak it over and over.
My point is that productivity is a deeply personal thing, and what works for other people won’t necessarily work for you. What system you use isn’t nearly as important as finding a system that works for you. If putting sticky notes on your computer or the wall seems reasonable, that’s ok. Some people like apps, some like paper notebooks or a list of TTD on a card that is kept nearby. The point is, do what works. You might find that a hybrid of paper and digital formats works as best for you.