Tired of the endless cycle of responding to emails and attending back-to-back meetings?
Are you tired of feeling like productivity means working yourself into the ground?
In this episode of Productivity Hacks, I’m challenging the traditional, output-focused view of productivity. If your days are packed with emails, meetings, and Slack messages, but you’re still not moving the needle on your big goals, this one’s for you.
We’ll explore:
By the end, you’ll feel inspired to redefine productivity on your own terms—balancing impact, focus, and sustainability. Ready to work smarter, not harder? Hit play now!
Productivity isn’t about being busy all the time—it’s about focusing on what really matters. Many of us fall into the trap of measuring our success by how many emails we send, how quickly we respond to messages, or how full our calendar is. But is that truly productive? Let’s break down why traditional productivity models miss the mark and how you can work smarter, not harder.
Ever feel like you’re working all day but getting nothing done? That’s the overhead tax (so coined by Cal Newport) —the time spent on emails, meetings, and admin tasks that don’t directly contribute to meaningful progress. The more projects you juggle at once, the more overhead tax you generate, drastically reducing the time available for deep, impactful work.
If you work on one project, it takes seven hours to complete, with an extra hour of admin (emails, meetings, follow-ups). That’s an eight-hour workday.
But if you take on four projects at once, each requiring the same time commitment, your admin overhead skyrockets. Instead of completing each in one day, you’re now stretched across multiple days, slowing your progress dramatically. The more projects, the more overhead, the less real work gets done.
Instead of chasing a never-ending to-do list, consider slow productivity, a concept by Cal Newport. This approach focuses on producing high-quality work at a sustainable pace, reducing stress while increasing meaningful output.
Prioritise Deep Work – Focus on fewer, high-impact tasks that align with your goals.
Reduce Overhead – Batch emails, limit meetings, and cut out unnecessary admin.
Embrace Single-Tasking – Multitasking is a myth. Work on one thing at a time for better efficiency.
Set Boundaries – Protect your focus time by blocking out distractions.
Plan for Rest – Productivity thrives when balanced with proper breaks and downtime.
Identify your most important task for the week.
Remove or postpone anything that isn’t a priority.
Communicate your focus to colleagues (e.g., using an out-of-office auto-reply to set expectations).
Schedule dedicated time for deep, focused work.
By shifting your mindset from busyness to true productivity, you’ll achieve more with less stress. It’s time to redefine what productivity really means.
Jasmine:
Hey there and welcome to Productivity Hacks, your go-to podcast for quick hacks to help you to get things done and to do them well. I’m Jasmine, your host, productivity coach and consultant, and my mission is to help people increase their productivity so that they have time for what really matters. Each week, I’ll bring you a short episode packed with tips that you can implement right away to boost your output. So let’s dive in. Hi everyone, welcome back to Productivity Hacks. I am so glad you’re here Today.
Jasmine:
I wanted to challenge a common idea about productivity that being busy equals being productive. If your days are filled with replying to endless emails, hopping from one meeting to another, staying active on Slack, it might feel like you’re getting a lot done. But is that actually true productivity? I was prompted to do this episode after someone shared with me that she was initially put off by the word productivity in my podcast title and this put her off listening to my podcast, but she was intrigued, so she had a listen and was pleasantly surprised. I don’t think I realised how much I was challenging the traditional views of productivity, as I lean into balanced, purposeful, meaningful productivity that works for the individual, getting the important stuff done in a way that doesn’t compromise ourselves or our values. So I thought I’d do an episode on it. So in this episode, we’ll dig into what productivity really means at least what it means to me and why traditional definitions often miss the mark. We’ll talk about something called the overhead tax, which you get on tasks like emails, endless meetings, slack. It drains your time and energy, and I’m going to share a concept I love, which is Cal Newport’s idea of slow productivity which is actually really efficient. At the end of this episode, I really hope that you’ll see productivity in a whole new light and you’ll feel empowered to focus on what really matters. So let’s get started. Let’s start with what I believe productivity isn’t. It isn’t about getting everything done at any cost. It is not keeping doing, doing, doing, doing, doing at the cost of your health, your happiness, your family time, your life.
