Productivity in the Age of Collaboration
How productive would you say you are? In a time where we have so many collaboration tools to aid us in our work, how can we use these to aid our productivity?
Introduction
Amazing, Microsoft has all of these tools to help you throughout your day, all these ways to collaborate with your team, but how do you stay productive when you have a constant flow of various communications. How can these tools help you in your day to day activities?
I am someone who wants to get everything done there and then, tick it off the list, give my colleague what they need, this often means I shift my focus to different tasks. I’m great at multitasking but I may have to tone it down a bit as this means that often other tasks get pushed down the list, not ideal, so I have had to come up with some methods in carving out time to focus and get these done.
Here are some ways that I have found to help.
1. Organise your day
I love sitting down in the morning with my coffee and organising my day it sets me up in the right direction and this wouldn’t be so satisfying without the use of some Microsoft 365 tools. After Microsoft Teams I would say Microsoft To Do is my most used tool, it is what I constantly refer to throughout the day. Being able to look through my planned tasks by the due date and set certain ones to “My Day”.
Having planner and flagged emails integrated into To Do as well means I have one place I can view all of my tasks, this alongside the ability to creating subtasks, add notes to any tasks and create different task lists makes this a very powerful tool when it comes to tracking your tasks and time. I highly recommend having a go and see how this changes your day.
Mentioning planner there, also a great tool, it allows you to view all of your teams' tasks, know what they are up to and in turn see if they will be needing any input from you. So, I use a planner when setting tasks for my team and tracking progress, however, To Do is where I look at my own.
2. Structure your day
Something important is to know what time is your peak work time, yes there are often times when you don’t get the luxury of choice, as deadlines are looming and things crop up but if you know when you’re most productive, you can use this to your advantage.
For example, I know that my most productive hours are between 11 am and 2 pm this means I try to get most of my large tasks for the day, done then.
So I tend to, if allows, structure my day so that in the morning I plan my day, tick off any little tasks, reply to emails. Then spend some time concentrating on certain tasks, using the Pomodoro technique, see below. Then if possible, I like to schedule meetings later afternoon, a frequent 14h30 meeting scheduler! This is as I know by this time I am often flagging and really bounce of peoples energy from discussions, this then gives me a secondary burst of energy that allows me to be productive until the end of my day.
As mentioned above, something I have recently discovered is the Pomodoro technique. Type this into google and you will find a mountain of blogs but essentially it involves setting a timer for a period of time, in which you then focus on one activity, no distractions, then straight after you have a break. I usually do it for 25 mins then break for 5 then another 25 mins and so on. It is amazing how much you end up getting done in this time! But go for time scales that suit you, 45 mins then 15mins break is also a popular one. You can download many apps to help with the time setting but I just used the built-in timer on my laptop.
3. Block out time
Have you ever noticed MyAnalytics in the Microsoft app suite? It picks up patterns and analyses habits in your working day with handy hints and tips, it is interesting to explore if you are interested in how your day to day looks. But my main point here is to discuss the focus tab. It gives you the ability to set a focus plan. This links with your outlook calendar and blocks out specific focus time for you in a time that you have available, this means you can give yourself an hour or two purely focusing on your own work, your status is automatically set to focusing and teams switches to do not disturb mode, only allowing priority notifications to come through.
This can also be done manually, set out task blocks in your outlook calendar, this also helps with structuring your day and making sure you get everything done. When entering a task you can set it to show as free, meaning people who need to can still book you in for meetings and show that you are available – the drag and drop function comes in handy here as I have a constantly changing calendar. You can also colour code those tasks to keep it tidy and clear. I even block time out for my workouts for example, on a side note this helps with keeping me accountable with exercise as movement is key to refreshing your brain and maintaining that productivity.
4. Tailor your notifications
Are you ever working on something and a notification pops up from your team member or an email comes through from a client? Do you then immediately click on it, read it, answer then do that particular task they may have asked of you?
Notifications are the most useful yet often unuseful function of collaboration tools. Although it is important to know when someone messaged or emailed you but often this can break your flow, my advice would be to set your own times that you look at these. It is possible on both outlook and teams to change your notification settings. Although this isn’t to say turn them off completely, all the time, they have their value and often there are urgent things you need to attend to.
I personally no longer have the banner pop up where you can see the message, but just have the notification on the bottom bar flash, so I know someone has contacted me but gives me time to finish what I am doing before my mind reads the message, as previously I was seeing the message and instantly my focus would shift. In fact from a study by Gloria Mark, she found that it takes on average 23 minutes and 15 seconds to get back to the task at hand after a distraction. (On discovering this fact I have just found a plethora of really interesting information and studies around this topic, I think that will be for another blog!)
So head to settings, notifications on teams and have a look to see what suits you, you probably didn’t realise there are so many options, Microsoft products can be tailored to the way you like to work.
This can also be done with team and channel notifications, you may be part of a team with a channel that isn’t relevant to you, turn notifications off that channel, don’t be bombarded with unnecessary noise.
Also, a handy tip on this is with the mobile phone notifications, I have the teams app on my phone which is brilliant and gives me that flexibility and reassurance that if I am out and about I can still be contacted, but at the same time I don’t want a message coming through later in the evening when I am midway through a book in bed! So, you can set the hours in which you wish to receive your notifications, promoting a healthy work-life balance.
5. Make use of the tools
There are ways you can make the most of these collaboration tools to aid your productivity.
Firstly, the search function, Microsoft search function is brilliant and very advanced, it will search through all locations to find anything of relevance whatever you put in the search engine. This is especially useful if you are looking for a particular file or conversation you had, rather than waste time manually searching type it into the search box and within a minute or so it should come up. This is best used in Microsoft teams where you can search across chats, channels and file storage and SharePoint online where it should find all of your documents.
Emails, regular conversations I have with those that I work with is their challenges and frustration with email, I encourage a move away from email, to not only improve collaboration but also save time. Why not post in a channel, quickly start a meeting, or have a personal chat – all of which teams makes extremely easy.
Continuing from this, the thumbs up reaction function within teams is great, it means you can easily click to say you have acknowledged the note, you will act on it, rather than having to type back a message, or worse an email!
6. Have a place to jot things down
Always have a place to jot down any sudden ideas, thoughts or concerns that come into your head, this way you can easily note them down and come back to them at a time that better suits you, rather than mulling over them or instantly switching focus.
Of course, there is always the classic notebook and pen by your laptop but this often ends up being lots of pieces of paper with strange notes on them, that often cause a cluttered workspace, not the best for concentration. I would recommend using OneNote, I always have it open, it is one of the first things I open up in the morning and the last thing to shut down. Being able to quickly click on it write down my thoughts and come back and place them in a more suited place later. I also use it for creating notes in meetings, planning out my day and storing important information. If you are more of a creative, visual type I would try out Whiteboard, this would not only allow you to type your thoughts but draw them to. What’s especially great about whiteboard is that you could then share it with a team member
https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/microsoft-365/microsoft-whiteboard/digital-whiteboard-app
Conclusion
As you can probably tell I love organisation, lists and planning and use infrequently to structure my days and get everything done, no wonder I’m in the role of the project manager!
Now of course with all this you need to allow time for changes, work environments are rapidly changing, someone calls you, you aren’t quite on track, make a plan, but don’t stick to it religiously.
And remember to take breaks, get some fresh air, make a coffee, have a stretch and make sure you switch off and eat some lunch!
Bye for now
Anna