15 surprising things productive people do differently
I recently interviewed over 200 ultra-productive people including seven billionaires, 13 Olympians, 20 straight-A students and over 200 successful entrepreneurs. I asked a simple, open-ended question, “What is your number one secret to productivity?” After analyzing all of their responses, I coded their answers into 15 unique ideas.
近期採訪了超過200位擁有超凡表現的人，其中包括7位億萬富翁，13位奧運會選手，20位高材生和200多位成功企業家。問了他們一個簡單的開放式問題:“你能保持高效工作的最主要秘訣是什麼？”經過分析，將他們給出的答案歸類為15種。
ృ Secret #1: They focus on minutes, not hours.
秘訣1：細分時間
Average performers default to hours and half-hour blocks on their calendar. Highly successful people know there are 1,440 minutes in every day and there is nothing more valuable than time. Money can be lost and made again, but time spent can never be reclaimed. As legendary Olympic gymnast Shannon Miller told me, “To this day, I keep a schedule that is almost minute by minute.” You must master your minutes to master your life.
普通工作者們的日程表上都是默認以整點和半點來劃分時段的，而那些成功人士不同。他們知道，每一天都由1440分鐘組成，每一分鐘都是最寶貴的財富。錢不夠了還能再掙，時間一去可不會回頭。大名鼎鼎的奧運體操運動員香農•米勒告訴我說:“直到今天，我的日程表還是按分秒來記。”你要能夠通過把握每一分鐘，來掌控你的整個生活。
ృ Secret #2: They focus only on one thing.
秘訣2：專注一件事
Ultra productive people know their Most Important Task (MIT) and work on it for one to two hours each morning, without interruptions. Tom Ziglar, CEO of Ziglar Inc., shared, “Invest the first part of your day working on your number one priority that will help build your business.” What task will have the biggest impact on reaching your goal? What accomplishment will get you promoted at work?
擁有超凡表現的人都清楚自己的首要任務，並且會在接下來的每個早晨，用一到兩個小時去完成它，期間絕不分心。齊格勒公司的首席執行官湯姆•齊格勒分享了他的成功經驗:“將一天的開始分配給你最首要的任務，這有助於你事業的發展。”什麼樣的任務最有助於你完成目標？什麼樣的成就有助於你在工作中穩步提升？
ృ Secret #3: They don’t use to-do lists.
秘訣3：廢除任務清單
Throw away your to-do list; instead schedule everything on your calendar. It turns out only 41% of items on to-do lists are ever actually done. And all those undone items lead to stress and insomnia because of the Zeigarnik effect. Highly productive people put everything on their calendar and then work and live from that calendar. “Use a calendar and schedule your entire day into 15-minute blocks. It sounds like a pain, but this will set you up in the 95th percentile…”, advises the co-founder of The Art of Charm, Jordan Harbinger.
把你的任務清單丟掉吧，因為事實證明這上面最終只有41%的任務會被圓滿完成；而且由於蔡格尼克記憶效應，剩下的那些未完成的任務將成為你焦慮和失眠的元兇。所以，你應該好好安排你的日程表。作為高效率人士，他們會把所有事都寫在日程上，然後將它放到一邊，繼續自己的工作生活。魅力藝術網站的創始人之一喬丹•哈賓格建議道：“把你一天的計畫以每15分鐘為單位劃分，這聽起來很頭疼，但可以讓你省出95%的時間。”
ృ Secret #4: They beat procrastination with time travel.
秘訣4：著眼當下
Your future self can’t be trusted. That’s because we are “time inconsistent.” We buy veggies today because we think we’ll eat healthy salads all week; then we throw out green rotting mush in the future. I bought P90x because I think I’m going to start exercising vigorously and yet the box sits unopened one year later. What can you do now to make sure your future self does the right thing? Anticipate how you will self-sabotage in the future, and come up with a solution to defeat your future self.
我們對自己未來的判斷是不可信的，因為誰都不會是永恆不變的。舉例來說，我們今天買了一些蔬菜，想著這一周都要吃健康的沙拉。然而最後綠菜葉都爛成了一堆，我們不得已全都丟掉；我買了一盒“90天魔鬼訓練”健身DVD（P90x），想著自己要開始每天鍛煉身體。然而那個盒子放了一年，也沒有被我打開過。我們該怎麼做才能保證上面的情況不會出現？那就是做好最壞的打算，想個對策解決當下，而不是拖給未來。
ృ Secret #5: They make it home for dinner.
