The One Minute To-Do list (1MTD) is a productivity system developed by Michael Linenberger. It’s called the One Minute To-Do list because it takes just a minute to set it up and a minute to review it each day.
The system is based on organizing your to-dos in 3 lists;
1. Critical Now: Tasks that are absolutely due today
2. Opportunities Now: Tasks that are urgent, but can wait up to 10 days 3. Over-The-Horizon: Tasks that can wait 10 days or more
How To Use The One Minute To-Do List
Start by creating 3 different lists based on urgency; “Critical now”,” Opportunities now” and “Over-the-horizon”. Use 20 seconds on each list and braindump all tasks that come to mind.
1. Critical Now
✓ Write down tasks that are absolutely due today. ✓ These tasks would impact you negatively if you don’t do them today. ✓ Keep the list to 5 items or less. ✓ Review this list once each hour
2. Opportunities Now
✓ Write down tasks that are urgent, but can wait up to 10 days. ✓ These are tasks you would do today if you had the opportunity. ✓ Keep the list to 20 items or less. ✓ Review this list once each day.
3. Over-The-Horizon
✓ Write down all tasks that can wait 10 days or more. ✓ These are not urgent, but writing them down gives a mental relief. ✓ Review this list once a week.
Create Your One Minute To-Do List In Upwave
Make your one minute to-do list digital with Upwave. Select the ”One Minute To-Do List”- template. You can change the colors on your cards and add your own background if you like. By default the colors represent priority, but you can change this by click on the gear-icon. Start adding tasks to the different columns and set due dates on them. Remember to assign the tasks to yourself! You can also add one column called ”Completed”, where you put your tasks when they’re finished.
Are You Interested In Learning More About Productivity Frameworks?
We have written an eBook that explain the most popular methods to increase personal productivity – you can get it for free by clicking on the banner below.
We are excited to announce our new Upwave add-on for Gmail! You can now turn your emails into Upwave tasks with the click of a button.
With the Upwave Add-On for Gmail, you will never lose important information again. Spend less time in your inbox and more time on actually getting work done.
Remove the fear of things being forgotten: Make your emails actionable by creating a task for it in Upwave
Gather all relevant information in one place: Subject line and email body will automatically be added to your Upwave card
Get full overview of your commitments: Visualize, organize and prioritize the action items from your inbox on Upwave boards
You can also install the Upwave Gmail Add-On directly from your inbox. Just click on “Get add-ons” in the inbox sidebar, and search for “Upwave”.
2. From your Gmail inbox, select the email you want to turn into a task and click on the Upwave icon
3. Authorize access and log in to Upwave
Before you log in to Upwave, you need to approve access to your Gmail account. Simply click on “Authorize access” and “allow” in the next window. You are now ready to log into your Upwave account or create new account.
4. Select the board you want to create your task in and click create card
Select the board where you want to place your task from the dropdown menu. The subject line and the email body will automatically be added to the card header and description. If you like, you can edit the card description before you click “Create card”.
5. Click “View card” to see your task in Upwave
Voilà, you’re all set to start de-cluttering your inbox!
According to Shawn Achor, author of “The happiness advantage”, a company with happy employees can increase their productivity by 31 % and sales by 37 %. In addition, happiness at work builds positivity, reduces stress, increases innovation, and improves quality of life. It’s a win-win situation, where your happiness benefit both yourself and the company you work for. Let’s go through seven ways that you can increase your happiness (and productivity) at work.
1. De-clutter your workspace
«The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.» – Hans Hofmann
Why?
The environment around us can have a big impact on how we feel, which again can affect our performance at work. When our workspace is a mess, it’s hard to focus. Clutter is simply delayed decisions. It can induce stress and anxiousness, which again affects our productivity.
Simplicity and de-cluttering however, brings peace and tranquility to the mind. Less clutter means less distraction and allows you to focus on the task at hand.
How?
1. Identify the necessities. What do you absolutely need to get your work done?
2. Get rid of everything non-essential. This goes for physical items piling up on your work desk, like paper copies, but also digital files and emails on your computer.
3. Make a habit of cleaning your desk at the end of every day. Starting your day with an uncluttered workspace goes a long way to freeing up your mental space!
2. Plan your day the night before
«The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.» – Stephen R. Covey
Why?
Planning gives you peace of mind by knowing you have created action steps to reach your goals. An hour of planning can actually save you 10 hours of doing! When you plan your day the night before, you will be mentally prepared to start working the moment you wake up, because you know exactly what to do.
How?
