Daily habits of productive leaders: Back to basics

At Selligence, we understand the everyday stumbling blocks that slow recruiters down. The importance of efficiency and productivity is key to our understanding of how we help you do your job better, and it’s what our products deliver for all our clients.

Finding enough hours in the day to get your long list of jobs done is an age-old problem. We know that organisation, discipline and hard work should be enough to get you to those targets, but sometimes it’s just not. With Talent Ticker and Anaxym’s all-round solutions, you’ll already be ahead of the curve, but how else can you streamline your day-to-day?

Here we’ve highlighted some more easy-to-implement changes you can start building into your routine to boost your productivity and improve your efficiency.

Getting enough sleep?

According to a number of global studies around 35-40% of adults in the UK and US get less than the recommended amount of sleep. Lack of sleep is widely reported as being a factor for a number of health conditions and is an integral factor in our productivity levels.

Somewhere between seven and nine hours of sleep a night is what medical professionals recommend for us to be functioning at our best. Just because you can function on five or six hours of sleep doesn’t mean you can operate at your best on so little. To be working most efficiently and effectively we need to be on our A-game, so make sure you’re dedicating enough hours to rest and sleep.

Common signs of sleep deprivation include: fatigue, irritability, mood changes, and difficulty focusing and remembering. Any of these factors will make your working day harder and your reduced ability to pay attention, react quickly and make decisions can cause you to lose deals or fail to capitalise on an opportunity.

Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates are big believers of a good night’s sleep, all three acknowledging the importance of a minimum seven hours of sleep. Bezos told Thrive Global that “eight hours of sleep makes a big difference for me, and I try hard to make that a priority”.

Talent Ticker’s very own CEO and Founder, Nick Vaughan, is a big advocate of a good night’s sleep and aims for eight hours a night himself. Nick has founded several hugely successful companies and has also been CEO of these award-winning outfits, Selligence included.

To do: Write a ‘to do list’

An active list of tasks to check off as you mark progress with a task has been proven to improve productivity. If you’re a list writer already, but struggling to keep momentum with it, there is likely at least one area in which you’re going wrong.

Common mistake number one: your list is too long. We’ve all been there, adding things to a list that we’ve already done, just so we can tick something off. But while ticking that one thing may be gratifying for a moment, the visual of a longer list can actually be demoralising and end up as detrimental to your progress.

Consider one of the many different apps out there and try to find one that hides your completed tasks and allows you to prioritise. You can still double back to old tasks if you want to see what you have completed, but you’ll have the benefit of seeing the list shrink as you face the remaining list.

Common mistake number two: you’re swamping yourself with a host of smaller tasks for the next month – you need to prioritise. Focus on what must be achieved for that day, then start afresh with a new list the following day.

By being proactive in identifying the day’s targets and essential tasks you will put yourself in a positive mindset; you are taking charge of your day. This will help you be more focused in hitting your goals while also being less distracted by external factors. The visual list will help keep you accountable to what you are achieving in the day and will enable you to block necessary slots of time for specific tasks.

What next?

Looking for other ways to save time, improve your efficiency and increase productivity? Our all-round solutions can save you hours of time a day and put you up to three months ahead of your competition.

Book a quick 15-minute call with our team to see how you can spend less time doing business development and get more time to build stronger relationships with candidates and customers. You can also check out some other daily habits that will supercharge your efficiency, at home and at work.