The 3 Most Important Rules Of Productivity (and Their Psychological Keys)
It is well known that in the work and business spheres, the term “productivity” is one of the most important and used; Ultimately, it is one of the main indicators that show the good or bad performance of any system that generates goods or services: whether it is an organization or a particular worker along with their materials.
However, it is of little use to estimate the extent to which we are being productive if we do not know the main psychological phenomena involved that explain our success or failure when trying to reach the objectives that we have set in this regard.
Luckily, there are already several principles that can help us when optimizing work processes; In this article we will see some of them, through a review of the most important productivity rules
In economics, productivity is the relationship between the total productive activity and the means or resources invested to achieve said activity in a given period taking into account the measurement of the quality of what is produced.
These resources can be of a different nature and can be measured based on different factors, such as the time invested, in the case of personal productivity, or, in the business field, based on workers, natural resources, infrastructure or the capital necessary to achieve a certain productive activity.
Productivity is, therefore, a necessary indicator to know if the viability of the productive activity is greater or less The more resources used to produce X quantities of product in a period, the lower the productivity will be, and vice versa.
This general indicator serves, in turn, to estimate the exact productivity of each worker, each machinery or each portion of cultivated land, very necessary information used by companies and workers to improve their work performance and detect failures in certain parts of the work sequence.
What are the main rules of productivity?
Over the last century, experts in different disciplines have proposed the existence of a series of principles or regularities that govern the productivity of any type of entity dedicated to work
These are the so-called productivity rules; Knowing them is of great help to enhance aspects such as efficiency when working and even to generate a good work environment thanks to good time management.
These rules are usually expressed in a simple way, practically in the form of aphorisms, and can be considered advice to apply not only in formal work but in any human activity, in which we apply effort, resources or even investments.
However, Beyond their appearance of belonging to the world of logic, they describe material realities Here we will learn about the 3 most notable: the Pareto principle, Parkinson’s law and the two-minute law.
1. Pareto Principle
“20% of the actions give 80% of the results.”
The Pareto principle was stated by the Italian economist and philosopher Vilfredo Pareto in 1907, and postulates that Greater results can be obtained by investing less time and fewer resources This implies, among other things, that putting more money and resources into an activity does not have to translate into significant improvement, and that it is often relatively easy to obtain much better results without spending more.
This advice can be very useful for workers who want to improve their productivity in a crisis context in which it is necessary to cut budgets, and emphasizes that better planning during the day and detecting efficiency errors is key. Although it is paradoxical, continuing to spend is the easy solution, because we have already been working like this and at the present moment we are imbued with the inertia of habits
2. Parkinson’s Law
“The work expands until it fills all the available time.”
This law was stated in 1957 by the British historian Cyril Northcote Parkinson and states that each job is usually carried out depending on the time one has available
This means that if we have little time to carry out a task, we will finish it in less time; and if, on the other hand, we have more time, we will finish that work in a longer time.
Our way of working adapts to our perception of the work day. Taking this into account can help us improve time management and better organize our calendar. For example, one of the implications of this law of productivity is that It is almost always better to have many simple short-term goals than one general medium or long-term goal since in the first case we will be creating a context that predisposes us to make good use of all the time available for the final objective.
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The consultant and productivity expert, David Allen, is the creator of the productivity method “Getting Things Done”, where he proposes this and other highly useful precepts. Without a doubt, a very necessary precept especially for people who must carry out multiple tasks of a different nature during their work day. It has a lot to do with self-motivation and work strategies designed to combat procrastination : Downtime has a lot of potential, it is not an excuse to do nothing.
Are you looking for professional psychological assistance?
If you are interested in having psychological assistance applied to the world of work performance or stress management linked to your projects, I encourage you to contact me I am a psychologist specialized in the cognitive-behavioral model and I have been working for many years for individuals, professionals and companies as a consultant. I offer my services in person in Madrid, and also online.
