Here Is The Most Underrated Productivity Hack That I Know

If you really want to be productive start ignoring 95% of the tasks you must perform.

Wait… what?

Ignoring 95% of what you need to do? How is that being productive?

Isn’t that just avoiding the work, Lukas?!?

Well, kind of.

Imagine you only had 2 hours, instead of your 40 hours per week, to get some work done; What would you focus on first?

With only 2 hours you cannot answer every email, cannot go to every meeting, and you definitely can’t spend all the time at the water cooler.

You will have to get effective!

You’ll start slowly chipping away at what you planned to do until you are left with the 5% that really matter.

It is that 5% that you should get done first.

Focus solely on finishing that 5%. Do not switch tasks until you are done.

Of course, you still have to do the other 95%, but thinking about that now serves no purpose.

It only opens up options for you to be distracted from what matters and options for you to over-burden yourself with the mountain of tasks ahead of you.

In an attempt to run from that mountain we often do what’s easiest first, not what’s important, resulting in too little time left at the end.

Because, unfortunately for most of us, what is easiest is usually what’s least important. For the time being, ignore everything else.

It will put you in the moment, leaving only 1 thing to do at any given point in time.

It slows you down enough to be effective in the short time you spend on things.

Rather than being more productive by doing more, you’ll become more productive by doing less.

And that, leads to true effectiveness.

Originally published at http://quora.com.