Fridays are typically the most unproductive day of the week, with the exception of the occasional Monday doldrums. By Friday everybody is ready for the weekend and its often just difficult to get into the work rhythm of the first four days of the week. [Cue infomercial voice here] But what if I told you there was a way to make your Fridays productive again? What if there was a way to get even more done Monday through Thursday by doing something a little different on Friday. Well, there is a way and today I’m going to tell you how! [End infomercial voice.]
Okay, so there really is a way to make your days more productive, including I-can’t-wait-until-5pm-Fridays. Its really simple.
Step 1: Find a part of your daily job that actually doesn’t have to be done each and every day.
Step 2: Stop doing that job on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.
Step 3: Do that job on Friday.
Yeah, it’s really that easy. Almost everybody has daily tasks that that need to get done during the week, they just don’t have to be done today. Sometimes these are things that take only a few minutes, sometimes they are things that take an hour or more, but they do add up and sometimes they do bog down productivity as you switch from task to task. By moving many of these tasks to a single day, you can make your other days more productive and create a Friday that stands out from the rest of the week. You now get to do something entirely different on Friday that you don’t do any other day of the week. This makes your Fridays more interesting, and more fun, than the other days of the week.
What tasks you move to Friday are up to you and dependent on your job and ability to do so, but here are some things I do on Friday that I don’t do other days:
Writing: Friday is my day for all my article writing. Most of what I write goes on my blog, but I just save it and post it later. This post, for instance, was written last Friday. Of course, this can’t take the place of time sensitive blogging, etc. but that which isn’t time sensitive can easily be put off. Whenever I get an idea of a topic, I just jot it down and revisit it on Friday to flesh it out.
Backups and Cleanups, etc.: Each Friday I backup all my hard drives, websites and databases. Clean up my computers, etc. Compiled together this takes a good hour of my time and Friday is the perfect day for it.
Filing: Along with my backups I do all my filing, both physical and digital. Throughout the week I put things that need to be filed in a certain location and then on Friday put it all in its proper location.
Pay Bills: I only pay bills once each week. I do this every week and I don’t look at any bills until Friday rolls around. This task doesn’t take much time at all, but when you’re interrupted each day to look at each bill as it comes in the seconds are ticking away. Push that stuff to the side and do it all on Friday.
Meetings: Friday is the day I have all my one-on-one meetings with my employees. Even if you’re not the boss, you can schedule certain type of collaborative meetings and planning sessions, etc. This often changes the office environment quite a bit on Friday. We’re more talkative throughout the day because Friday is a more collaborative day all together. It’s nice.
When you make your Fridays different than any other day of the week you’ll find that Fridays go a lot faster. You won’t be looking at the clock, because you’re not doing the same old job as every other day. Instead, you’ll find that it’s 5pm before you even know it! Instead of coming to work saying “Thank God it’s Friday,” because you can’t wait for the weekend to start, you can come to work and say “Thank God it’s Friday,” because you’re not stuck in the Monday through Thursday routine. And who knows… maybe you won’t be so anxious to leave at 5pm.
So what about you? What can you put off until Friday?