Jasmine:
For a lot of us, productivity looks like constant busyness. We measure success by how many emails we’ve answered, how quickly we’ve responded, how many items we’ve ticked off that to-do list. We sit in meeting after meeting, often without questioning whether those meetings are even necessary. The dictionary definition of productivity typically focuses on the concept of this effectiveness and output, so the Oxford English Dictionary defines productivity as the effectiveness of productive effort, especially in industry, as measured in terms of the rate of output per unit of input. The Merriam-Webster dictionary says the rate at which goods are produced or work is completed, and the Cambridge dictionary says the rate at which a person, company or country does useful work. All these definitions focus on measurable outcomes, but I want to explore how productivity goes way beyond this, because here’s the thing all of these outputs that we tend to focus on to measure our productivity, how many emails we send, how many meetings we’ve been in, how many slack messages we’ve done in a day they’re not actually your real work. They’re what Cal Newport calls overhead tasks, the work that you have to do just to manage the other work.
Jasmine:
I want you to think about it with me for a minute. I’m going to try and explain it. The more you take on, the more projects you take on, the more overhead tasks you generate. So I’m going to put it really simply and I know that the world isn’t as simple as this, but if you have one project that will take seven hours to complete and it generates one hour of overhead tasks so that’s emails, meetings, slacks a day you should be able to complete the project in one eight hour working day. However, if you are working on four projects at once, each taking seven hours to complete and each generating one hour of overhead tax a day, completing these four projects takes significantly more time than four days. Let me break it down that totals 28 hours of work to do if they take seven hours each to do, plus one hour per day of overhead tax of those emails, meetings, slack messaging, all that stuff that comes with the actual work.
Jasmine:
So day one you do four hours of your overhead tax to maintain the four projects, plus you do four hours of actual work, leaving 24 hours of work to do. Day two you do the four hours of overhead tax plus the four hours of work, so you’ve got 20 hours. Day three continues. Day four. Day five, day six you’ve got your four hours of overhead tax plus four hours of work, and you’ve only got four hours left. So day seven is when you complete, you finish all your projects. So it’s taken seven days to do those four projects. If you focused on them one at a time, it would only take one day each, so four days in total. But this example shows that it blasts up the amount of time it takes to do by almost double seven days to do the four projects. Now imagine if you had seven projects at once. What should take seven days, if one at a time would take 49, as you would only have one hour per day to actually work because the other seven hours were the overhead tax. Obviously this is very simplified, but I do hope it helps show the massive impact of that overhead tax, of the time spent juggling emails, coordinating with others, staying visible online, doing the things that show our productivity that others view as productive and busy. They are actually drastically reducing our real output.
Jasmine:
So if productivity isn’t about being busy, what is it? This is where I love Cal Newport’s idea of slow productivity. Instead of chasing quick wins, ticking boxes, slow productivity focuses on doing less but doing it better. It’s about producing high quality work in a way that’s sustainable over the long term and you work at a natural pace. Here’s how I like to think about it. Real productivity isn’t about how much you do, but about the impact of what you do. It’s about working on fewer, more meaningful tasks that align with your long-term goals. Imagine how much better your day would feel if, instead of rushing to clear your inbox. You spent your time deeply focused on something important, whether it’s a big project, a strategy session or even planning your personal goals. Think of how you would feel if that overhead tax was dramatically reduced, if you knew the important things and you focused on them. When you look over a month or a year of work, can you imagine how much more actually productive you would have been? And just imagine how much lower your stress levels would have been as well.
