Top 10 Productivity Tips

Need to stop procrastinating and get something done? Follow these steps to help you get your task complete ASAP!

1. Check your email. There might be an important message you need to read. Until you have read all your email, your mind will not be clear enough to get anything done.
2. Open Twitter and read through at least 100 status updates. Perhaps someone you follow is being productive and tweeting about it. This will motivate you to be productive as well.
3. Open Facebook and read the latest news feed from the past 48 hours (or until caught up). Perhaps an old friend you haven't seen in years is doing something cool or important and this will provide motivation for you.
4. Check your RSS aggregator. I recommend Google Reader. There may be a really good article you need to read that will help you be more productive today.
5. Check any statistics that might be relevant or interesting. These could include: website analytics, affiliate commission reports, bank account balances, <shameless_plug>Inzolo envelope balances</shamelss_plug>, sports team stats & highlights, etc.
6. Check the most recent news. You can do this by looking at news.google.com, or through your favorite local television, radio, or newspaper site. There might be exciting news that wasn't covered in Twitter or Facebook that you don't want to miss. If so, be sure to share this news on Twitter and Facebook.
7. Get something to eat. By now you are probably hungry. Get something that you can eat while sitting in front of your computer. Just type with one hand. You can still be productive.
8. Get "fun" out of the way. If you have any favorite games, play them for a bit to get the fun out of your system. You are about to get into some not-so-fun work, so might as well get it in now. If you don't have any favorite games, try one of the following: Solitaire, Minesweeper, Bejeweled, Zuma's Revenge, Plants vs Zombies, or whatever happens to be pre-installed on your operating system.
9. Help others. While getting your stuff done may sound appealing, help others first and your stuff will take care of itself. You can do this by answering stack overflow questions, hanging out on relevant IRC channels, and responding to questions on Google Groups & other forums. Remember, you're not only helping others, your gaining karma and in some cases POINTS so take the time to get give well researched answers. Oh, and be sure to stay logged in to all instant messaging protocols (Google Talk, YIM, AIM, MSN IM, Jabber, Facebook Chat, etc). You want to make sure that you are there for questions your friends and co-workers have at a moment's notice.
10. Write a blog post sharing your own favorite productivity tips so all can benefit from your experiences (good & bad).