A lot of productivity comes down to state management.

It sounds goofy, but if I’m ever really struggling, I may stop work for 5 minutes to watch a few fight scenes from my favorite action movie, The Bourne Identity. That’s state management.

If you’re a Tony Robbins fan, you may know he jumps on a trampoline while shouting affirmations to himself for a few minutes before he rushes on stage to greet the crowd. That’s state management.

If I’m feeling sleepy before hopping on a coaching call, I’ll do 50 push-ups, or step outside for two minutes without a coat during the winter. That’s state management.

Thinking can only take you so far. Sometimes you need to change your state first and then the right kind of thoughts begin to emerge with less struggle.

Before I learned this truth of human nature, I used to try to fight drowsiness by thinking my way out of it. I’d be driving during the midafternoon slump, my wife asleep in the passenger...

We’re often busy, but not really productive.

So how do we change that? 

What if there was a better way to supercharge your productivity? 

I’ve given this a lot of thought and applied some of these techniques to my own work. Here's what I recommend...

Upgrade your capacity for speed.

Parkinson’s law states that “work expands to fill the time available for its completion.”

Cyril Northcote Parkinson, the British historian and author who made this statement, was qualified to make the observation. He worked in the British Civil Service and saw first-hand how bureaucracy could impact productivity.

In fact, you’ll see this in action in many office environments today. There is still a notion we should be “working harder” rather than faster or smarter. Research suggests that given the standard eight-hour workday, most of us are only productive for around three hours!

So, if we’re simply making our work expand to...