You may have heard the term “work smarter, not harder”, and this is precisely where the DRY Principle comes in. DRY stands for Don’t Repeat Yourself, and it outlines exactly how you can improve time management and productivity.
How Does the DRY Principle Work?
The DRY Principle was originally mentioned in The Pragmatic Programmer, a book published in 1999, and was used by programmers to streamline code. The main premise behind it is that instead of manually repeating the same workflows over and over, you automate that process to save time.
On the surface, this might sound obvious, but there are a lot of tasks that workers repeat every day. For instance, how many emails do you receive and write on a daily basis? For every email you send, you are basically re-creating the same structure with slightly different wording, and this is highly time-consuming.
The DRY Principle requires you to make note of all the actions you take at work, one by one. To fit this requirement, you may include tasks that fall under the following categories:
Unplanned, such as inbound messages from clients. Monthly and yearly responsibilities, such as annual reports or one to one. Routine, or things you do every day.
With this list, you can then start to figure out which ones work with the DRY Principle. Pay attention to how repetitive, time-consuming, and/or daunting each one is, and take note of those. Your top contenders will be prime subjects for the DRY Principle, and you can begin automating them as much as you can.
There will be some that you can’t automate entirely, and in these cases, you can streamline aspects of the responsibility.
Create Templates for Your Emails
One of the simplest and arguably the best ways to automate your output is to create a template. As mentioned, many of the actions you complete most likely rely upon the same specific structure, for example, emails sent to clients, and monthly reports. Having a bank of templates reduces the repetition significantly.
You can automate your emails in two distinct ways. You can use an application like TextExpander, which allows you to save sections of text into the Abbreviations tab, and when you go to write your next email, simply type the abbreviation you want to use, and it will automatically produce that text. Likewise, you can also use this in Slack and other instant messaging services.
Alternatively, you can automate your emails in-app. In Outlook 365, just do the following:
Highlight the text you want to save. Go to the Insert tab and click Quick Parts. Click Save selection to Quick Parts Gallery. Name it, and then click OK. When you want to use it, go to Insert > Quick Parts and select the one you want to use.
For Gmail, you will need to ensure that Templates are enabled. Simply go to Settings > Advanced > Templates and click Enable > OK. Then, follow these steps:
In an email, highlight the text you want. Click the three vertical dots in your email, go to Templates and click Save draft as template. Then, to use it, click the vertical dots in an email, go to Templates and select the one you want to use.
Create Templates for Your Work
Much like emails, you can make templates for virtually any piece of work you complete. Whether this is a report, a spreadsheet, a project, or anything else. The aim is to use as little repetition as possible with each action, so having a template addresses this easily.
Microsoft and Google have a huge selection of templates you can pick from, or you can create your own. Although the initial set up may take time, it will more than pay for itself in the long run. Likewise, if you regularly present slideshows, make a standard template that you can return to and edit as required.
Make sure to save all your templates to a specific location so that you can call upon them when needed. If you find that one of them isn’t saving you time, use text from previous work to inform your writing.
Automate Your Routine Tasks
There are a plethora of tasks you do that are incredibly repetitive. From scheduling events, writing your to-do list, taking notes, saving files, and much more. Although they may only take you a couple of minutes to do, it adds up quickly, and take your focus away from your work.
Zapier is a fantastic application for streamlining multiple work streams, as it enables communication between the applications that you use the most, and sends data to complete tasks. For example, if you use Gmail and Google Drive, you can set up a workflow where your email attachments are automatically saved to your Google Drive. This cuts out the middle-man, as it were.
When you create your free account, simply do the following:
From your Dashboard, click Create Zap. Search for an app you use, where an event takes place, e. g. , Gmail. Choose a Trigger Event, e. g. , you receive an email. Connect the app. Choose the app you want data sent to, i. e. , Google Drive. Choose the outcome, i. e. , saves a file.
With your Zap set up, this process will be completely automated.
The DRY Principle Has You Covered
With all these processes happening in the background, your time is freed up, so you don’t have to worry about manually completing those repetitive pieces of work. Of all productivity tools, the DRY Principle makes time-management work most effectively.
Use the time you have now to maximize your output in the future, and you will find that you can carve out a lot more of your day for the things that matter most. There are always things that you can apply the DRY Principle to, so have a look at your workload, and see what you can automate.
