Boost Your Productivity

All the prioritization and list-making in the world won’t make one productive. Those are good practices but they can’t substitute for what business strategist and executive coach Michael Beck calls the hidden ingredient in productivity: energy.

Composed of four components — physical, emotional, mental and inspirational — energy is key to maintaining productivity, according to Beck, whose firm is Portland, OR-based Michael Beck International.

“It’s important to remember that we can’t manage interruptions. But there are strategies travel professionals can use to deal with the demands of the job.”

Beck talked with Travel Market Report about his strategies for sustaining energy and boosting productivity.

Block out “protected time.”
“One of the things I hear from clients is that they make a list of what they want to get done and at the end of the day they get through maybe one or two of those things.

“That’s stress-producing,” Beck said. “It also means they’re then working late or over the weekend.”

Beck recommends blocking out an hour or two of uninterrupted time each day to address that work.

“Book some time on your calendar as if it were a meeting and don’t answer the phone, check email or, if you’re in an agency, deal with walk-ins,” he said. “For calls, your voice mail can say you will get back to the caller in a specified amount of time.

“When you slot out that protected time — 30, 60, 90 minutes or so — you can get through a tremendous amount of work.”

Give yourself a break.
“The idea that being away from your desk is unproductive is not true,” Beck said.

“A lot of what we do is not the busy work; it’s the problem solving and you need to take a step back and get a different perspective for that.

“Doing so can produce some remarkable insights,” he said.

Beck suggests taking a 15- to 30-minute break every two to two-and-a-half hours throughout the day to recharge and rejuvenate.

“People say ‘I’m too busy, I can’t take the time,’ but oddly enough if someone wants an hour meeting with you, you find the time to do that,” he said.

“Just treat that time away from your desk as if you were meeting with a client.”

Re-think that impulse to respond immediately.
Agents may feel they have to respond instantly to a client or they’ll lose the business or have an unhappy client.

“My question to those folks is ‘would your client think it was poor service if you got back to them in half an hour instead of instantly?’

“And, of course, the answer would be no.”

Eat “strategically,” exercise, sleep.
Eating strategically means eating small amounts about five or six times a day to boost physical and mental reserves, Beck said.

Snacks or small meals should consist of a balance between protein, carbohydrates and fats. Sugars and heavy starches lead to a “carb crash,” according to Beck.

“Insufficient nutrition affects the ability to reason and be creative.”

The benefits of exercise and sleep are certainly no secret, he adds.

“When I ask in one of my workshops if anyone has trouble sleeping, 80% of the attendees raise their hands,” he said.

Being too stressed to sleep leads to insufficient sleep which leads to more stress, Beck said. “It’s a downward spiral.”

Among the strategies: Exercise and avoid caffeine and big meals late at night, he said.

Maintain your attitude.
Attitude maintenance might take some work at first but it’s worth the effort, said Beck.

Reducing the negative and introducing the positive boosts emotional and inspirational reserves. That might mean steering clear of negative people and surrounding oneself with positive people.

“It’s cumulative,” Beck said. “You have to practice this.”

Having a bad day?
Who doesn’t have bad days?

“If you know you’re not feeling it and are having a hard time concentrating and you don’t know the reason, you can persevere but the work will be sloppy and the progress slow.

“Far better to write the day off,” Beck said.

“We’ll be far more productive when our energy is higher so don’t fight it. Just work on less critical tasks for that day.

“Think of it as a recovery day.”