1. Set your goals for tomorrow At the end of each day, gather your thoughts, go through your tasks and set your goals for tomorrow. This way, you know exactly what to do when you get to work the next day.
2. Decide which tasks you need to do tomorrow and schedule them. Which tasks do you need to do in order to get closer to your goal? Your most important tasks are usually the tasks that you are most likely to procrastinate on. Schedule to do them during the period of the day when you have the most energy and the fewest distractions.
3. Use a task management system. One way to help you plan, organize and prioritize your tasks is to use a task management system, like Upwave.
3. Work on one task at a time
«Task switching means you aren’t getting the full benefit of anything. There is a cognitive need to monotask.» – Amy Brann
Why?
Multitasking is basically just switching back and forth between multiple tasks, which makes you lose focus, reduces your productivity and increases the chance of mistakes. In fact, it’s physically impossible for your brain to multitask. Focusing on one tasks at a time will both help you perform better and feel better.
How?
One method to help you combat multitasking is the “Pomodoro technique”. It’s based on the concept of using a kitchen timer to manage your work sessions. A Pomodoro is a 25 minute, uninterrupted work session. When you finish a pomodoro, take a short break before you start a new one. Just pick a task, set the timer and start working!
1. Pick a task to work on.
2. Use a timer and set it to 25 minutes.
3. When the timer rings, take a 3-5 minute break.
4. After completing 4 work sessions, take a longer break.
4. Connect with your coworkers
«The greatest predictor of long-term happiness is social connection.» – Shawn Achor
Why?
Quality work relationships provides a sense of “we’re all in this together”, which is essential for increasing both happiness, engagement and productivity at work. Connecting with your team on a personal level simply makes going into the office more fun. A happy team is a successful team!
How?
1. Give feedback and acknowledge efforts. Offering feedback, acknowledging efforts and expressing your gratitude for the work your coworkers do is a great way to build a deeper connection.
2. Find things to celebrate at work. Birthdays, tasks or projects completed on time, and individual achievements are great causes for celebration.
5. Make self-improvement a habit
«When we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better, too.» – Paulo Coelho
Why?
If you want to change or improve any aspects of your life, you should start with the on thing you have control over – yourself. Self-improvement is about mapping out how to get to where you want be and taking charge of your happiness. It’s basically an investment in your future self. Examples on personal development can be learning something new, improving existing skills or becoming a better person.
How?
1. Identify your personal and professional goals Which skills or areas of your life do you want to improve? 2. Find resources that can help you achieve your goals Depending on the goals you’ve set for yourself, find out what kind of resources could be useful to you. It could be courses, books, articles, ted talks, videos, podcasts or audiobooks. Whatever works best for you! 3. Commit to 15 minutes of learning every day Make personal development a priority by scheduling a time for it. This way, you create a habit of personal growth.
6. Celebrate your progress
«It’s the small wins on the long journey that we need in order to keep our confidence, joy and motivation alive.» – Brendon Burchard
Why?
We have a tendency to focus more on negative outcomes than positive ones, which is called the negativity bias. In a work setting, this means that we are more prone to pay attention to our mistakes and setbacks than we are our achievements. This bias is likely a result of human evolution, where the brain emphasizes dangerous and negative experiences to keep us safe. Due to this bias, we need to put an extra effort into remembering the positive experiences – to celebrate our daily accomplishments.
How?
1. Make a habit of tracking small achievements every day. Did you finish a task? Got a compliment on your work? Had a good idea in a meeting? Helped out a coworker? Write it down, and store it in your memory.
2. Do a weekly review to reflect and celebrate the progress you have made. Once a week, review all your small wins. Take it all in and savor these positive experiences. After a while you will see that a little progress each day adds up to big results!
7. Prioritize your health
«It is fine to be committed to work, but our minds need time to recover and our bodies need to move.» – Annika Sorensen
Why?
Our mental and physical health has a big impact on our happiness – and vice versa. A healthy lifestyle can both transform your mind and body, reduce your stress-levels, increase your energy and boost your mood. Without making health a priority, it’s difficult to perform well at work. Try to create healthy habits that involves both exercise, rest and recreation.
How?
1. Do 20 minutes of exercise daily Physical exercise not only changes your body, it also promotes a positive self-image and higher productivity, by changing your mind, attitude and mood.
2. Spend time outside Fresh air and nature bring balance to your life, soothe your worries help recharge your batteries and studies show it can even improve your memory.
