You may have been suffering from procrastination. You might have just realized that you’ve not been productive all this while. It’s not easy to hustle in a country like Cameroon to make ends meet. At times, you get discouraged and will want to give up. You have the feeling you are not productive at all. Whatever it takes, you need to be more productive in your ventures.

This is for those who want to become productive. Would you like to stop wasting your precious time and start being more productive right now? Do you want to move your projects to completion? This post will help you focus on how to be more productive from now onwards.

Most of the time, we become unproductive because we don’t focus our efforts on the task at hand. The key to being more productive with your time and resources, is to concentrate your efforts on what you have at hand.

There are lots of things running in our heads that we plan to achieve. At the end of the day, we are unable to achieve any.

How do you start concentrating your efforts on one thing at a time, to become more productive?

1. Create milestones

Breaking a project into achievable tasks and completing them one after the other within a timeframe is a great way to being more productive. When a project or activity is done in bits, it is easier to complete than when everything is done at the same time. Milestones will help you to plan, track your activities and finish quickly.

2. Eliminate Distraction

You can easily get distracted from what you do or plan to do in two ways:

• Externally– Technology has increased our rate of getting distracted nowadays. We are easily distracted from calls, social media notifications, emails and interruptions from people. Pick a time during the day when you feel at your peak and separate yourself for a period of time daily. This will give a real boost to your productivity. Be self disciplined to stay away from the distractions of the outside world when you are focusing on a task. Try this out and you will see a growth in your output.
• Internally – The most difficult source of distraction to manage is that coming from within. This is because it’s very difficult to control yourself from yourself. I earlier talked about doing one thing at a time – that is, you take one task and finish before taking on another. Most solopreneurs suffer from this kind of distraction. At times, it’s as if your brain is playing a trick on you and you just can’t focus on the task at hand. At such moments, you’ll need to think of what you will achieve at the end, remind yourself of your objectives, to give yourself a boost.

3. Take a break when you are bored or tired

For you to be more productive, you have to start focusing on one thing at a time. Put all your effort and attention on the task until all is done. But that doesn’t mean you will not feel bored or get tired at some point. You can give yourself a break if you become bored. Taking a short break will not put you behind schedule but give you renewed energy for the task to be completed. Checkout these 20 Things To Do When Bored on Uplifting and Inspiring Content by Yvette Mayemelle. Don’t forget to remind yourself on what you will achieve after finishing your task.

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4. Pick high priority tasks

Make a priority list and choose the tasks with the highest priority and concentrate on first before anything else. Most solopreneurs are trapped between staying productive and staying busy. Here is where the 80/20 rule comes to play. It states that 80% of the gains you make come from 20% of your efforts. With this in mind, you need to find out the 20% tasks that pay high and make sure you concentrate on achieving them first.

4. Manage priority activities yourself

It’s time to streamline your workload by picking projects that have a high payback potential pass on projects with lower priority. Calculate the value of your time, and if you must, delegate lower priority projects to others, even if you have to pay them. It’s going to be money spent with a purpose. Checkout these tips on maintaining a good relationship with your employee(s)

You always have to remind yourself of the need to be more productive. Make sure you discipline yourself to do the right thing. Don’t punish yourself if you have failures, rather reward yourself in a way for every step you make. Remember that every action you take helps you to move towards your goal of increased productivity.