8 ways to get all your work done before 2 PM

If you’re tired of long, exhausting workdays, here are eight things you can do to get all of your work done by 2 PM.

1. Schedule your day the night before

One way to make sure you’ll get everything done before the day even starts is to spend Sunday night scheduling everything for the week down to the minute. This will eliminate wasted time on irrelevant tasks while making sure that your workweek is lean and filled with only necessary activities.

You can do this by categorizing activities with labels such as “billable” or “nonbillable” hours, meaning that there are certain portions of your workday that you get paid for and others that you don’t. You can also organize tasks by most and least difficult, or by the earliest and latest deadlines.

2. Exercise early before work

Another way to make sure that all your work gets done before 2 PM is to prime your mind for a productive workday. A 2019 study from the British Journal of Sports Medicine notes that morning exercise improves brain-derived neurotrophic factors, which are key to learning, memory and higher thinking, in addition to executive function on the whole.

This means that an early-morning workout will make it easier for you to focus throughout the rest of your day, especially in the morning, when you need a little extra boost.

3. Focus, but don’t rush

This tip might sound intuitive, but in order to compress your workdays, you’ll need to have a laser focus on the various tasks you need to accomplish. Many other tips on cutting down on working hours will tell you that 60-second decisions are the most important part of shortening your days, but studies show that getting into a flow state in which you’re not distracted by outside stimuli can trigger your brain into making more informed, quicker decisions.

Reaching this flow state is imperative to cutting down on the noise both outside your desk and in your own head. If you’re constantly reminding yourself to make 60-second decisions, you may break up your own flow.

4. Set an alarm to take breaks

Whether it’s a Fitbit that tells you to stand up and walk every hour or an alarm on your phone that permits you five minutes of social media time, scheduled breaks will help keep your 2 PM deadline achievable.

Usually, you take breaks when you’ve accomplished milestones in work, like one small project or a small batch of emails. But these unstructured breaks are triggered by rewarding yourself for ignoring the tough tasks, which we’ll explain in the following points. By making your breaks firm and formal, you’ll waste less time, and you might even enjoy and appreciate your break more.

5. Emails after lunch

Marketing experts report that there tends to be a spike in how many people view their emails after lunch. So this isn’t just the best time for companies to send out their email blasts, it’s also the best time to send emails and receive a quick response. By compartmentalizing this particular task, you’re more likely to save a little time instead of slogging through your email inbox, waiting impatiently for responses that won’t arrive.

6. Don’t put off the tough tasks

One of the most important parts of a productive day that ends before 2 PM is to tackle the hardest things on your to-do list before the easy ones. While people enjoy easy wins, that’s simply because they feel like they’ve completed more. But researchers have found that those who complete easier tasks have a false sense of progress. You can then be lulled into a false sense of complacency and assume that you’re getting more done than you actually are.

7. Have a daily reward

Just like short, planned breaks throughout the day, different kinds of rewards can grant a busy person a little bit of relief. Legendary behavioral psychologist Ivan Pavlov invented the notion of classical conditioning, in which consistent rewards can rewire the brain to begin to believe that a certain activity itself is the reward.

So whether the reward is a slice of chocolate cake or the notion of finishing your workday before everybody else, a daily reward is extraordinarily important to both reinforce and reward your hard work.

8. Outsource and delegate

Outsourcing and delegating are companions to schedule drafting. When planning out your day, keep in mind what needs to be done and whether or not you’re the best person to do it. Sometimes you can spend hours on a facet of your work that a team member could do in half the time, and there’s no rulebook saying that you can’t work smart rather than just working hard. With less busy work, you’ll be freer to do what you do best and finish earlier in the day.

Just keep in mind that one day, that very co-worker could call on you to do something for them, and you’d want to treat them with the same consideration.