5 Things to Do on Friday Afternoon at Work Before You Hit the Weekend

Everybody is “working for the weekend”, according to the 1981 Loverboy song, and while you might be anxious to leave work, get out early, and hot the weekend, your career and life might benefit from taking a few minutes to pause on a Friday afternoon to get a few things in order before you leave.

Scheduling just 30 minutes into your Friday routine to tackle the following five items will significantly impact your well-being, and help you be more prepared for the next week.

Evaluate the week. Take a few moments to check in on your priorities for the week. Did you accomplish your goals or is there some unfinished business that you’ll have to complete over the weekend, or get after first thing next week? You can do this in your head, but it can be helpful to write down a few notes to help you remember your assessment of the week. Think over your meetings and interactions with colleagues, supervisors, and customers. Is there anything you would change or is there a situation you would have liked to handle differently? You don’t need to spend a lot of time on this evaluation, and five minutes or so is plenty for now. 

Respond to Messages. You won’t want to go into the weekend knowing you owe someone a phone call, or an email reply and it can hang in your thoughts until you get back to them. Take care of it now, even if it means following up with a more detailed email or conversation later. You might also, if possible, work to attain in-box zero, meaning you have dealt with all your emails by responding to them or filing them away to read another day.

Organize your desk. Avoid coming in to work on Monday to a messy and disorganized desk by taking a few minutes to straighten up before you leave. Wipe away the stains from your coffee mug and toss out the crumbs from that protein bar you had after lunch.

Set some initial goals. Think about your priorities for the coming week and identify 3-5 preliminary goals or tasks to accomplish. Situations and priorities change but you’ll head into the week with a clearer focus by taking some time to prepare.

Review your calendar for the upcoming week. Before you leave take a quick glance at your calendar and note any meetings, training sessions, or big deadlines coming up. You don’t want to arrive at work on Monday morning to discover you’re 10 minutes late for the company-wide meeting.

By taking a few minutes on Friday afternoon to prepare for the following week you’l

l set yourself up for success and allow yourself to better enjoy the weekend.

5 Ways to Be More Organized Today

One way to reduce stress and anxiety related to your job is to become more organized and structured at work. This will help you be better prepared for the inevitable curve balls that come your way.

Implement these five tips to be more organized at work today.

Create a to-do list. But limit it to only three to five items. Be focused on tackling the most important tasks facing you today and avoid becoming distracted by tasks that seem urgent but ultimately do not contribute to the success of your project, career, or company.

And create your list in an e-version rather than hard copy so that you don’t add to the clutter around your work area. If you don’t want to use a simple Word document you can find many apps available to assist with setting your daily priorities.

Simplify your work space. Speaking of clutter, remove anything you don’t need from your desk or work area. Keep your space free of items (folders, files, papers, desk supplies, etc.) that are unnecessary to the work you’re doing. These items can make it difficult to concentrate or focus on the task at hand, or complicate finding some important notes you jotted down about the project you’re completing.

A clean, simple work space will assist you in directly your energies more fully to the important tasks you’ve identified.

Schedule time to organize. Set aside 15-20 minutes in your day to organize your work area, systematize files and folders, and remove or delete unnecessary files.

Ensuring that you schedule just a few minutes to organize each day will prevent you from becoming overwhelmed in the future.

Plan for tomorrow. Before you leave work take 10-15 minutes to evaluate your day, review your to-do list and set your priorities for the next day. This will enable you to relax and enjoy the evening better, and prevent you from the stress of thinking about what you need to get done.

Automate as much as possible. If there are ways to use apps, programs, or other tools to automate task associated with your work find a way to incorporate them into your work flow. This can free up time for the most important things you do in your work day and can ease stress levels.

Spend a few minutes today researching apps related to your job and you can yourself better equipped and more organized tomorrow.