When it comes to organizers, many people prefer the old-fashioned paper versions. David Allen presents the idea of a paper organizer shaped to suit your own needs (which makes it a quite different vehicle than a purchased Day Planner or similar item). As Allen says, paper-based organizers have the advantage ...

An interesting interview with busy Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak was published a few days ago by Lifehacker.com, in which the Woz reveals a few of his productivity tips---some of which are surprising. For instance, he says the biggest benefit he gets comes from his Segway, which he uses everywhere he goes. ...

Want to get a rep for running a tight and effective meeting---one that gets results and doesn’t waste your co-workers’ time? Follow these simple steps: 1. Thoroughly prepare for the meeting. Draw up an agenda and distribute it in advance of the meeting. Build in reading time for any supporting documents, ...

One of the greatest and most common productivity problems is procrastination. Everybody procrastinates---everybody. Admit it: no matter how efficient or organized you are, you procrastinate once in a while. Some of us are occasional procrastinators. According to researchers, however, about 20-25% of the population procrastinates chronically! The word procrastinate comes from ...

When you are fighting emotional paralysis, how do you manage to be productive? The details hovering around this question are fresh and achingly poignant after a five-week emergency visit to my childhood home. My parents live on a meager income that was dwindling fast due to medical costs from my dad’s ...

Why pay for someone else to do your taxes when you can do them for free? No tax experience needed. All you need is access to the Internet. Receive your w-2 or wage information. Log on to IRS. Find the e file link on the main page. Choose what type of tax payer you ...

Most files, reports, and papers I want to keep are stored in a two-drawer file cabinet in my office. What I’ve found over the years is that I almost never open that filing cabinet to retrieve anything; it usually opens only so that I can thrust something into a file. ...

A few years ago the idea of multitasking was viewed as a wonderful way to get more done. It seemed logical to conduct business on the phone while driving to work; to answer email while watching TV; to run the month-end numbers while carrying on a conversation with a co-worker. But ...