How to stop procrastinating – 6 Steps to Manage Time

How to stop procrastinating: This article takes you through key steps to address the question – how to stop procrastinating? With procrastination being the number one reason for incomplete projects, you can prevent this trap by following the steps in this article. These steps are grouped together to derive beneficial actions. Key points touched on in this article are grouping tasks, making small improvements and creating a plan for delivery.

A primary prerogative of this article is to ensure that any decision taken must have an action associated. These actions help you get through the initial inertia about starting a task. For more control on better time utilisation, I would refer to our article on Time Management PPT for a concise representation of managing time.

How to stop procrastinating?

Procrastination can be a common challenge, but there are strategies you can use to overcome it. Here are some tips to help you stop procrastinating:

1. Set clear goals: Define your objectives and break them down into smaller, manageable tasks. Having a clear vision of what needs to be done can motivate you to get started.
2. Prioritize tasks: Determine which tasks are most important and focus on those first. This can help you avoid getting overwhelmed and prioritize your time effectively.
3. Break tasks into smaller steps: Break down complex tasks into smaller, more manageable steps. This can make them feel less daunting and easier to tackle.
4. Set deadlines: Establish deadlines for each task or subtask. Having a sense of urgency can increase your motivation to complete the work in a timely manner.
5. Create a schedule: Develop a schedule or to-do list to organize your tasks and allocate specific time slots for each one. Stick to your schedule as much as possible to stay on track.
6. Eliminate distractions: Identify and minimize potential distractions, such as turning off notifications on your phone or computer, finding a quiet workspace, or using website blockers to limit access to time-wasting websites.
7. Use productivity techniques: Explore different productivity techniques, such as the Pomodoro Technique (working in focused bursts with regular breaks) or the Eisenhower Matrix (prioritizing tasks based on importance and urgency).
8. Find motivation and reward yourself: Find ways to stay motivated, such as visualizing the benefits of completing the task or rewarding yourself after completing a challenging task. Celebrate your accomplishments along the way to maintain momentum.
9. Seek accountability: Share your goals and progress with someone else, such as a friend, colleague, or mentor. Being accountable to someone can provide support and encouragement to stay on track.
10. Practice self-care: Take care of your physical and mental well-being through proper sleep, exercise, healthy eating, and stress management. When you feel more energized and balanced, it can be easier to stay focused and motivated.

Remember, overcoming procrastination is a process that requires self-awareness, discipline, and practice. Be patient with yourself and implement these strategies consistently to develop positive habits and improve your productivity.

These steps can be further refined into 6 points as below on how to stop procrastinating.

Identify your pattern

The first step in preventing procrastination is in its acceptance. If procrastination is causing you trouble, the first step is to identify how you fall into this trap.

We tend to leave clues in the way we operate. Identify what your clues are and the common reasons you provide to procrastinate something. Look back at your last few experiences of procrastination:

• How and where did it start?
• At what points in the process did you feel that you were procrastinating?
• What was your mind telling you when you postponed working on it?

This is a non exhaustive list of questions you can ask. But these patterns have a beautiful way of pointing out unhelpful habits. Once you recognise them, you can work on interrupting these patterns.

Why do you procrastinate?

Each procrastination story is individual. No two patterns are the same. What are your reasons/rationalisations for procrastination? Common reasons expressed are:

• It is an easy project, I can finish it quickly and hence can postpone
• This is a very difficult one – it might get easier with time
• Need other people to help me with the project
• There is not enough time now
• I like the adrenaline rush when I’m close to a deadline

For a long time I’ve used these rationalisations. Although the last is my favourite, it has resulted in more failures than success. Do any of these contribute to your pattern? If not, what is your list of rationalisations – why do you procrastinate?

Plan, Prioritise and Group activities together

The tasks will appear impossible unless broken down into simpler activities. If the project appears too big, the first step is to create a plan of attack. It is natural to postpone complicated things. You will need to break it down into simpler things or else it appears too complicated to start.

Instead, start on a plan to resolve this. Your plan must include the prioritisation of activities based on importance. A good guide on prioritisation is using the framework of 4 Quadrants of time management using the Eisenhower Matrix.

Once you start on this plan, you have embarked on the journey to simplify this task.

Create an Advanced Deadline

Everything to do with – how to stop procrastinating boils down to deadline and time management. As you know, time is the most expensive resource you have.

Your goals influence the external deadlines. You have very little leeway with these timelines, but they produce a necessary motivation for you to comply.

You can draw a parallel by creating an internal deadline that is equally serious. Instead of this being deadline for the final product – it can be a deadline for the first draft. In the worst-case scenario, you at least have something like a plan B.

Avoid Perfection, use Iterative Completion

This is one of the most powerful answers to your question – how to stop procrastinating. Although perfection appears to be a great standard to work towards – it can be a powerful demotivation. We go into detail in our discussion – why being perfect is bad.

A common trap of being a perfectionist is that you can easily get lost in details. The project/task as a whole has higher importance than an individual element to it. I will draw the attention back to prioritisation.

If at any point, you feel stuck in an element of a project, look back – identify its importance in the priority scale. Which section of the quadrant does it lie in? Don’t fall into the trap of working on urgent things vs important things.

Use Urgency to Motivate a Completion

This might sound slightly outside the topic. Being an agile enthusiast, my focus is constantly on delivery and preventing wastage of time.

We often run with the manifesto of ‘Done is better than perfect. An important requirement in this approach is continual improvement. Instead of waiting for something to be the final product – we release small deliverables at each stage for feedback.

This approach gives you an opportunity to make changes to meet external expectations. The idea of this approach is to prevent any losses and make most mistakes at the start. It not only protects your time but also gives you an opportunity to make changes when required.

Main thing to remember is : You cannot lost sight of the overall project and timelines for smaller details.