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Students can struggle with productivity in several ways, from being distracted by social media to letting assignments pile up and facing unnecessary stress.
Read on to discover 9 common productivity-killing habits students should avoid because they can hold you back, hamper your effectiveness, and prevent you from reaching your full potential. We’ll offer advice on what to do to boost your productivity instead.
Later, we’ll find out why not taking breaks is so bad for your productivity. First, though, we’ll find out why you should never let assignments and homework pile up.
Habit 1: Leaving Assignments to Pile Up
We know that when people feel overwhelmed, they are more likely to procrastinate, thus if we have difficult assignments to complete, we avoid working on them at all. Check out our post on why we procrastinate for more.
When we procrastinate, all productivity ceases, worsening the initial problem and making us feel so overwhelmed that it can be hard to know where to start and thus you end up never starting at all. Thus, you are not productive.
What to Do About It
Use the Eisenhower Matrix to prioritise tasks so you know what you should be working on. It’s even better if you use the Matrix in conjunction with time blocking to help you manage stress well so that you don’t become overwhelmed. If you don’t feel overwhelmed, you’re less likely to procrastinate.
Now to discover why not taking breaks is a bad idea.
Habit 2: Not Taking Proper Breaks
If you try to do all your work without pause, it can lead to a reduction in efficiency and effectiveness. You might also become frustrated by a perceived lack of progress.
What to Do About It
Have a ten-minute break every hour. This helps refresh your brain and means you will be able to retain more information. Taking breaks also makes it more likely that you will come up with new ideas. It also increases alertness.
Habit 3: Working Against Your Body Clock
Many students seem to believe that the most successful, productive people are morning people. Thus, they believe that the secret to maximising their productivity is to force themselves to wake up and get going earlier.
The problem with this is that there are over 300 genes that determine how your individual body clock operates. The result of this is that we are all productive and alert at different times of the day. So, if you’re not a morning person, don’t force yourself to work in the morning if you don’t have to.
What to Do About It
Work with your internal clock and find your most productive hours. That way, you will be working when your energy levels peak and resting when they begin to drop off. Remember, the surest way to sabotage your productivity is to work against your natural circadian rhythms.
Habit 4: Working or Studying in Noisy, Bustling Places
It can be tricky to focus if you work or study somewhere busy and loud. A lack of focus will make you less productive, and the quality of your work may suffer.
What to Do About It
Pay attention to where you’re studying or working. Are you working at the kitchen table, with your family coming and going around you? To minimise distractions set up an area dedicated to your study that’s away from obvious forms of distraction, for instance, in the spare room. If you don’t have somewhere you can designate as a permanent place of study, you could tell your family or roommates that you’re going to work at the kitchen table in the evenings for a couple of hours and ask not to be disturbed.
If you’re stuck and feeling unmotivated, try seeking a change of scenery to see if that helps. This could be something as simple as taking your work out into the garden on a fine day. It might even inspire you.
Habit 5: Procrastination (Especially on Bigger, More Complex Tasks)
If you spend all your time and energy completing small, easy jobs, you won’t have enough energy left to complete larger, more difficult tasks. This can lead to more stress, and frustration, and may also mean assignments and tasks are not finished to the highest possible standard.
What to Do About It
The secret to beating procrastination is to plan ahead. When you have a large assignment to complete, create a plan of attack as early as possible. Work on bigger more difficult tasks first, so you can at least make some progress before moving on to easier tasks. Doing this will help you feel motivated too, because you will have achieved something early in the day, and all the other tasks you have will seem easier by comparison.
If you find yourself struggling to make progress, break larger tasks into more manageable chunks before you begin.
Read our simple guide to planning your day for more advice.
Habit 6: Waiting for the Perfect Time to Start
Many of us think we need a good chunk of time before we can begin any assignment, but this is a misconception. This is merely procrastination in disguise.
What to Do About It
The right time to start something is always now, because there will never be a perfect time to do so. You needn’t do much of the assignment at first, making progress, however little, is the aim. Getting started makes tasks seem less overwhelming and scary, so you won’t be as stressed as you would have been had you put off doing so. This, in turn, makes it more likely that you will be productive.
You could:
- Create a Word document and outline for your next assignment.
- Spend 10 minutes searching for keywords for a literature review.
- Write a plan for your dissertation.
Face your natural discomfort and get started on that task you’ve been dreading.
Habit 7: Becoming Distracted by Social Media and Messages
Technology plays a vital role in our lives. Unfortunately, our digital devices can also prove a major distraction that can destroy our focus and thereby damage our productivity.
What to Do About It
Use productivity and time-tracking apps to keep yourself on track, you can use some to block websites like Facebook and Twitter if they prove an irresistible temptation. Check out our list of the 7 best time management apps for some tips.
Habit 8: Chatting with Your Study Buddy too Much
Having a friend to study with can be hugely motivating for some. For others though, it can be a distraction and make you less productive, because you are distracted by each other and end up chatting. Thus, tasks take much longer to finish than they would have had you tackled them alone.
What to Do About It
When working with a study buddy, give yourselves an incentive to stay focused and on task by promising yourselves some sort of reward when you complete your work. This may be something like going out to grab a coffee together afterward.
This will help ensure you remain productive.
Habit 9: Not Asking for Help When Needed
Not asking for help is counterproductive, leads to unnecessary stress and frustration, and can make you miserable too.
What to Do About It
Ask for help at once if you need it. Don’t let your anxieties mount up and cause you to become distracted and unproductive.
Remember that you’re a student and are not expected to do everything on your own without aid. So, don’t sabotage your productivity before you begin by being afraid to ask for help.
There is more on this subject in our post on the art of asking for help.
Wrapping Up
Now you’re aware of some common productivity-killing habits that plague students, you will be able to spot when one or more of them is damaging your productivity. Whether you tend to procrastinate or chat to your study buddy a little too much, we hope you can use some of the tips we’ve shared here to help.
Start trying new approaches to study to see what works for you and use these tips to help optimise and speed up your study routine.
Good luck!
Make Your Biz Fizz 