Jasmine:
So why do we fall into the trap of busyness? A big part of it comes down to how we’re wired. We get that little dopamine hit every time we tick something off a to-do list, even if that task isn’t particularly meaningful. And don’t tell me I’m the only one who writes things down just to be able to cross them off. But let’s face it our culture often equates busyness with success. Being busy feels important. It makes us feel like we’re achieving something. When someone asks us how we’re doing, we wear busyness as a badge of honour. Oh, I’m really busy. Oh, I’ve got lots on. But here’s the truth Multitasking, rushing and overloading yourself aren’t just unproductive, as I showed earlier with the overhead tax maths I did they’re also mentally exhausting. Studies show that multitasking while feeling like you’re more productive significantly reduces your efficiency and the quality of your work. On the flip side, focusing deeply on a single task, one that is aligned to the main goals you have the kind of focus that slow productivity encourages actually improves your performance and your sense of satisfaction, and, because it’s sustainable, it also helps prevent burnout. Have a listen to last week’s episode if you’re worried that you or someone you care about is approaching burnout, where I explore this topic further. Okay, your turn.
Jasmine:
It’s time to make this practical. Firstly, I want you to take a moment to reflect what is the number one most important thing you need to achieve this week, and what task or commitments can wait or can be removed altogether. This is a really interesting question. By not working on it until next week or next month, you actually reduce all the overhead tax of maintaining it. If colleagues are asking you about it, about a project that you’re not working on right now, but it is on your to-do list, find a way to show them that you’re not working on right now, but it is on your to-do list. Find a way to show them what you’re working on this week and when those other tasks are in terms of priority, so you could potentially put an out-of-office on your emails which reply to every email saying, hey, thanks for your email. This week I’m focusing on X, y, z. If you’re messaging about another project on my list or a new project, I will get back to you by whenever You’ve communicated really clearly what your focus is and you’ve given people an expectation of when to hear from you. So it’s time to take action.
Jasmine:
Prioritise that meaningful work. Write down the few things that really matter to you this week. Be ruthless about cutting out anything that doesn’t support that. If you struggle with procrastination I did an episode about this a few weeks ago and I’ve got a cheat sheet that helps you navigate it. You can grab this in the show notes. Reduce your overhead, so batch your emails. See my previous episode on emails if you need to sort that out. Decline unnecessary meetings. Set boundaries around your time. Schedule the deep work, so block time in your calendar for focused, uninterrupted work. Turn off notifications. Set a timer. It’s really important to have that focused, deep, uninterrupted time. And don’t forget to plan for rest and recovery. It’s a critical part of working sustainably.
Jasmine:
Depending on the way you work and who you work with, it might be a good idea to communicate this with your line manager, with colleagues, so they can see your process and hopefully respect it. As soon as you start leaning more into this way of working, your actual output will improve. You will be more productive. So don’t be afraid of seeming less busy. The emails can wait. Remember, true productivity isn’t about how much you do. It’s about doing what matters, and I strongly recommend reading Slow Productivity by Cal Newport. It is wonderful.
Jasmine:
Next time I’m going to be sharing about the power of a pivot and how you shouldn’t be afraid to stop doing something or change quickly if you can. It saves a lot of time. If you want to figure out how to reduce that overhead tax, how to focus on the important, how to be truly productive with all the freedom and life that that brings. If you want to work out how to stop those stressful days, those stressful weeks, months that run away from you. If you’re ready to take your productivity to the next level, check out my coaching options. Whether you’re looking for a quick reset or long-term impact, there’s something for everyone. Head to lifewithzestcouk for more info and my latest offers.
Jasmine:
If this episode resonated with you, I’d love to hear about it. Share your reflections on social media and please tag me, jasmine Clark Coach, on Instagram or Facebook, and be sure to share this episode with a friend. Thanks for tuning in to Productivity Hacks. Let’s redefine productivity together. See you next time. That’s it for today. Thank you for tuning in to the Productivity Hacks podcast with me, jasmine. What is your action point today? Write it down and make time to do it. If you like what you’ve heard, follow this podcast to get notifications of the weekly episodes and please, please, share it with your friends.
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