秘訣5：回家吃飯
I first learned this from Intel’s Andy Grove, “There is always more to be done, more that should be done, always more than can be done.” Highly successful people know what they value in life. Yes, work, but also what else they value. There is no right answer, but for many, values include: family time, exercise, giving back. They consciously allocate their 1,440 minutes a day to each area they value (i.e., they put it on their calendar) and then they stick to the schedule.
第一次向我談起這個的是英特爾前CEO安迪•格魯夫，他說：“我們總有很多該做的事、想做的事，但我們能夠做到的事很少。”成功人士都瞭解自己生命中最重要東西的是什麼。工作很重要，但這不是唯一。重要的東西有很多，並沒有一個標準答案：家庭時間，鍛煉身體，回饋社會。他們將自己每天1440分鐘分配給了他們認為重要的東西（比如將它們寫在日程上），然後堅持完成他們的計畫。
ృ Secret #6: They use a notebook.
秘訣6：攜帶筆記本
Richard Branson has said on more than one occasion that he wouldn’t have been able to build Virgin without a simple notebook, which he takes with him wherever he goes. In one interview, Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis said, “Always carry a notebook. Write everything down…That is a million dollar lesson they don’t teach you in business school!” Ultra-productive people free their mind by writing everything down.
理查•布蘭森曾不止一次說過，他和筆記本形影不離，沒有他就沒有維珍公司。在一次採訪中，希臘航運巨頭亞里斯多德•奧納西斯也說：“隨身帶個筆記本，隨時記下任何事……你在任何商學院都學不到！”高效率的人通過記錄發生的所有事情，解放了自己的思想。
ృ Secret #7: They process email only a few times a day.
秘訣7：少看郵件
Ultra-productive people don’t “check” email throughout the day. They don’t respond to each vibration or ding to see who has intruded their inbox. Instead, like everything else, they schedule time to process their email quickly and efficiently. For some that’s only once a day, for me, it’s morning, noon and night.
高效率的人不會一整天都在流覽郵件，也不會一接收到提示就去查看是誰發來郵件。相反，他們會安排特定時間迅速高效地處理這些郵件。對一些人來說可能是一天一次，我自己則會在早中晚各查看一次。
ృ Secret #8: They avoid meetings at all costs.
秘訣8：推掉無意義的會議
When I asked Mark Cuban to give me his best productivity advice, he quickly responded, “Never take meetings unless someone is writing a check.” Meetings are notorious time killers. They start late, have the wrong people in them, meander in their topics and run long. You should get out of meetings whenever you can, hold fewer of them yourself, and if you do run a meeting, keep it short.
當我向馬克•庫班尋求建議時，他很快告訴我：“別去參加亂七八糟的會議，除非有人給錢。”有些會議是時間殺手人盡皆知，它們開始得遲，參會人員也亂，討論話題漫無目的，持續得倒是很久。只要你可以推掉就別去開什麼會了，會議主持得越少越好。如果迫不得已必須上陣，無需贅言，點到即可。
ృ Secret #9: They say “no” to almost everything.
秘訣9：幾乎所有事情都可拒絕
Billionaire Warren Buffet once said, “The difference between successful people and very successful people is that very successful people say ‘no’ to almost everything.” And James Altucher colorfully gave me this tip,“If something is not a “hell, YEAH! Then it’s a “no!”
億萬富翁華倫•巴菲特曾說：“成功者和更成功者的差異在於，更成功者懂得拒絕幾乎任何事。”詹姆斯•阿爾圖切爾說得更為形象：“如果說的不是‘當然’，那就是‘不’！”
Remember, you only have 1,440 minutes in every day. Don’t give them away easily.
記住，你每天只有1440分鐘可以使用。好鋼要用在刀刃上。
ృ Secret #10: They follow the 80/20 rule.
秘訣10：遵守80/20原則
Known as the Pareto Principle, in most cases 80% of outcomes come from only 20% of activities. Ultra-productive people know which activities drive the greatest results, and focus on those and ignore the rest.
大家都知道帕累托法則，即多數情況下，結果的80%只取決於20%的投入。高效率的人瞭解什麼樣的投入能得到最大的產出，因此他們只專注於這部分的投入。
ృ Secret #11: They delegate almost everything.
秘訣11：委託任務
Ultra-productive people don’t ask, “How can I do this task?” Instead they ask, “How can this task get done?” They take the “I” out of it as much as possible. Ultra-productive people don’t have control issues and they are not micro-managers. In many cases good enough is, well, good enough.
