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Motivation is a topic that has fascinated psychologists and big business for years, but what exactly is it, and how can it be of use in the work environment?

It’s a driving force that propels us to act, in order to achieve our aims and objectives. It is also more than a mere wish or desire. When someone lacks motivation the chances are the job won’t get done. For example, we’re all aware of a New Year’s Resolution to lose weight, or give up smoking. It started out so optimistically after Christmas, yet by mid January had been abandoned forever or at least until next year.

The simple truth is, most people can’t succeed with willpower alone and so, exactly how do you motivate yourself? First, you need to want it badly enough, or it won’t work. Be it money, promotion, success, or even just going home at the end of the day satisfied you did the best you could. Once you know what motivates you and you’re enthused, there are things you can do to keep the momentum going, these usually involve working with your emotions and utilising the imagination.

1. Work out what you’re looking to achieve and write it down. Putting the goal on paper makes it more real.

2. Direct your energy there by visualizing and thinking about your goal. Just as a top sports person will mentally prepare before the big race, to increase their chance of success, so can you.

3. Think about what you’ll gain by fulfilling your goals and imagine how good that will feel.

4. Picture your new improved life once you’ve started achieving the things you desire. This might be increased popularity, promotion, money or whatever appeals to you.

5. Search out likeminded individuals either in the company, on-line, or through reading material. It’s always easier to get there with support, knowing you’re not on your own.

6. Take action now and start the ball rolling. It’s the little steps that take you there. Everybody thinks it’s the grandiose gestures that make the difference, but it simply isn’t true, small steps lead to success.

Motivation really is the vehicle that can drive success into every area of your life. So figure out what motivates you and exploit it to its full potential!

Sometimes the best solutions are so simple and obvious that they’re completely overlooked.
Take the whole notion of accomplishing tasks. People build up all sorts of complex systems for accomplishing their tasks, but quite often that amounts to putting the cart before the horse. Why? Because before you can set about doing a really good job of accomplishing tasks, you’ve got to know what they are.

Sure, you may identify 5 or 6 red-hot things you’ve absolutely got to do today or this week, writing them down and crossing them off one by one. But there are probably dozens and dozens of other tasks waiting for your attention. Things at home or at work that you’ve been procrastinating about. Things you intend to do and want to do, but which somehow get pushed to a back burner. Things you don’t want to do but really must do. And they’re all lodged in your consciousness, sapping bits and pieces of your attention every moment of the day.

So, then: one of the best ways to maintain focus is to know what all those niggling tasks are. Once you identify them and have them secured tightly into a list, they can’t nag you or dilute your concentration.
The way you keep track of those pesky tasks? With a Mindsweep!

There are various ways to accomplish a Mindsweep, but one of the most popular is just to spend quiet time alone with a pencil and notebook (or a computer), writing down each  and every task you can think of. The first time you do this, it might take an hour or more. Over the next few days, maybe even weeks, other tasks will occur to you. Standing in your kitchen you might remember that you have to change the faucet’s washer; entering the produce market, you’ll be reminded to buy a sustainable cloth bag so that you don’t keep polluting the planet with the store’s plastic bags. It will take a while, yes, but once your major task list is accomplished it’s just a matter of maintenance.

You’ll find many “trigger lists” on the Web that can help you identify tasks. Here’s a good one from GTD Portal.

The other day, while doing some research on the Internet, I stumbled across the best and most concise description ever of what it means to be productive. But what’s particularly terrific about this little ditty is that it’s kind to those of us trying to do our best. It allows for the fact that we’re human. We can’t be perfect every day. We make mistakes. But nonetheless, we continue striving. In other words, it’s a Zen approach to productivity. I’m passing it along now:

Now is better than later.
Later is better than never.
Organized is better than messy.
Big things are composed by smaller things.
Smaller things are done by action.
Think like a person of action.
Act like a person of thought.
The beginning is half of every action.
The longest journey starts with the first step.
Everything should be made as simple as possible.
But not simpler.
Celebrate any progress.
Don’t wait to get perfect.
Deadlines and stress are a part of life.

Thanks so much to todoist for posting this great advice.

