I have a table in my office that is covered in piles. And then there are more piles on my printer and one next to the copier and two on top of the file cabinet.

I know what is in every pile - mostly.

Today I attended a luncheon in which Chris Perrow, president of Perrow Systems spoke on being INTENTIONALLY PRODUCTIVE.

She offered a variety of tips on how to identify the clutter in our brains, prioritize and then schedule to effectively move through all we have on our plates.

One of her tips - TIME BLOCKING. Scheduling small blocks of uninterrupted time to complete one task.

She suggests making the time frame under 20 minutes because even if outside forces don't interrupt you during that time, you'll begin to interrupt yourself. So schedule time blocks of 7-10 minutes and gradually work your way through your tasks.

Additionally, she offered great tips for daily/weekly and monthly activities to help you become more productive:

DAILY

At the end of the day write down three priorities that you will focus on the next day. This way you have the opportunity to think through what you accomplished during the day and set the stage for doing what needs to be done the next day. And the best thing is that when you come into the office in the morning, you'll have your "marching orders" for what to start with.

WEEKLY

On Friday review your week; meetings, tasks completed, and phone calls. And then review what you will be doing the next week. You have the opportunity to congratulate yourself for a job well done and begin to plan for what you'll focus on in the coming week.

MONTHLY

Chris shared that statistics show that 90% of what we file we never look at again. So once a month go through a few files and see if they can be purged. Over time, you'll begin to whittle down the amount of paper you keep and thereby eliminate the piles all over your office - freeing your mind to be more productive.

What tips do you use to be more productive?