5 beliefs that limit productivity—and how to overcome them

When I work with people in my business productivity practice, the first question I ask them is, "What's stopping you from being more productive?" The answers that keep coming up are pretty much the same from everyone.

In this article, we'll take a look at these beliefs one by one, and see how you can turn them around.

1. There's too much information coming at me too fast

Belief: My e-mail is overwhelming me. I can't keep up with it.
Reality: The volume of e-mail isn't the issue. How you process and organize the volume is the issue. Learning how to better manage your e-mail by using McGhee Productivity Solutions' "Four D's for Decision Making" will transform this belief.
Each year we receive more and more data from a growing array of devices, which can be accessed from an increasing number of locations. If you're not careful, the quantity of data starts to drive you instead of the other way around. Learn 4 ways you can take control of your e-mail Inbox. And when you do, you can reduce the number of messages in your inbox by as much as 80 percent.

2. I have to keep everything

Belief: I have to keep everything. You just never know when you might need it!
Reality: Okay, prepare yourself. On average, the clients we work with throw away 50 percent of their stored information, with no ramifications. They feel lighter, happier, and have more time. So if you're a "keeper," and you know who you are, hold on to your hats! You "keepers" are a proud and experienced breed! There's nothing quite like laying your hands on a file that no one else can find. It justifies all of your filing and keeping efforts. If you're a keeper, you might recognize yourself in one of these statements:

• 
  I got badly burned when I couldn't lay my hands on an important document. Now, I'm afraid to let go of information.
  
• 
  I want to be able to justify the decisions I make, so I keep everything.
  
• 
  If my system crashes, I want backup information.
  
• 
  I felt so good when no one else could find "that document." As a result, I decided to keep everything so I could continue being useful.
  

At some point you made a decision about keeping all your information. That decision has been driving you ever since, but it may not be appropriate in your current situation.
The truth is, most people use only 15 percent of what they file, and this makes the other 85 percent ineffective. You can read about one way to develop a functional filing system in my Create an Effective Reference System article. By clarifying what is useful and letting go of the rest, you can reduce your filing, make it easier to find what you do keep, and save valuable time and energy that you can direct to more meaningful tasks. Also, learn 7 tips to help you manage your files better.

3. Organization cramps my freedom and creativity

Belief: Being organized blocks my creativity, and there's nothing spontaneous about it.
Reality: Organization actually fosters and supports creativity and spontaneity. You may find your creativity being disrupted by the non-stop flood of reminders spinning around your head, such as:

• 
  Call Kevin for his birthday
  
• 
  Review the P&L spreadsheet
  
• 
  Review PowerPoint slide deck
  
• 
  Decide on a Valentine's Day present
  

Imagine if you could clear your mind of all these lists and transfer them to Microsoft Office Outlook. You can do this by putting them in the TaskPad. This will create space for new ideas and creative thinking. Being disorganized can also stifle your creativity. Imagine you're an artist and decide to paint the Colorado autumn colors in Aspen. You drive for three and a half hours from Denver to Aspen to find the perfect spot. When you arrive, you realize you've forgotten to pack your paint brushes. That can make being creative really hard! Preparation does support your creativity.
When your calendar is booked and leaves no time to be spontaneous, this can be frustrating. However, if you pre-plan, you can block out large chunks of time with no organized events, giving you more freedom to do something on the spur of the moment.
To get control of all the "stuff" in your life, I recommend you set up an Integrated Management System (IMS). An IMS gives you a methodology for storing reference information, turning action information into tasks, and scheduling tasks on your calendar. After you've set up your IMS, you'll find that it will support your creativity and spontaneity. The best result is being able to close your system, knowing that everything is taken care of so you can relax and let go!

4. There's not enough time in the day!

Belief: I just don't have the time to do all the things I want.
Reality: Time is not the issue. The issue is deciding what you can do given the time you have.
As you know, managing your time with Olympian skill doesn't create more hours in the day. We all have the same 24 hours, so the issue isn't managing time—it's managing what you can do with the time you have. You can't do everything, but you can do anything, as long as it fits into your calendar.
If you keep your to-do lists in multiple locations—in e-mail, on a calendar, on paper, in an Excel spreadsheet, a list in your head, and notepad paper—you might want to consider centralizing this list in the Outlook TaskPad. This will make it easier to centralize and prioritize this list. Then, you need to schedule your tasks on your Outlook Calendar so you will know what you can and can not do. To start, put your to-do items on your Outlook Task list. Learn how to create a Task.

Create a task list to see all the commitments you have.

Then, drag your tasks onto your Outlook Calendar.
If you click on a task and drag it to the Calendar, you can choose to move or copy it to your Calendar as an attachment, with all of the details intact.

View all your tasks on your calendar.

