Productivity Hacks Won’t Save You Unless You Overcome These 5 Roadblocks

We live in a modern world where success and productivity go hand in hand. But in our quest for a more productive lifestyle, it’s easy to get sidetracked and end up slaving away on a 70-hour workweek. When that happens, take a moment to step back and understand your why. Most of the time, we seek smarter ways to reach our goals in order to make more time for what matters and achieve a lasting sense of fulfillment.

Luckily, the rising mindset shift to a healthier work-life balance has led to numerous productivity hacks springing up every so often. As we all know, any skill worth learning isn’t easy, and so being up to date with the latest productivity trend is barely half of the battle. We come across another article, become convinced by a new time management method, try it out, and fail to stick to it. This is usually the case.

While productivity enthusiasts are constantly churning out life hacks for getting more things done in less time, it’s important to acknowledge that productivity is a major, life-changing commitment and it all starts by identifying the root cause of your struggle. By eliminating the roadblocks hindering you from being more productive, it’ll be easier for you to adopt the strategies and behavior changes necessary to create the lifestyle you desire.

Let’s take a look at the most common productivity roadblocks you’ll run into and how you can overcome each of them:

Roadblock #1: Busyness Addiction

If you’re asked to define what productivity is to you, you’d probably imagine someone who’s always on their phone, racing to meetings, and constantly knocking off items from a never-ending to-do list feeling like they still haven’t done enough. As a result of the fast-paced work culture we’ve bred through the years, we’ve learned to associate productivity with being busy when there’s clearly a significant difference between the two.

According to mind-body physician Lissa Rankin, we use our busyness to numb the feelings of vulnerability we get from stepping out of our hectic schedules. She says:

“Because I suddenly have more downtime, I find myself faced with the time to reflect upon my life. But facing my life isn’t always so pretty… We are a culture of people who’ve bought into the idea that if we stay busy enough, the truth of our lives won’t catch up with us.”

Although we take pride in being busy, it’s also a sure-fire way of reaching a state of burnout — hurting our productivity and creativity in the process. More than that, the need to stay busy causes us to perceive time as more scarce than usual and in effect, lose sight of the big picture.

For this reason, we tend to focus on urgent but low-value tasks. By the end of the day, we’re too tired to accomplish our most critical work. So, what can you do?

Solution: Be More Purposeful with Your Time

Busyness inevitably sucks the joy out of our lives, making us question our own purpose and willpower. To combat such threats to our productivity and overall well-being, we need to be more purposeful with the time we have for both work and leisure.

Conduct a time audit and analyze how your time is actually spent each day. Identify busywork masked as high priority and adjust your schedule to allocate enough time for the most important tasks that directly align with your objectives.

When you expect to have a free day, intentionally carve out the time to do something stimulating that contributes to your personal growth. Rather than mindlessly browsing through social media, learn a new recipe or take a quick hike. Schedule your downtime in advance in the same manner you schedule your work meetings. That way, you’re forced to take your time off just as seriously and make room for the rest and relaxation you need.

Roadblock # 2: Analysis Paralysis

With virtually unlimited access to high-quality information, you’d think making decisions should be easier than ever before. But it isn’t. Psychologist Barry Schwartz explains this irony in a phenomenon known as the Paradox of Choice. Even though a vast range of options can lead to objectively better results, it can also result in greater feelings of anxiety, indecision, and dissatisfaction.

Beyond wasted time, chronic indecision can take a toll on your productivity by lowering your performance and limiting your willpower. High-level cognitive tasks such as learning and decision-making are driven by our working memory. So when you spend hours at a time overthinking decisions and overanalyzing situations, you’re only exhausting your limited mental resources — causing you to feel too stressed and tired to make the right decisions and make significant progress.

Solution: Start Your Day with Tasks That Matter Most

According to psychologist Ron Friedman, you are most focused during the first three hours of your day. If you fritter away those precious hours on less important requests from other people, you’re not making the most effective use of your time.

Structure your day by tackling the biggest tasks in the morning when your limited supply of willpower and mental resources are newly replenished. Eliminate unnecessary decisions by weaving them into your routine as habits that require little conscious effort to accomplish.

