Productivity Mindset: How to Think About Work in a Sustainable, Supportive Way

Are you looking to improve your productivity mindset in your business and career so you can get things done with ease?

Your productivity mindset is what you think and believe about productivity. This influences your relationship to productivity as well as your overall actions and work habits.

In this article, you’ll learn what a productivity mindset is, common productivity challenges that people face, and ways you can strengthen your productivity mindset every day.

Before we dive if, if you want a simple daily structure to help you prioritize your work, my free Productivity Mindset Planner™ is a good place to start.

Key Takeaways

Table of Contents

What is a productivity mindset?

A productivity mindset is what you think and believe about productivity in your daily professional and personal routines. Your productivity mindset ultimately dictates the actions you take and how you conduct your work on a regular basis.

A supportive productivity mindset can help you cultivate sustainable and realistic work habits, while an unsupportive mindset often tends to lead overwhelm and burnout.

What are some common productivity mindset challenges?

As a productivity expert, I’m well aware of common productivity mindset challenges. Here are some of the most common challenges I’ve seen with clients:

All-or-nothing thinking

You may believe there are only two ways of approaching a situation. For instance, you might think there are only two decisions you can make. Or you might falsely believe you cannot successfully take action unless specific conditions exist or requirements are met.

Productivity guilt

You may experience productivity guilt when you fail to complete tasks or ignore a work aspect. You may negatively judge yourself over perceived work failures, unsatisfactory work, or unaccomplished projects.

Perfectionism

Perfectionism is when you insist your work must be perfect in all shapes and forms so it’s accepted by yourself or others. You might believe your work must have no flaws or errors, or that you must work under unrealistic and optimal conditions.

Fear of rest

Fear of rest is the belief that if you stop to rest, you’ll somehow sabotage or derail your productivity. This may manifest as lack of meal and coffee breaks, insufficient hours of sleep, and working during vacation, holiday, or personal time off.

“I should be doing more”

This mindset fails to acknowledge the time, energy, work, and effort you’ve put into a task, assignment, or project. You might minimize work successes, whether you’ve completed a handful of small yet important administrative tasks or learned important management lessons.

Over-identifying with output

Lastly, you might judge your productivity solely by the quantity of work produced. The reality is that productivity is a combination of quality and quantity. Ideally, you want to comfortably produce consistent work on an ongoing basis.

Why does mindset come before using tools and systems?

Mindset comes before using tools and systems because it is the foundation on which tools and systems are used. It dictates your approach towards your work and the actions you’ll take.

In my belief as a productivity expert, how you think about and approach your work is important, if not more important, than the productivity tactics, tools, and tips themselves.

Here’s an example for you: let’s say you’re a carpenter. You decide to build a large table (your mindset) and create detailed plans. You identify the materials, equipment, and tools you’ll need to build the table (your tools).

What don’t you do? You don’t pickup the nearest hammer and start hammering nails into a random block of wood in your shop. That’s just using a tool for tools’ sake. You only use specific tools once you’ve decided to build a project.

A tool performs a specific function. But it is your mindset that will help you use that tool and do your work.

Why doesn’t organization alone work?

Organization alone doesn’t optimize your productivity levels because it does not address your unique needs, wants, desires, and preferences for your current circumstances and environment.

Technically speaking, you could organize a group of materials in any manner you’d like. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s the most efficient method for your needs.

Look at it this way: let’s say you ask your friend to the organize office supplies on top of your desk. Your friend neatly groups pencils and notebooks together…but they’re located on the opposite side of your desk where you can’t easily access them.

Yes, the materials are organized. But you need to make sure organization is combined with both efficiency and effectiveness.

How do tools give a false sense of security?

Tools give a false sense of security because they play to our physical senses and mental desires.

A tool can be easily understood by others. Everyone’s used some sort of productivity app, program, method, tip, or technique.

But here’s where things start to get tricky. People search for the latest and greatest productivity tool. I like to call this the “productivity silver bullet.” They believe that if they find this tool, they’ll instantly be productive. Unfortunately, this isn’t the most practical approach.

That’s not to say productivity tools aren’t helpful. But people tend to inadvertently overlook why they’re searching for a productivity tool in the first place.

