Conrey is for Closers

Today will be the 11th Productivity Wednesday since I started this whole thing – so enough data to give some perspective on it. What have I learned?

• Some people still don’t get that I’m not just being productive on Wednesdays, just focusing on it.   Its like Mother’s Day – I love my mom every day, but I get to celebrate it once a year.
• Having one dedicated day that I know I can crank away on stuff and people are going to respect that I’m heads down more than usual is nice.
• Turning off tweetdeck every once in a while is a good thing.
• People are starting to join up – search #productivitywednesday on twitter and you’ll start to see about a dozen regulars posting with the hashtag (usually at the beginning of the day then not much until the evening).
• It isn’t easy to focus every wednesday on keeping it up – but not everything is easy every time you do it
• Having Hacknight at the end of Productivity Wednesday is a nice way to know that I’ll be able to let off some steam at the end of a hard day.
• I find other people helping to keep me motivated and on task to support my productivity – often in obscure ways like public humiliations and mockery – but it works.

This is not the end of Productivity Wednesday, but hopefully a way for more of you to jump on board and start to use it to be more productive in your own workspace.

At the beginning of February we at Integrum ran into a busy couple of weeks, and I felt a little out of gear when it came to getting stuff done. We returned to AZ from client meetings in California late on a Tuesday night and had less than 5 hours to sleep before returning on Wednesday. Both Jade and I came in ready to rock on Wednesday and energized by our client meetings so I declared the day “Productivity Wednesday” and started tracking how many to-do’s came off my list.

12 to-do’s later I called it a successful day. The next week I crossed off 16 things.

Now of course I’m aiming for this kind of production everyday, but having a stated target and tweeting about it gives me some level of accountability. It gives me one day a week where I know that I’m turning off tweetdeck, putting my shoulder to the wheel, and cranking out to-dos. Not only that but the concept is spreading – I’m starting to see some twitter traffic with the tag.

So how do you get play? Tweet on wednesday with a goal, and #productivitywednesday as your hash tag. As you get things done, tweet again – get some encouragement – give some to others – and watch the To-Do List check boxes get filled up.

Productivity Wednesday starts in less than 9 hours – are you ready?