Oh my gosh, it’s 5 o’clock and what a day it’s been! Every moment filled with go-go-go, and you touched so many tasks . . . until you realize you didn’t do anything you had planned to do that day. It’s easy to get caught up in the email, meetings, calls, and spontaneous fire-fighting that pull you farther from your daily goals. And while you can’t add hours to the day, you can improve your efficiency during work hours.

Here’s how:

• Develop a daily routine. Adding some routine items to your day can help you stay focused and refreshed at work. In the morning, first thing when you get to work, review the to-do list of the tasks you want to accomplish by day’s end. Identify what must be done today, versus what can wait if it needs to. (You’ll write your very first list in the morning. Thereafter, you’ll prep the list at the end of the day.) Throughout the day, manage your time by setting the alarm on your phone or computer to alert you once an hour. When the alarm goes off, check in with yourself. Were you as productive in the last hour as you wanted to be? If not, take a look at your to-do list and refocus your time for the next hour. In the evening, five minutes before quitting time, shut it all down. Review your to-do list, reflecting on how successful your day was and what you might do differently moving forward. Prepare a new to-do list for tomorrow.
• Conserve time. Facebook here, text message there—where is your workday really going? To find out, keep an activity log for a full week. Log all your activities and how long you spend doing each. By the end of the week, you’ll have a good idea of where your time is actually going. Once you know that, you can use time limits to maximize your productivity. Assign a time limit to each task on your to-do list, and don’t exceed it. (Think 80-20 Rule, that 80 percent of your results come from the first 20 percent of your effort. There’s no room for perfectionism here!) Do the best job you can within that time limit, and then move on to the next task. Also set daily times to triage and respond to work email.
• Push past procrastination. We’ve all done it: pushed a project until the last minute. And why? Because we were afraid of it or didn’t want to do it to begin with. Instead of looking at that project as an insurmountable whole, break it up into smaller pieces. Now you have a checklist of the doable steps that make up that “insurmountable” project. You may find the act of creating a checklist is enough to start building momentum on your project’s progress. Continue that momentum by checking off each step as you complete it. Progress is the best motivator!

You can’t add hours to the day, but you can operate more efficiently within those hours. And while improving your efficiency can help you stay focused, even the most efficient workers don’t always accomplish everything they mean to. Just keep your chin up and stay with the routine, and you’ll be closer to your goals in no time!