Why does forcing yourself to use systems tend to backfire?

Forcing yourself to use productivity systems you dislike tends to backfire because it’s unsustainable. Sure, anybody can force themselves to use a system they dislike for a little while. It’s new, novel, and exciting!

But after sometime, you may find that same system to be unpalatable. You might dislike the design, user interface, method, or approach. And if that’s the case, you’ll be more likely to stop using the system.

Remember, the point of productivity is to be consistent. You want to be productive over days, weeks, and months, and not for a single day.

Think about it this way. You wouldn’t force yourself to eat foods you dislike, so why would you force yourself to use productivity systems you dislike?

If you’ve been struggling with productivity for longer than you’d like to admit, The Order Expert’s Guide to Time Management™ eBook helps you manage your calendar, overcome procrastination, and develop a healthier relationship with time from the inside out.

How a productivity coach helps with mindset

A productivity coach can help you improve your productivity mindset by uncovering unhelpful mindsets, strengthening your self-agency skills, clarify your goals, gain confidence, and uncover your personal preferences.

Let’s take a closer look at each of these items:

Break free from unhelpful mindsets

Breaking free from negative mindsets is paramount when it comes to long term productivity. A positive and supportive mindset will help you work with ease, while a negative mindset will make the process more challenging.

A common unhelpful mindset is that we must complete 50 to-do list items in a single day. That’s completely unrealistic. A more helpful mindset is to choose a limited amount of tasks to complete, say 3 to 5 items. This way, you can successfully complete tasks while still making forward progress.

Strengthen your self-agency skills

Strengthening your self-agency skills means setting goals, making decisions, and taking actions on your own terms, and not the other way around. You understand you have the power to create your own schedule. You also understand you can design your work flow to your needs.

Sure, we’ve all experienced unexpected emergencies, deadlines, or situations. But those instances should be far and few between. What matters most are your decisions in these moments. Believe it or not, you have the power to prioritize tasks, schedule your calendar, and delegate work on a daily basis.

Clarify your goals and desires

Clarifying your goals and desires helps improve your productivity levels because it gives you a roadmap you can follow. More often than not, when I meet with potential clients, these goals and desires are often masked by the desire to select and use a productivity tool.

Many times we have to peel back the layers to get to those goals and desires. Maybe you want to feel on top of your daily work and finish projects ahead of schedule. Sure, a planner or calendar can help you get there. But you might need to identify your true goals and desires first.

Gain confidence in yourself

Gaining confidence in yourself is an overlooked yet powerful way to improve your productivity skills. Sometimes we can lose confidence in ourselves and our work when we let others dictate our tasks or schedule. But you need to be confident when managing your workload and related tasks.

The good news is that by setting proper boundaries, structures, and guidelines, you can thrive in your work. When you have these frameworks in place, you give yourself the time, space, and grace you need to work comfortably and sustainably.

Uncover your personal preferences

When you uncover your personal preferences and play to your strengths, the work itself becomes easier. You can joyously meet those external deadlines because you aren’t resisting the doing of the work.

As productivity coach who works with mindset, I believe everyone innately knows the best working environment, conditions, and techniques for themselves when it comes to being productive.

But there’s one glaring problem. You don’t know that you know it. My job is to help you discover it so we can leverage it to your advantage.If this sounds interesting to you, I encourage you to learn more about my productivity coaching services.

What are some common productivity mindset topics?

Okay, so you may be wondering, what are some common productivity mindset topics that come up with clients?

Here are some of the most common topics I see on a regular basis:

Productivity and self-trust

Productivity and self-trust go hand in hand because you need to trust your work preferences. If you prefer a particular way of working, then the best thing you can do for yourself is to trust yourself. You choose the method and consistently use it.

It’s also worth mentioning that productivity is about continual refinement. Even the most productive people continually tweak and refine their systems. But they trust themselves work, learn from their experiences, and make adjustments along the way.

Letting go of unrealistic expectations

Letting go of unrealistic expectations can be challenging simply because you’re used to thinking this way. Of course, you want to succeed, do well, and be your best. But when you set expectations that cannot be met, that’s a sheer recipe for failure.