As you drop tasks into the available time on your Calendar you will immediately see if you are overcommitted and if you need to re-prioritize your tasks and, in some cases, reschedule your commitments.

5. It takes too much time to get productive

Belief: I don't have the time to set up a system. I've got too much to do.

Reality: You can save one to two hours a day using an Integrated Management System, so the return on the investment is significant.

Here are some interesting statistics. On average, people we work with spend two to three hours a day working in e-mail and 60 minutes a day finding and filing information. After setting up an Integrated Management System, they spend one to two hours a day working in e-mail and 10 minutes a day finding and filing information. That's a savings of nearly two hours a day, or almost 12 weeks a year! The bottom line is: You can't afford not to create an effective Integrated Management System.

Take a moment and consider the time you spend:

• 
  Finding and filing information;
  
• 
  Writing a to-do list, and then rewriting it a week later on another list, and then another;
  
• 
  Opening e-mail, reading the message, closing the e-mail and then coming back to the same e-mail to read it again tomorrow; and
  
• 
  Going to the store and realizing you don't know the model of the hardware you need to pick up.
  

These are just a few examples of how we waste time by not having an Integrated Management System to help us remember what, where, and when. Take the time to set up your system. You're worth it, and you can't afford not to.

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Find information faster: Organize your computer

If you've been using your computer for more than 6 months, it's probably safe to say that you don't need all the files and e-mail messages stored there. When left untreated too long, an unorganized computer will perform slower and make it more difficult for you to find the information you need. If that's the case, it's a great time to make sure your computer is cleaned up and ready to roll for your next upcoming project or assignment. This article can help you get started.

Clear out your old, unnecessary files

So how long should you keep old files on your hard drive? It's kind of like cleaning out a closet?if you haven't used a particular file (or sweater) in a year, you're pretty safe storing it somewhere else.
How can you tell how old a file is? Rest your mouse cursor over the file to see when it was last modified. For more information right-click the file, and choose Properties. You can see when the file was created, last modified it, and most recently accessed. If a file is old, not important, and hasn't been accessed in more than 6 months, it might be time to clear it out.
You're the best judge to determine which files to keep, but here is a list of items you might want to consider saving:

• 
  Tax and legal information
  
• 
  Project-related files
  
• 
  Favorite digital images from the year
  
• 
  Plans you could leverage for future projects
  
• 
  Important e-mail messages
  
• 
  Customer information
  
  
  By looking at the properties of a file you can see when the file was created, last modified it, and most recently accessed.

Once you've gotten rid of your files, learn 7 ways to manage your files better.

Tip To view your files in a folder by the date they were last modified, open a folder and on the View menu click Details. On the top of the column, click Date Modified.

Quickly find old files by organizing them by the date they were modified.

Back up important files

The next step is to copy selected files to another storage medium, such as a writeable CD or DVD or an external hard drive. For your most important files, such as project files, key presentations, or large e-mails, you'll rest a lot easier if you have a backup copy stored safely away from your computer. Backing up your files to CD or DVD will allow you to safely store these disks should you happen to lose your computer or if it should fail.
To back up your files it's ideal to have a CD or DVD burner or a hard drive you can connect to your computer through a USB or FireWire port. Learn more about how to back up your files with Windows XP. Also, learn more about how to back up your Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 e-mail messages.

Tip If you're backing up your information to a CD or DVD, be sure to create labels for your CDs that in some way describe their contents. For example, you might title the CD "2005 Archive" or be more specific with something like "2005 Presentations."

Clean out your e-mail

Do you have a system for weeding out and organizing your old e-mail messages? Here are a few quick ideas for taming your Inbox and getting ready to handle those messages in the months to come:

• 
  Create folders to store messages according to sender, topic, or date.
  
• 
  Create e-mail rules to file and manage your messages automatically. For example, you can create a rule to send all messages from your manager to a special folder. Learn more about managing e-mail messages with rules.
  
• 
  Go through your Sent folder in Outlook in and delete items you no longer need (especially those with large file attachments).
  
• 
  If you're sure you no longer need e-mail you've deleted, empty the folder that contains it.
  

For more help keeping your e-mail in check, learn 4 ways to take control of your e-mail Inbox. Or watch a demo about how to manage the size your Inbox.

Organize and clear out your Internet files

If you're like the average person, you've been doing a lot of Web searching and your Internet Explorer Favorites folder may be bursting at the seams. It could probably use some weeding out and organizing. To organize your Favorites in Internet Explorer, on the Favorites menu, click Organize Favorites.

While your tending to your Favorites folder there's some additional clean up that's easy to do. Start Internet Explorer and on the Tools menu click Internet Options. In the General tab of the Internet Options dialog box, you have two cleanup choices. These steps can help reduce some unnecessary files on your computer.