高效率工作的人不會去問“我該如何完成這項任務？”，相反，他們會問“這項任務怎麼完成？”他們盡可能將“自己”排除在任務之外，不是控制狂，也不會事必躬親。在很多情況下，任務完成得足夠好就行。
ృ Secret #12: They theme days of the week.
秘訣12：分批完成每週工作
Highly successful people often theme days of the week to focus on major areas. For decades I’ve used “Mondays for Meetings” and make sure I’m doing one-on-one check-ins with each direct report. My Friday afternoons are themed around financials and general administrative items that I want to clean up before the new week starts. I’ve previously written about Jack Dorsey’s work themes, which enable him to run two companies at once. Batch your work to maximize your efficiency and effectiveness.
成功人士通常會將一個星期劃分開，用來處理不同的工作專案。幾十年來，我一直都將星期一定做開會日，對直接彙報做一對一的評價。我的星期五下午通常用來處理經濟和相關行政事宜，因為我想在新的一周開始前解決掉這周所有的事務。我曾寫過傑克•多西的每週規劃，這個規劃使他能夠同時管理好兩家公司。像這樣分批次處理工作能最大程度地提高你的工作效率。
ృ Secret #13: They touch things only once.
秘訣13： 隨手小事當即完成
How many times have you opened a piece of regular mail—a bill perhaps—and then put it down only to deal with it again later? How often do you read an email, and then close it and leave it in your inbox to deal with later? Highly successful people try to “touch it once.” If it takes less than five or ten minutes—whatever it is—they’ll deal with it right then and there. It reduces stress since it won’t be in the back of their mind, and is more efficient since they won’t have to re-read or evaluate the item again in the future.
你會打開一封普通郵件或是一份帳單幾次？你會看完接著合上放到以後再處理嗎？你會多久去流覽一次電子郵件，接著關掉等以後再處理？成功人士只會做一次。不管是什麼，只要事情能在五到十分鐘內被解決，他們就會立刻處理。既然事情已經解決，他們也就無需顧慮；這樣同時還提高了效率，因為他們以後不必再重新考量這些事情。
ృ Secret #14: They practice a consistent morning routine.
秘訣14：堅持良好的晨間作息
My single greatest surprise while interviewing over 200 highly successful people was how many of them wanted to share their morning ritual with me. Hal Elrod, author of The Miracle Morning, told me, “While most people focus on ‘doing’ more to achieve more, The Miracle Morning is about focusing on ‘becoming’ more so that you can start doing less, to achieve more.” While I heard about a wide variety of habits, most people I interviewed nurtured their body in the morning with water, a healthy breakfast and light exercise. They nurtured their mind with meditation or prayer, inspirational reading, and journaling.
最讓我吃驚的是，在我採訪的超過200位成功人士中，有不少人想同我分享他們的晨間作息。《魔法早晨》的作者哈爾•埃爾羅德就告訴我說：“當大多數人還在關注多勞多得時，《魔法早晨》通過關注早晨的生活變化，幫助人們少做也能多得。”在我通過採訪瞭解到的各色習慣中，有很多人會在早晨喝杯水，吃一頓健康的早餐，然後做少量運動來保持身體健康 ；他們還會通過冥想或是禱告，讀點勵志故事，寫寫日記來豐富自己的精神生活。
ృ Secret #15: Energy is everything.
秘訣15：活力就是一切
You can’t make more minutes in the day, but you can increase your energy which will increase your attention, focus, decision making, and overall productivity. Highly successful people don’t skip meals, sleep or breaks in the pursuit of more, more, more. Instead, they view food as fuel, sleep as recovery, and pulse and pause with “work sprints”.
你不能給自己多加一分鐘，但你可以給自己增添活力。有了活力，你能夠提高注意力，集中精神，果斷決策，進而全面提高自己的辦事效率。成功人士不會犧牲吃飯睡覺以及零散的休息時間去追求更多的效益。相反，他們視食物為燃料，會借睡眠恢復體力，勞逸結合去衝刺工作。
Tying It All Together
總結
You might not be an entrepreneur, Olympian, or millionaire—or even want to be—but their secrets just might help you to get more done in less time, and help you to stop feeling so overworked and overwhelmed.
你也許不是、也沒考慮過要成為企業家、奧運選手或是百萬富翁，但這些秘訣同樣可以幫助你事半功倍。從此，你將不再為整天忙忙碌碌卻勞而無功所困擾。
【Vocabulary】
sabotage: 妨害；對…採取破壞行動
文章來源：高效工作的15個秘訣
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