Releasing unhelpful expectations, whether they’re ones you’ve unwittingly set up for yourself, or the unhelpful expectations of others, is key. You can’t control what others think or do, but you can control what you think and do.

Sustainable productivity

Working sustainably means levels means being productive consistently on a regular basis, without undue stress or overwhelm. As a productivity coach, I want my clients to not only work sustainably, but comfortably and joyously as well.

What does sustainable productivity look like on a daily basis? For me, that means working consistently without draining, overwhelming, or burning yourself out in the process. You should be able to complete work everyday, without needing weeks or months to recover.

Embracing rest and recovery

Embracing rest and recovery is absolutely necessary because it gives both your mind and body an opportunity to recover from daily work. This isn’t an optional action. Rest and recovery are part of the natural cycle of our world, whether you’re human or not.

If you have any misgivings about the necessity for rest, just look to mother nature. The changing seasons are a testament that rest and recovery are key towards producing crops. Springtime is a time of year to sow seed. The summer is a time for growth. And autumn is a time of year to harvest crops, while winter is a time for rest.

How can you strengthen your productivity mindset?

Here’s a few things you can do today to help you strengthen your productivity mindset:

Challenge your default thoughts

Challenging your default thoughts means you’re not buying into what you’ve told yourself or what others have told you about productivity in past. What’s more, you’re not simply viewing yourself as someone who completes tasks, but as someone who thinks about how they’re thinking about a task. This does take practice, but the reward is great.

What to try today: Be aware of your thoughts when it comes to your productivity levels and work. Be honest and ask yourself, “Is that statement really true?,” “Am I exaggerating things?,” “Why do I think this is the case?” You may find that your default thoughts are not something you’d consciously choose. You might have mistakenly absorbed others’ beliefs into your mindset.

Approach tasks with perspective

Approaching tasks with perspective allows you to see how your workflow functions overall as a whole. Look at it this way: single tasks help you reach goals in your business. Once you understand how individual tasks move your work forward, you can make necessary adjustments.

What to try today: Take a moment to look for patterns in your daily work and workflow. How do these tasks support your work as a whole? Where do these patterns appear? Are they helpful to you? Or are they unhelpful? Where can you make improvements? These are all helpful questions to ask yourself.

Celebrate your accomplishments

Celebrate your accomplishments throughout your workday so you have built-in internal motivation, inspiration, and satisfaction in your work. By acknowledging the work you’ve done, you’re honoring the time, energy, and effort it took to do the work in the first place. And that’s an important part of productivity.

What to try today: Celebrate a work accomplishment at the end of each day. Savor that sense of satisfaction when you turn in a challenging client report. Enjoy that friendly chat with a vendor to catch up and strengthen your relationship before getting down to business. Or congratulate yourself on declining an unsolicited meeting and delegating a task to your assistant.

FAQ: Productivity mindset

Conclusion

Productivity mindset goes way beyond doing your work, but how you’re showing up to your work in the first place. Entrepreneurs, small business owners, and executives can all benefit from finding a new way to think about their work, instead of hunting down the latest productivity tool.

If you want an easy way to get started, my Productivity Mindset Planner™ is a daily worksheet you can use to organize your thoughts and work before the day begins. If you’re ready to go deeper on managing your time and energy my eBook, The Order Expert’s Guide to Time Management™, is a good place to start.

Rashelle Isip Productivity Coach and Founder of The Order Expert®

Rashelle Isip is a New York City-based productivity coach, consultant, and founder of The Order Expert®. With over 15 years of experience, she helps entrepreneurs and executives replace the "hustle and grind" mindset with one of "ease and flow." Rashelle is a former contributing columnist for Inc.com and Lifehack.org, and has been featured in Fast Company, Forbes, NBC News, The Washington Post, and NPR. She is the author of four books, including The Order Expert’s Guide to Time Management. When not helping clients master their schedules, she enjoys scouting for practical, well-designed office supplies. Learn more at TheOrderExpert.com.

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Productivity coaching Mindset-driven productivity Work-life balance Organization systems Productivity for entrepreneurs Time management