Over the weekend I read a small book by Robert Maurer entitled One Small Step Can Change Your Life: The Kaizen Way (Workman Publishing, 2004). A psychologist, Maurer has focused much of his career on the study and implementation of success systems relating to change. In other words: how people succeed in making/maintaining changes—anything from losing weight to transforming yourself into an effective CEO or public speaker.

Maurer describes the typical western approach to change as a “drastic” process targeted to a quick turnaround, one in which you aim to obtain the biggest results in the smallest amount of time. He uses the business school term innovation to describe this process, which, he says, often doesn’t work in the long term.

Contrast this with the alternative strategy of kaizen, which consists of small steps compounding and eventually leading to much larger results. According to Maurer, kaizen actually got its start in the U. S. around 1940, with the realization that the country had to implement large-scale production of military equipment in factories that had been producing refrigerators, automobiles, and the like. One government course taught at factories urged mangers to make continuous small improvements toward changing to a war footing.

After the war, this philosophy was transported to Japan by American occupation forces, and it played a big part in that country’s recovery: one company that used kaizen with great success was Toyota. “As you probably know,” writes Maurer, “Japanese businesses—which rebuilt themselves on the bedrock of small steps—soon rocketed to unheard-of levels of productivity. Small steps were so successful that the Japanese gave them a name of their own: kaizen.” (In Japanese, kaizen means “continuous improvement.”)

But what interests me here is not the war, or Japan, or even kaizen. I’m intrigued by the concept and history of those small steps.

To me the most powerful tenet of Getting Things Done is in breaking down a large task into small, take-action steps. That’s an extremely simple but powerful idea, and it’s made GTD quite popular of late. This  breaking down just makes sense. There’s something you have to do, but it seems so overwhelming that you can’t get started. So you break that great big task into little task pieces. You pick up the first task—quite manageable now that it’s bite-sized—and accomplish it. Then you pick up the next.

The thing is, people have always known about the value of small steps. In his book, Maurer twice quotes the 6th century BC Chinese philosopher, Lao Tzu:

• A journey of a thousand miles must begin with the first step.

• Confront the difficult when it is still easy: Accomplish the great task by a series of small acts.

Some people think Lao Tzu actually lived in the 4th rather than 6th Century BC. But anyway you slice it, be it 8000 or 6000 years ago, the sage was Getting Things Done.

Maurer quotes others, of all different backgrounds, throughout the book. My two favorites are the great basketball coach, John Wooden (”Don’t look for the big, quick improvement. Seek the small improvement one day at a time. That’s the only way it happens—and when it happens, it lasts.”) and the writer, John Steinbeck (”When I face the desolate impossibility of writing 500 pages, a sick sense of failure falls on me, and I know I can  never do it. Then gradually, I write one page and then another. One days’ work is all that I can permit myself to contemplate.”).

So simple, so easy, so powerful: break it down into small steps and you’ll get it done. And yet we humans have a hard time adhering to this advice. I don’t know why…do you?

We’d all like to get the most out of our busy schedules; however, the simple things we could do to make our days more efficient usually lay before us undetected. Likewise, everyone has regular access to computers and mobiles in the office, but quite often we forget to take full advantage of them. By using some simple and obvious applications, we can make our working days less stressful, more productive and focused.

• Set up filters for your email account. This way you’ll avoid being bombarded with hundreds of mail at once, they’ll be divided into relevant categories and can read at your convenience.
• Use whatever organizing tools you have available. Most people have access to these on their computers or mobiles, but instead tend to scribble notes on scraps of paper, only to then waste time ferreting around looking for them.
• Make use of shortcuts. To avoid repeatedly expanding folder after folder on your computer, try adding a shortcut so you can easily retrieve the items you routinely need with a single click.
• Utilise the ‘ messenger’ status button. If you’re in the middle of an important project and don’t want interruptions, set yourself as ‘busy’ or ‘ unavailable.’ If somebody is really desperate to contact you, they can always send an email or yell across the office.
• Close unused programmes. Open only the applications you are using and avoid the constant Alt-Tabbing. There’s no need for unused stuff going on in the background. Give your computer a rest.
• Make use of favourites when online. When you come across an interesting site that you know you’ll use again, add it to your favourites and then categorize it into a relevant folder.
• Set up your mobile to receive email. Most phones have the facility, but we’ve just not bothered to set it up. This ensures you’re bang up to date 24^7. .

