I love productivity.
I don’t really know where it started. I guess somewhere along the line I had more to do than time to do it so I decided I had to get myself in gear. Over the last few years, I’ve used countless apps, ideas, software, and programs to try to manage the projects and contexts that I work in. I’ve learned a few things over that time.
One of the biggest things I’ve learned about productivity is that you’ll never get anything done if you spend all of your time backtracking because you forgot what you were doing in the first place.
Here are 6 ways a project manager can help us all get more done…
Keeps you organized
Whether you’d consider yourself an organized person or not, you need to have some level of organization to get stuff done. If you’re leading or operating at a high level, you have many projects and areas to manage. A project manager helps you keep it all organized. A good one even lets you attach appropriate documents and notes to individual tasks.
Provides brain freedom
How many times do you think of a task that you need to do way before you’re actually able to do it? What happens when that’s the case? You replay it over and over in your mind until you’re able to dump it somewhere you know it’ll be safe. A project manager gives you a place to dump it. That keeps you from laying in bed at night thinking, “I need to fill that document out tomorrow,” or “Where’d that sticky note go?”
Helps you concentrate on what’s important
A good project manager lets you schedule a task and break tasks down into contexts or labels. In other words, while you’re at your computer, you can do all the tasks labeled “computer” or while you’re out and about, you can do everything with “errands.” A project manager focuses us on what we should be doing where we are. That way, we don’t have our attention divided while we’re at our desk and see we need to go by the post office. It helps you concentrate on desk work only.
Makes busy work more efficient
We all have that busy work that is a necessary evil. That stuff needs to get done as quickly and effortlessly as possible. When you’re organized, that become possible. You can either assign those tasks to someone else or you can check them off quickly because you’ve recorded them and you know when the best time to do them is.
Reminds you of repeated tasks
Every Monday, I post to the MillennialLeader.com site. Every 2nd Friday, I pay our cable bill. No matter how many times I do these repeated tasks, there’s still a chance I’ll forget them at any time. A project manager let’s me schedule these out to remind me every Monday and ever 2nd Friday. All in all, I have around 30 tasks a week that repeat. I’m glad I don’t have to remember all of that!
Opens you up for time with people
For a leader, Dad, Mom, Pastor, CEO, whatever, that’s what really matters. By focusing and organizing our work, we can have time for the people that we care about so much. It’s hard to project manage and schedule people but that’s what our purpose is. By managing everything else, we have time to do what really matters.
What project management system do you use? Any tips?
Note: I’ve tried many programs and the best I’ve found is Todoist. Trust me, at least for my needs, it’s the best by a long shot. It is a list maker’s dream and has great flexibility for task and project management. If you want to keep it simple, Todoist lets you do that too.
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