1. 
   In the Temporary Internet files section, click Delete Files to remove all temporary files. (You can also elect to remove all offline content downloaded from sites you've visited.)
   
2. 
   In the History section, click Clear History to remove the list of sites you've previously visited. Also make sure that you have the Days to keep pages in history: set to where you would like it.
   
   
   Clear out Internet Explorer using some of the options on the Internet Options dialog box.

This article was written by Katherine Murray.

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5 good computing habits

Working off a slow, disorganized computer can be frustrating—and it happens to the best of us. This article is designed to give you some easy-to-follow guidelines on how to keep your computer on the right track using tools in Microsoft Windows Vista and Microsoft Windows XP.

1. Organize your folders

We all know how easy it is to dump files into the wrong folder when we're in a hurry. But one way to make sure you'll keep your files organized is to remove the clutter with a filing system that makes sense for the way you use your computer. Here are a few tips to get you started:

• 
  Start clean
  Begin by deciding which files you no longer need on your hard drive.
  
• 
  Think it through
  Take the time to plan the best way to organize your files. How do you spend your time on the computer and what do you create? Do you work with photos and image editing software, surf the Web, write short stories, research school projects, or play games? The folders you create in Documents (called My Documents in Windows XP) can be easily tailored to show you just the kind of data about your files that you need to track.
  
• 
  Use subfolders
  After you have an idea of the kinds of items you produce and want to save, create folders and subfolders to store your files. Be sure to use logical, easy-to-understand names. For example, within Documents, you might create additional folders called Projects, HR Benefits, and Career. Then, within the Projects folder, you could create subfolders for each different project.
  

Windows Tip
To create a new subfolder with Windows Vista or Windows XP, simply right click anywhere in the folder, select New, and Select Folder. Type the name for the new folder and press Enter. For more tips about creating a well-organized filing system, see 7 tips to manage your files better.

Create a new folder using the File and Folder task pane.

2. Clean up your hard disk

Now that you've organized your files and folders, and cleaned up your desktop, you can organize the data itself. Windows includes two utilities—Disk Cleanup and Disk Defragmenter—that help you free up more space on your hard drive and help your computer work more efficiently.

• 
  Disk Cleanup compresses your old files so you can free up storage space.
  
• 
  Disk Defragmenter scans your hard drive and consolidates files that may be scattered across the disk
  

Not sure how often to run these utilities? It's really up to you—some people like to run both weekly, others prefer monthly, and a few only run them every few months. It's not a bad idea to do both at least once a month. Windows Vista users take note: Disk Defragmenter is automatically scheduled to run once a week (Sunday at 4 a.m.). You can change the scheduled time for this feature or turn it off, if you prefer.
To find both programs, click Start, point to All Programs, then point to Accessories, and then choose System Tools.

3. Use System Restore

System Restore is one of those programs that can be a life-saver when you've been the unfortunate recipient of unstable software, a badly timed power outage, or a damaging thunderstorm. System Restore records important documents, settings, and preferences on your computer. If the unthinkable happens and your computer files are damaged or inaccessible, you can use System Restore to restore your computer back the same state it was in before the data was lost.
System Restore creates restore points daily, and whenever you install device drivers, automatic updates, and some applications. Still, it's a good idea to get into the habit of creating a system checkpoint (called a restore point) whether you're about to install new software, or take any action you suspect might make your computer unstable. That way, if there's any conflict at all, you can restore your computer to the point just before you began the installation.

To use System Restore:

1. 
   Click Start, and choose All Programs.
   
2. 
   Point to Accessories, then point to System Tools, and then choose System Restore.
   
3. 
   When the program begins, choose Create a restore point and click Next.
   
4. 
   Enter a description of the restore point and click Create. After a few seconds, the program will tell you the date, time, and description of the new restore point.
   
5. 
   Click Close to exit System Restore.
   

Use System Restore to put your computer back the way it was before the data was lost.

4. Keep Windows and Office up-to-date

Computer programs are continually improved based on customer feedback and continuing product testing. As problems are resolved, you should benefit from those improvements. By checking Microsoft Update regularly, you can make sure you've got the most recent Windows and Office improvements available to you.
If you're using Windows XP, visit Microsoft Update to start the update process. If it's your first time to visit Microsoft Update, you might need to sign up to the service. Windows Vista users don't need to sign up for Microsoft Update: an account is automatically created for you during the registration process.

To use Microsoft Update:

1. 
   For high-priority updates, click Express Install (recommended). If you're just looking for general updates that aren't critical, choose Custom Install.
   
2. 
   The site will do a quick check of your system to see whether any new updates are available that have not been downloaded to your computer. When the check is finished, a window appears showing you any new updates ready for download.
   
3. 
   Follow the on-screen instructions and click Install Now to update your computer with the latest software improvements.
   

