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The Fifty Minute Focus Session – Get More Things Done During the Day

I wanted to share something with you today that has helped me with my productivity and stress levels. You know…the anxiety you feel when you look at your to do list and you get so overwhelmed and wonder “how the hell am I going to get this all done.”

Of course, it doesn’t help when you tend to be a bit of a procrastinator as those of you who have read my BIO can testify.

It’s a technique I learned from marketer, Dean Jackson. He has a podcast called “More Cheese Less Whiskers”. It’s an awesome title especially when you learn the background of how that name came to be. I have linked the podcast episode at the end of this article, where Dean goes into detail about his system. However, if you would like a summary of it and how I use it day to day then read on.

Fifty Minute Focus Session

Dean actually calls it the Fifty Minute Focus Finder. Essentially, he describes it as a way of getting anything you want done…done.

At times we all struggle with productivity or lack of it. Our To Do Lists are so long that some things never get done and they are always shoved on the back burner. Usually these are the hard things. They may be very complex, and we know they will take ages to complete or they maybe things that challenge our inner emotions, like fear.

Either way the feeling of overwhelm can be by debilitating and for some can manifest into a lot of health issues.

So, You Don’t Have Enough Time

That is the number one thing we all say. Not enough time in the day to get everything done!!

Dean, states that the main problem is that during the day we are always responding reactively when we should be more proactive. Let me explain.

There are four key reactive triggers. They are email, the telephone, people and our thoughts. Now, before you roll your eyes and think here we go again, another article about how I need to stop checking email and social media and then everything will be miraculously alright, please hear me out.

Eliminating these distractions are crucial, but you need to put that into context with the whole technique.

Reactive Triggers are the Problem

Email – we start reading emails, we need to reply, we follow links to the internet, we then browse, we get the replies, we have to reply, emails then remind us of other things we need to do or more emails we need to send. The cycle goes on and hours later we are finally ready to start work.

Telephones – they ping – need to check notification, they ring – need to take the call as it could be important, messages come in – have to reply, oh wait you also have your social apps on your phone, let’s see what’s happening!

People – You’re in the office working (checking email) and someone pops in to say Hi or ask for help. Fifteen minutes later you’re back working but now need to spend another five minutes working out where you left off. Just then, you hear another knock on the door…”Hi!”

Now don’t get me wrong, email, making phone calls and interacting with people are all very important, but how much time do we waste each day on these activities?? A quick Google search will tell you that we spend 2-3 hours on email and 3+ hours on the phone, these numbers are conservative, in some studies the length of time is a lot more.

The fourth reactive trigger, our thoughts, is a lot harder to control. Have you ever been “lost in thought?” One thought triggers another and it may seem like only a small amount of time has elapsed, until you check the time. Doh!

Even when we want to do some serious work, our thoughts can easily take us out of the flow state and hinder productivity.

So how do we control our thoughts? Well, this is where the structure of the fifty minute focus session really shines.

Fifty Minute Focus Session – The Steps Involved

Firstly, you should start scheduling time to play GOLF. Yep, you read that right…GOLF.

G – Have your Goals (tasks) you want to achieve all set out.
O – Set up an Optimum environment,
L – with Limited distractions
F – Have a Fixed timeframe. In our case this is 50 minutes.

Let’s break that down. Your optimal environment with limited distractions equates to a quiet space that inspires creativity and has no phone, email or other apps open. A browser tab dedicated to only what you need for the next fifty minutes and a sign on the door saying, “Do Not Disturb.”

Set a 50 minute timer and work on one predetermined task for those 50 minutes.

So, what about your actual goals or tasks?

These will be generated in your first 50 minutes. Grab a pen and several sheets of paper. For the next 50 minutes write down everything you need to get done and I mean everything. If this includes getting milk, then write it down.

What you will find is that during the first 10 minutes or so you will be writing a lot of reactive things down…the everyday stuff. Soon, however you will be going deep into the things you need to do in your business and personal life. These will be the proactive things. Those tasks that will move the needle in the direction of success, whatever success means to you.

Write everything down. This is a massive brain dump. At the end of it you are going to feel really good because now, everything you need to do is on these pieces of paper and not rattling around in your brain as random thoughts stressing you out.

Remember how I said that controlling your thoughts is the hardest reactive trigger to overcome? Well by doing this you go a long way in settling those thoughts because you can tell yourself, “Hey, I don’t need to think about that right now because I’ve written it down on my list.”

Now what do you do with that mega list? Set up another 50 minutes session and start grouping them, prioritising them etc. For instance, do you have half a dozen or so easy tasks that are related? Group them and do them in another 50 minute session.

Do you have complex tasks? Then break them apart into smaller tasks.

For this to work it is important that you know what task you are going to work on before each session. Don’t spend the first 10 minutes deciding what to do.

Don’t get overwhelmed with your mega list. Just keep doing each 50 minute session with a clear objective. You’ll be surprised with what you can achieve in 50 minutes. We rarely work this long uninterrupted. At first it might be hard because you need those distractions to break the time up. Resist this. Set your timer and work until it goes off.

Some other tips. Try this first thing in the morning. Generally, your brain is at its peak performance then and hasn’t had the chance of absorbing a day’s worth of issues like it would if this was done in the afternoon.

Also, start your sessions before you go into reactive mode. That means before you start checking email, social media or making phone calls.

Once you start becoming adept at single 50 minute focus sessions then start blocking out 2 hour chunks of your day, 50-20-50 minutes. Back-to-back 50 minute focus sessions with a 20 minute break in between. During that 20 minutes disengage from everything work related and do something that clears your head.

The 50 minute focus session stops you from multitasking. There is no such thing as multitasking. Basically, what you are doing is just continually switching between two tasks rapidly. The overall effect is taking longer to complete both tasks when compared to doing them separately.

I am sure if you give this technique a crack you will see massive gains in your business and personal life and an overall reduction in stress levels. Pretty soon those major projects that you have been holding off from tackling because they were just “too difficult”, will be well on the way to being complete.

Here’s to your success.
Warren

Reference:
The More Cheese Less Whiskers Podcast Episode 155