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November 1, 2022Productivity

"Nope!" How I reclaimed my time (and you can too)

  1. 100% async work
  2. Say "No" to just about everything, even if they are nice
  3. Say "No" to phone calls
  4. Don't make a huge to-do list, just try to get 1 big thing done for the day
  5. Set up and maintain email filters. Any new spam emails get through, I set up a filter to get them out of the inbox forever. I stay mostly at inbox zero by default.
  6. Try to get the bulk of my work done when I feel particularly eager to work
  7. Ask for clarifying instructions if someone needs something done. Better than pretending to know what people mean exactly
  8. Over-communicate in emails. Helps prevent time wasted on back and forth chatter.
  9. Screenshot with captions and arrows to show what I'm talking about (Cleanshot X)
  10. Write here in Scribbble - no distractions, 1-click publishing
  11. BlackMagic Twitter toolbar to see who responded to me and respond from there
  12. Schedule Tweets for weeks ahead (Typefully)
  13. If I need to go shopping I take one of my kids if possible (they are always bored, saves me from entertaining them doing nothing).
  14. Work in any spare moment I have when I feel eager to work. As I write this, I'm in-between getting my kid ready for sleep and doing other chores
  15. Practice work sprints. When I'm in the zone I try to power through all of my to-dos one after. Once I'm done with one project / thing, I move on to the next until I run out of time.
  16. Create swipe files for things I revisit often for work (I created Swipe Convert because I was referencing the strategies for clients every day, and Swipe Ecom because I was doing ecom audits and wanted a checklist).
  17. Create products that I wish existed to save me time. I created SaaS Blocks because I needed a good design system and common components. Got the idea for Scribbble and created together with Alex to save me time writing without distractions.
  18. Write blog posts for common questions I get, so I can referencing them instead of explaining from scratch (Scribbble helps a lot with getting them out fast)
  19. Do all of my clothes shopping in one day for the entire year
  20. Pay extra to have groceries delivered once a week for the entire week
  21. Save all of my non-urgent chores for 1 day. Hardware store, fixing things up, deep cleaning, organizing. Sometimes it takes more than a day.
  22. Disable all notifications, phone on silence at all times (saves from constantly being interrupted and checking things).
  23. Delay most things until the last minute. This helps filter what really needs to get done (so I do it last minute), from what doesn't matter (I just end up not doing it).
  24. Never shut down my computer or close browser tabs. This way I can resume where I left off in a matter of seconds.

What techniques do you use to save time?

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