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5 Productivity Killers and How to Slay Them
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Well, I was directed here through my Twitter feed, where it was originally found through someone’s RSS Reader. I might email a friend or coworker about this before compulsively planning the rest of my week. Am I doing this right?
Seriously though, some good ideas/thoughts. More or less it’s all about time management and doing things in a way that best suits your own time. If I spent all day intermittently checking blogs, twitter and email, I’d get nothing done. Based on this post’s existence, it seems like there are people who do just that.
@ Jaremy — I think that’s the way to do it…according to Angie anyway. ;)
I agree, it is about time management, and perhaps a little about willpower. It was funny when we were talking about the article with a friend who isn’t a freelance blogger and designer about having to fight to be productive sometimes, they said, ‘yeah, sometimes you just have to turn off the internet and computer to get things done.’ We just looked at each other, and were like, but our work is mostly online or at least on our computers where all of these necessary distractions live and lurk.
When Angie was contacted by a few tweeps asking what she had done recently to be more productive, we felt that perhaps she wasn’t the only one who had to fight off these demons…okay, so the Buffy metaphor didn’t die with the post… :). So we thought we would turn it into a post to give an idea of what we identified as problem areas on this end, just like you said, it’s all about what works for you. Hopefully, it will help others to recognize some things that maybe traps for them that they hadn’t really thought about before.
That was a nice read! But isn’t the Stumble toolbar the same as “Social Media”?
Marcos last blog post..[Imagedump] May 2009
@Marco — Thanks! I know that Stumble is technically a social media site but the way it works differs so much from other sites that I had to include it on it’s own. Not to mention the fact that it can be an uber productivity killer.
Totally agree with all of the above. Google Reader is the biggest killer, and i must spend hours on it a day.
Lists are the biggest time waster.
My favorite is 100+ ways to save time, and I know they weren’t trying to be clever.
I get about 40 emails a day (rss feeds in emails) and usually they take 4 hours minimum to check them. Many are freebies or nice articles/tutorials/inspiration. It is quite a waste of time and I haven’t really figured out a way to stop that.
I guess I can try to read some in the morning (but I would be at work) and some at night.
My other emails are open all day but it only takes 1–2 hours total to check/reply to all of them.
Good tips! Moderation. Now I must get back to work! :)
Jentris last blog post..It’s Never Crowded Along the Extra Mile
Great points on how to reclaim your day.
Email on mobile devices is another area that needs to be managed for maximum efficiency. I did this by switching from Exchange/Outlook to Gmail. I set Exchange email to forward to Gmail and then added Gmail as an Exchange account on my iPhone. Since Gmail doesn’t support push email notification, this stopped the constant “you have mail” interruption.
Alternatively you could mail setup alone and just change the notification sound to none/silent for incoming mail.
@Andy — Google Reader is both a blessing and a curse at the same time. lol
@Anthony — Are you saying we wasted your time here ;p. LOL @ 100+ ways to save time!
@e11world — It’s definitely a fine line to toe. I just make sure that I get in at least 6 hours of actual design work a day (meaning no email, reader, social media, ect)
@Jentri — Moderation is definitely the key!
@J. Charles — I keep email off of my mobile all together. I know that I’m lucky to not be out of the office enough to need it though and that for others this may not be a viable solution.