How To Use the Superstructure Method to Boost Your Productivity
By: Leon Ho
Tags: Productivity, Time Management, Efficiency

Image courtesy of Pixabay

Over the years, I’ve noticed that when colleagues have low productivity and low achievement, they also have high stress levels.

This tells me that although they want to get as much work done as possible, their efforts are actually reaping small rewards.

For example, I remember a colleague of mine who always appeared to be busy. He never liked to be disturbed, and never had time for any small talk. You would think that he was a productivity machine. But you’d be wrong!

In reality, he was busy but he struggled to get much done, and often missed his deadlines. He lacked the ability to work efficiently and productively.

As I often mention in my articles, learning how to work productively is something that should be taught in all schools and colleges. Sadly, it’s taught in very few.

However, it’s never too late to learn how to boost your productivity. And if you can spare a few minutes now, I’ll introduce you to the Superstructure Method — which will help you to save hours every week.

Taking Back Control of Your Time

The Superstructure Method is a tried-and-tested technique for organizing your work and boosting your productivity.

If you’re fighting a losing battle when it comes to mastering your day-to-day tasks, then this method will put you back in control of your time and help you accomplish whatever you want.

Before I show you the 4 simple steps that make up the Superstructure Method, it’s important for you to know that every task contains 3 components:

Intention: Why you are doing it Value: What benefits this task brings you Cost: What you have to give up or invest to achieve the value (your resources and time, etc.)

To pinpoint the best tasks to focus — as well as spending the right amount of time doing them — you’ll need to assess their value to you and your work.

This is exactly what the Superstructure Method will enable you to do.

Let’s dive straight in and take a look…

Boosting Your Productivity in 4 Simple Steps

Imagine being able to get your daily tasks done in half the time it normally takes you.

This might seem pie-in-the-sky, but stay with me, and I’ll show you how to make this a reality in your life.

It all has to do with the four steps that make up the Superstructure Method.

Step 1: Start with a clear intention.

The first step is to spend some time looking at all the tasks you have on hand and think about why you need to do these tasks.

I suggest you mentally ask yourself the following two questions about each task: “What benefit am I getting out of this task?” and “Will this action help me make progress towards my goal or my company’s goal this week?”

If you’re looking at all your tasks for the year ahead, then this step will probably take you a few hours. But if you just want to look at your day ahead, it should just take you a few minutes.

Step 2: Decide the task’s value.

The next step is — based on your short and long-term goals — to sort the list of tasks into one of these 3 categories:

Must Haves : Critical to achieving your objective. Without the successful completion of these tasks, your goals will remain dreams.

: Critical to achieving your objective. Without the successful completion of these tasks, your goals will remain dreams. Should Haves : Important but not critical. However, if you leave these tasks out you may lessen the impact of your goals.

: Important but not critical. However, if you leave these tasks out you may lessen the impact of your goals. Good to Haves: These tasks are nice to have, but not including them won’t have any negative impact on your goals.

Let me give you an example of these in action.

It’s early Monday morning, and you’ve just logged into your computer to check your work emails and your calendar.

You notice immediately that you have several important tasks to complete, as well as 2 essential meetings that you need to attend. In addition to this, you have multiple tasks that you’d like to get done and a couple of meetings that you’d be keen to attend.

Spend a few minutes putting your tasks and meetings into the Must Haves, Should Haves, and Good to Haves categories.

In the Must Haves category, you’d definitely want to include your important tasks and essential meetings. In the Should Haves category, put in the tasks and meetings that will help you and your organization achieve your goals. In the Good to Haves category, list anything else that is left over. (This might include meetings that you’d like to attend, but don’t really need to.)

Once you’ve listed out your tasks in this way, the next thing to do is to quantify them so you can rank them using numbers.

Let me explain what I mean…

Start by assigning a number value to each of your tasks. The higher the number, the more important/urgent/valuable it is.

Instead of a linear scale like 1 to 10, I prefer to use the Fibonacci sequence (1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21). This is because as the numbers go up in increasingly larger intervals, it’s much easier to visualize the difference between the numbers.

For example:

Must Haves:

Write project document (21)

Create PowerPoint presentation (13)

Attend management meeting (8)

Should Have:

Respond to project management emails (5)

Good to Have:

Attend meeting with colleagues to discuss Christmas party arrangements (1)

Step 3: Evaluate the task’s cost and prioritize.

After determining the priority of your tasks, the next thing you should do is to look at each task’s cost — the time cost.

Some tasks are difficult. Some require external help. Some require extreme focus. This is usually reflected in the time required to complete the task.

At this stage of your tasks evaluation, you only need to make rough estimates. Personally, I like to split cost estimates into half-hour intervals: 0.5, 1, 1.5, 2, 2.5, 3.

Why have I stopped that list at 3? That’s because I don’t suggest that you have any tasks that last longer than 3 hours. If you’ve calculated that a task will take longer than 3 hours, then it’s too big and you should break it down into smaller tasks — which will also bring the advantage of making it feel less daunting.

Once you’ve done this evaluation, you’ve now quantified the value and time cost of your tasks. All that’s left is for you to calculate the final score of each task and then to order them into priority, from highest to the lowest.

How to calculate the final score?

You just need to divide the task’s value by its time cost.

Take a look at the table below to see exactly how this works:

Step 4: Schedule the tasks.

If you’ve followed all the steps above, you’ll now know the priority of your tasks and approximately how much time you’ll be spending on each task. What’s next? It’s time to put all these things into action!

Fortunately, it’s as easy as scheduling these tasks on your daily/weekly/monthly planner.

“But which day and at what time should I tackle my tasks?” I hear you ask.

Well, if you’ve read my advice on categorizing your tasks into Must Haves, Should Haves and Good to Haves, you’ll know that your high-priority tasks should be tackled first. When you start doing this, you’ll no longer be overwhelmed with loads of tasks. And you’ll always have an organized plan that allows you to master your time and to consistently finish your critical and important tasks on or ahead of schedule.

From my experience of following the Superstructure Method, I noticed that after a few weeks I’d begun to create a solid routine for some recurring tasks such as replying to emails or having regular team discussions. And the good news about this is that routines save your time and energy, as you don’t have to think about them every time.

Oh, and one more thing…

Whenever you think of a new task, or if there are low-priority tasks that can’t fit in your schedule, I suggest you write them down in your task backlog file.

This file, which can be a paper notebook or a task scheduling app, is the place to record all your tasks. It’s a way for you to see at a glance what tasks you have completed — and what tasks you have to come. It will also make it easy to prioritize your tasks.

Succeeding in Life

When we live an unorganized life, we can expect unorganized and disappointing results.

For example, if you were due to sit a college exam, but had done zero studying in advance, you’d probably fail. But if you’d attended all the classes, did your research and studied enthusiastically for your exam — you’d be likely to pass with flying colors.

Disorganized people waste their time and energy; organized people profit from their time and energy. A recent Harvard Business Review study backs up this statement.

I really hope that you put the Superstructure Method into action in your life. If you do, I think you’ll be amazed by the results. You’ll have direction. You’ll have achievement. You’ll have success!