3. Get enough sleepevery night According to the National Sleep Foundation the optimal amount of sleep is 7-9 hours.
4. Train your brain to see the positive Practice gratitude. Stop your mind from wandering. Make a habit of speaking to yourself as you would to a friend.
Working on larger Boards just got much easier! Categorizing cards based on colors makes it easier to visually assess a board, and now you can also filter your cards based on colors.
Using colors for updating help desk articles
Just click on a color on your Board, and you will only see the Cards associated with that color. Click twice on a color to exit filter-mode. This feature is very practical, especially on more complex Boards with a lot of Cards.
Using colors to prioritize marketing content
Colors on a Board can be used for any purpose to give a visual overview. Colors are commonly used to see priority, but they can also represent a department, a project or an individual, to mention a few use cases.
Start filtering and get a better overview of your cards!
On behalf of our partner, Symfoni Next, we welcome you to join us at Google HQ in Oslo on the 7th of November. This will be a half-day event where you can experience firsthand how G Suite, Upwave, and Happeo among others can help streamline your organization’s collaboration.
Our CEO, Kjetil Moløkken-Østvold, is looking forward to take the stage and showcase how you can use Upwave and G Suite in combination to increase your organization’s productivity.
We are excited to announce our new partnership with Google Cloud Partner and authorized G Suite Reseller, Symfoni Next. With years of experience developing software, implementing and delivering services in Europe, Symfoni Next is now focused entirely on Google Cloud and delivers everything from basic cloud hosting to custom development projects on desktop and mobile devices on the GCP platform.
“The collaboration with Symfoni Next means that we are now taking our G Suite offering to the next level. Upwave has been a Google Cloud Technology Partner since 2018, and offer several G Suite integrations. Symfoni Next, in turn, is a Google Cloud Platform Collaboration Partner and authorized G Suite reseller. Together we can, therefore, offer our customers the right expertise and a solid overall collaboration package.” says Kjetil Moløkken-Østvold, CEO of Upwave.
Upwave integrates with G Suite, Google Drive, Google Calendar and Google Hangouts Chat, enabling effortless collaboration on tasks and projects throughout your organization.
“We’re excited about our collaboration with Upwave because it means we can extend our package of collaboration solutions. G suite provides a ton of benefits of its own, but it doesn’t offer collaborative task and project management functionality. Upwave’s seamless integrations with Google, and the visually pleasing look and feel of the platform, makes it a perfect complement to G suite. Together with Upwave, we can offer expertise on a platform that can be used by the whole workplace.», says Tord Ripe, CEO of Symfoni Next.
We look forward to taking our G suite offering to the next level and delivering a solid overall collaboration package together with Symfoni Next!
We are happy to announce that our Teams app is available on Microsoft AppSource and as an app within Microsoft Teams.
This integration comes in addition to the existing Office 365 Single Sign-On and OneDrive for Business integration. You can now use Office 365, Teams and Upwave in combination for a seamless collaborative experience.
Manage and collaborate on tasks and projects directly inside Teams
Upwave is a productivity platform that lets you organize, plan, track, collaborate and get things done – all in one place. The intuitive and user-friendly interface makes it easy to get everyone onboard – no extra training needed. You can easily and securely involve outside collaborators.
Add Upwave boards as Teams tabs
Visual boards helps you focus your attention, both at the task at hand and on your workflow as a whole. Keep all information in one place, and simply drag and drop tasks to visualize progress.
Inside your channels in Teams, you can embed Upwave boards as tabs by clicking on “+” and selecting Upwave. When using Upwave inside Teams, you will have access to all board features, including time-tracking and progress reports.
Collaborate on tasks and projects in real-time
Create teams for various departments, project groups or external partners. Break down silos and share knowledge across different teams. Assign tasks, comment, drag and drop files, and get feedback from your team.
While working with your colleagues in your Upwave board in Teams, you can also chat in real-time by clicking on the text box icon in the right corner.
Track time, set estimates and create reports
Easily track hours and set estimates on tasks inside Teams. See where time is spent and turn the data into insightful reports. Export timesheets to CSV or PDF with a single click.
Work with strategy canvases like Business Model Canvas
Upwave lets you brainstorm, collaborate and innovate in real-time with a growing number of predefined strategy canvases, including Business Model Canvas, Lean Canvas, SWOT and Risk Matrix.
See the big picture and discover new opportunities in a visual manner – without leaving Microsoft Teams!
How to use Upwave for Microsoft Teams
1. Sign in to Microsoft Teams and add the Upwave tab
Open the Microsoft Teams, go to the channel where you want to link an Upwave board, and click on the “+” symbol in the toolbar. Select Upwave and click “add”.