So before you head off to the bookshop or the Internet looking for inspirational ways to increase output and make life easier, first take a look at the small changes that can help to pave the way to success.

As Stevie Wonder once said, ‘We all have the ability. The difference is how we use it.’

Quick question: What day of the week do you work best?

Fifty-seven percent of respondents–nearly six in ten–chose Tuesday as the most productive day, echoing similar surveys conducted in prior years. Only 3% chose Friday (no surprise there).

Unfortunately for productivity, not every day is Tuesday. But here are some tips for maximizing productivity on each of the work week’s other days–even on Friday, when most of us are distracted with thoughts of the coming weekend.

It may seem like the connection between productivity in the work place and the daily grind of a working mother are miles apart. However, some of the strategies used for getting things done in business can be found in many places, even suburbia.

Housewife Bree is the envy of all her friends, mainly because she has it all. She’s immaculately dressed, friendly, popular and has a perfect home and family life. Yet unknown to her friends, the secret of her success lies in the form of 5 simple rules, which she has followed religiously since leaving college.

1. She always gets up early, believing that a ‘stitch in time really does save nine’. So while some of her friends are having a well-deserved lie in, Bree has already made a start on her routine chores.
2. As is the case with all of us, there are only so many hours in a day, and so recognizing and prioritising what’s most important each day is essential. There’s little point turning up mentally prepared if you’re still wearing your pyjamas! To help her out she keeps a notepad that she uses to keep track of everything that needs to be done.
3. Likewise, focus is key and avoiding being distracted and sidetracked is an art in itself and it was only after months of practise this finally began to work for her. The first thing she does every morning now is to copy the tasks for the day from her notepad onto a separate list so she knows exactly what needs to be done for the day.
4. Once she gets going there can be no interruptions. The answer machine will greet anybody who tries to call, until she’s good and ready. This may seem a bit excessive, but all her girlfriends know they’ll catch up with her later.
5. Finally, she understands that it’s a myth to think you can successfully multi task and produce perfection simultaneously. Experience has taught her that it’s better to successfully complete each task individually, than to mass-produce mediocre results.

And so there you have it, five ideas and a simple routine that will make your day feel so much more organized and will help you to feel more focused and productive - from the perspective of a not so desperate working mum.

Nearly three decades ago, Tom Peters co-authored a book that became one of the biggest-selling business books of all time: In Search of Excellence. One of its eight underlying excellence principles was: “Take Action.” In other words, Get Things Done.

Peters hasn’t slowed down a whit over the years. He’s still writing best-selling books, consulting on numerous topics, winning international awards, flying across the planet to give talks… Definitely a man on the go. The personal symbol he utilizes on his website and books—a fat red exclamation point—is quite apt.

Peters once put together a list of his 41 favorite quotes to help others “ruminate on where you’ve been, and where you might go.”

To start off the New Year, here are a lucky fourteen of Tom Peters’ treasures:

• “We have a ’strategic’ plan. It’s called doing things.”—Herb Kelleher, Founder of Southwest Airlines
• “If you can’t state your position in eight words or less, you don’t have a position.”—Seth Godin
• “It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.”—Charles Darwin
• “We may not be interested in chaos but chaos is interested in us.”—Robert Cooper, The Breaking of Nations: Order and Chaos in the Twenty-First Century
• “If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.”—General Eric Shinseki, retired Chief of Staff, U. S. Army
• “If things seem under control, you’re just not going fast enough.”—Mario Andretti
• “I guess it comes down to a simple choice, really. Get busy living, or get busy dying.”–-The Shawshank Redemption (Tim Robbins’ character)
• “You are the storyteller of your own life, and you can create your own legend or not.”—Isabel Allende
• “Nobody can prevent you from choosing to be exceptional.”—Mark Sanborn, The Fred Factor
• “Do one thing every day that scares you.”—Eleanor Roosevelt
• “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”—Mary Oliver
• “Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.”—Helen Keller
• “Make your life itself a creative work of art.”—Mike Ray, The Highest Goal
• “Dream as if you’ll live forever. Live as if you’ll die today.”—James Dean