Once you've visited the Microsoft Update site, you should also configure your computer to receive critical updates automatically. This service is called Automatic Updates (Windows Update in Windows Vista) and it's free. Learn how to turn it on in Windows Vista and Windows XP.

Turn Windows Update on in Windows Vista

1. 
   Click Start, and then click Control Panel.
   
2. 
   Under Windows Update, select Turn automatic updating on or off.
   
3. 
   Select a setting. Microsoft recommends selecting Automatic: Automatically download recommended updates for my computer and install them. You can schedule Automatic Updates for any time of day. Remember, your computer must be on at the scheduled time for updates to be installed. We recommend choosing a time when you will not be using the computer for other tasks.
   
   Change Settings dialog box

Turn Windows Update on in Windows XP

1. 
   Click Start, and then click Control Panel.
   
2. 
   Click Performance and Maintenance.
   
   Note: If the Performance and Maintenance category is not visible, click Switch to Category View.
   
3. 
   Click System.
   
4. 
   In the System Properties dialog box, click the Automatic Updates tab.
   
5. 
   Select a setting. Microsoft recommends selecting Automatic: Automatically download recommended updates for my computer and install them. You can schedule Automatic Updates for any time of day. Remember, your computer must be on at the scheduled time for updates to be installed. We recommend choosing a time when you will not be using the computer for other tasks.
   
   System Properties dialog box
6. 
   If you choose to have Automatic Updates notify you in step 5, you will see a notification balloon when new downloads are available to install. Click the notification balloon to review and install updates.
   

Important : If you choose an option in step 5 other than the one we recommend, you must download and install every critical update. If you download the updates, but forget to install them, your computer will not be protected with all the latest enhancements.

5. Run antivirus software AND a spyware detection and removal tool

Updating your Windows software is just the first step in keeping your computer safe. Next, you'll want to download and install antivirus software and keep it up to date. Your computer may have come with a free trial of antivirus software, but if you don't renew your subscription, you won't be protected from all the latest threats.
If your computer seems sluggish or if you begin to see lots of pop-up advertisements, even when you're not surfing the Web, your computer may be infected with spyware, adware, or other unwanted software. Learn more about spyware and what it can do to your computer. Fortunately, there's Microsoft Windows Defender, which is included in Windows Vista, and is available as a free download for Microsoft XP SP2. Alternatively, there are other free anti-spyware software programs available.

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9 ways to increase the security of your laptop while on the road

Using your laptop to get work done away from your office or on the road is becoming widely accepted. But this rapid growth in laptop computing has made portable systems the target for theft around the world. If your laptop computer is stolen, company information can be exposed, as well as your personal and financial information.

Use these 9 tips to learn how you can keep your laptop more secure when you're on the road.

1. Avoid using computer bags

Computer bags can make it obvious that you're carrying a laptop. Instead, try toting your laptop in something more common like a padded briefcase or suitcase.

2. Never leave access numbers or passwords in your carrying case

Keeping your password with your laptop is like keeping the keys in the car. Without your password or important access numbers it will be more difficult for a thief to access your personal and corporate information.

3. Carry your laptop with you

Always take your laptop on the plane or train rather then checking it with your luggage. It's easy to lose luggage and it's just as easy to lose your laptop. If you're traveling by car, keep your laptop out of sight. For example, lock it in the trunk when you're not using it.

4. Encrypt your data

If someone should get your laptop and gain access to your files, encryption can give you another layer of protection. With Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7 you can choose to encrypt files and folders. Then, even if someone gains access to an important file, they can't decrypt it and see your information. Learn more about how to encrypt your data with Windows XP, encrypt your data with Windows Vista, or encrypt your data with Windows 7.

5. Keep your eye on your laptop

When you go through airport security don't lose sight of your bag. Hold your bag until the person in front of you has gone through the metal detector. Many bags look alike and yours can easily be lost in the shuffle.

6. Avoid setting your laptop on the floor

Putting your laptop on the floor is an easy way to forget or lose track of it. If you have to set it down, try to place it between your feet or against your leg (so you're always aware it's there).

7. Buy a laptop security device

If you need to leave your laptop in a room or at your desk, use a laptop security cable to securely attach it to a heavy chair, table, or desk. The cable makes it more difficult for someone to take your laptop. There are also programs that will report the location of a stolen laptop. They work when the laptop connects to the Internet, and can report the laptop's exact physical location. One such tracing program is ComputracePlus.

8. Use a screen guard

These guards help prevent people from peeking over your shoulder as you work on sensitive information in a public place. This is especially helpful when you're traveling or need to work in a crowded area. This screen guard from Secure-It is just one example of a screen guard you could use.

9. Try not to leave your laptop in your hotel room or with the front desk

Too many things have been lost in hotel rooms and may not be completely secure. If you must leave your laptop in your room, put the "do not disturb" sign on the door.

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