2. Sign in to Upwave or create new account
Click on “Sign in with Upwave”. In the next step you can either log in or create a new account. Setting up an account takes just a few seconds via Office 365 login.
3. Select your board or create new
When you are logged in to Upwave, you will see a list of all boards in your workspace. Select the board you want to connect to Teams or create a new one.
4. Start working!
Voila – you’re all set up! When actionable items comes up in your Teams channel, put them right into your Upwave board without having to switch between apps. And whenever you need to discuss something related to an Upwave board, just start a tab conversation. Now, go get things done together!
«Productivity is the deliberate, strategic investment of your time, talent, intelligence, energy, resources and opportunities in a manner calculated to move you measurably closer to meaningful goals.» – Dan S. Kennedy
The concept of productivity has existed since the late 1800s in both verbal and mathematical forms, but all the different definitions and interpretations out there can make the term hard to comprehend. To understand productivity, let’s start with some definitions.
The general definition of productivity is related to output and input: Productivity = the amount of output created per unit of input
A different approach to defining productivity by Jackson and Petersson (1999) takes into account both efficiency and effectiveness: Productivity = Efficiency x Effectiveness
Efficiency vs. Effectiveness
Let’s have a closer look at efficiency and effectiveness. According to professor David Sumanth, efficiency reflects how well resources are utilized to accomplish results, while effectiveness reflects how well a set of results are accomplished.
Peter F. Drucker (1964) has an easier way to explain this: “ Efficiency is doing things the right way; effectiveness is doing the right things”.
Example:
Let’s say the goal in the image above is to move as many of the square-shaped objects over to the assembly line in the shortest amount of time.
Effective: By simply shoving the square, you are effective, because you will reach the goal eventually. However, it’s not the most efficient way.
Efficient: By shaping the square into a circle, you can move the objects over to the other side faster, thus being more efficient. However, you are not being effective, since the goal was not to create circle shapes.
Productive: By using a trolley to move the shapes, you can move several squares at the same time and at a faster pace – making you both effective and efficient, also known as the definition of productive.
We can translate this example into a real-life situation. Let’s say that you’re working on a marketing campaign. If you have done everything right in setting up the campaign, creating the content and analyzing the results, then you’ve been efficient. However, if this campaign has been targeting the wrong customer group or has the wrong Call-To-Action based on your business goals, then you haven’t been effective. You can be super efficient by executing numerous task in the correct manner, but it doesn’t make you productive if these tasks shouldn’t have been prioritized in the first place.
To summarize, in order to be productive, you must be both effective (do the rights things) and efficient (do things the right way). This leads us to the following explanation of productivity: Productivity is doing the rights things in the right way.
So, how can you be more productive?
One way of increasing your productivity, is to implement tools or methods that help you prioritize the right things (increase effectiveness) and/or execute tasks in the most optimal way (increase efficiency). Some frameworks that can help increase your productivity are:
You can either use a physical version of these methods, by using pen and paper, or you can use a digital tool, like Upwave, that supports these frameworks. We have written an eBook that explain the most popular methods to increase personal productivity – you can get it for free by clicking the banner below.
Brought to you by the world’s most generous community of photographers at Unsplash, you now have the option of choosing from over 1,000,000 high-resolution photos as backgrounds for your Upwave boards.
Use board backgrounds to make your work more enjoyable! Select images that motivate you, make you laugh, suits your current mood, or images that are just visually pleasing to look at.
Whether it is to add a splash of color to your to-do list or an inspiring background to motivate your project team, all you have to do is go to your board settings and select image gallery. Here, you can either choose from our collection of Unsplash images or you can search for the perfect image in the Unsplash Gallery. When you click on an image, you will get a preview of how it will look on your board before you decide on a photo. With over 1,000,000 photos to choose from, we’re sure you’ll find something that suits you.
We are excited to announce our newest member of the Upwave family, Christer Husstøl, joining as our new VP of Business Development. His expertise within project management and sales will be a huge asset when scaling Upwave globally .
Christer is an avid reader who is passionate about traveling and sailing, in addition to project management, technology and startups. He holds a degree in Management from the BI Norwegian Business School. His background includes both supply chain and project management within the oil industry, as well as sales and business development for the hydro power sector.
The combination of his experience and his interest in the use and implementation of task management tools will be very useful in helping Upwave drive further growth.
Interested in finding out more about Christer? Then visit his linkedin page – here.