Roadblock # 3: Non-Stop Distractions

The most successful and productive people have mastered the ever-elusive art of focusing on one thing at a time. Though seemingly unattainable, it’s a valuable skill we should keep trying to work on as interruptions at work are taking up more of our time than ever.

Studies have shown that it takes an average of 23 minutes to reclaim focus after dealing with a distraction from your task at hand. Add that number to the amount of time the interruption took, and you get the true cost of each distraction. Even more alarming is the fact that most of these distractions are self-inflicted, such as checking emails or chatting with a co-worker.

Constantly shifting your attention from one context to another not only hurts your productivity, but it can also lead to a bad mood and higher levels of stress. Although interruptions are bound to happen, it doesn’t mean you can’t do anything to take back control of your focus.

Solution: Anticipate and Prepare for Distractions

The first step is to pinpoint where your distractions come from. Remove those that you can and create an environment where you’re less tempted to squander your hours on irrelevant activities. If you easily fall prey to the allure of click-bait articles, go offline or use website blockers. If you expect to receive unimportant phone calls throughout the day, keep your phone inside a drawer. If it helps to tune out the noise around you, listen to music that puts you in a state of deep focus.

You can’t always eliminate every possible distraction especially when they’re beyond your control. If that’s the case, what you can do is set aside uninterrupted blocks of time in your workday for focusing on work that needs to get done. The Pomodoro Technique is one variation of such time-blocking strategies. It’s been shown to be highly effective at improving your focus by training your brain to work in 25-minute intervals with short breaks in between.

Roadblock # 4: Failing to Plan Effectively

If task management were easy, there wouldn’t be an infinite stockpile of articles on the internet about productivity methods worth trying. With so many factors to consider, mapping out your day in advance can be tough.

When you under-plan, you end up setting or changing goals in the middle of your progress which can be a waste of time. Meanwhile, overplanning will throw you off schedule, making you feel overwhelmed and defeated under a pile of unfinished work. Both situations arise out of unrealistic expectations and not having the right task management systems in place to guide you.

Solution: Define Your Tasks Clearly and Then Prioritize

When you’re too focused on the big picture, the path towards it can seem obscure. Before you take action, break down your goal into well-defined steps so it’s easier for you to assign priority levels later on. Choose one to three big things you can finish for the day and leave room for new possible tasks that could come up.

Structure your day by blocking out chunks of time for your most critical work. You can plan your schedule for tomorrow at the end of each day or plan out for the next few days ahead and make adjustments along the way to suit your priorities. With this strategic planning in practice, you’re actually running your day instead of letting your day run you.

Roadblock # 5: Using Too Many Apps

Given the plethora of apps available, all promising to enhance productivity, we’re compelled to believe that the more apps we use, the more productive we’ll be. However, an increasing number of studies have found app overload to be a growing cause for concern.

It’s reported that the average employee in 2018 relied on 28 different apps to perform basic tasks and often switched between apps up to 10 times per hour, which can take a heavy toll on their ability to stay focused at work. Aside from stunting employee and company productivity, using too many apps can leave you feeling chronically overwhelmed and fatigued.

Solution: Consolidate Your Apps

Before you dive deep into a rabbit hole of productivity apps, determine your needs first and consider important factors such as cost, functionality, and accessibility. Review your current collection of apps and analyze how each of them contributes to improving your personal productivity. Get rid of those that don’t address your needs and take some time to research better alternatives if needed.

Another important factor to consider is whether or not the app is easy to integrate with the rest of your tools. When you’ve narrowed down your apps of choice, use an integration tool like Pleexy to keep your tasks synced between your task manager and the different platforms you use for email, note-taking, or project management. This way, you don’t have to waste any time bouncing back and forth between apps.

What challenges are holding you back from being more productive? Are you taking any steps to overcome them? Let us know in the comments below.

Pleexy is a productivity app that channels tasks from your email, note-taking, mind mapping, and collaboration apps into your Todoist or Microsoft To Do. Follow us on Twitter for more productivity tips.