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The 30-Day Productivity Boost (Vol. 1): 30 Bad Habits That Are Sabotaging Your Time Management

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Learn How To Boost Your Productivity, Get More Done And Enjoy More Free Time!

Are you sick of procrastinating, losing focus and leaving projects unfinished? Do you feel overwhelmed by your responsibilities and unable to control the chaos of your day? Do you feel you could be more productive if only you knew how to better manage your time?

The 30-Day Productivity Boost Vol. 1 was written with you in mind.

This action guide takes you, step by step, through 30 bad habits that are crippling your time management efforts. Each habit is explored in detail. You'll learn about the triggers that prompt it and the ways in which it hurts your productivity. Most importantly, you'll receive a series of actionable tips you can use immediately to curb the bad habit and create a healthier, more productive habit in its place.


A Blueprint For Better Time Management!

Getting control of your time and improving your productivity is doable. You just need a blueprint describing the steps and a system for putting those steps into action. The 30-Day Productivity Boost Vol. 1 fills those gaps.

Here's a sample of what you'll learn in this new action guide:

- A simple formula for creating to-do lists that actually work (Day 3)

- How to slash the amount of time it takes you to complete any task (Day 4)

- How to stop being a people-pleaser and catapult your productivity (Day 6)

- 5 tips for designing your workday so you can avoid working overtime (Day 7)

- How to create a diet that improves, rather than hinders, your productivity (Day 9)

- A 6-step system for breaking your procrastination habit (Day 10)

- 6 easy tips for curbing your social media addiction (Day 12)

- The productivity-killing effect of television and how to deal with it (Day 14)

- How to control your inner critic and regain confidence in yourself (Day 18)

- 6 ways to leverage your body's natural rhythms to get more work done (Day 21)

- The one addiction nearly everyone has (and how to crush it!) (Day 24)

- 4 actionable tips for taking advantage of the Pareto principle (Day 25)

- 5 steps to creating reachable goals that motivate you to be more productive (Day 27)

- An 8-step formula for avoiding - or recovering from - burnout (Day 29)

- And much, much more!


Bonus Material Included In The 30-Day Productivity Boost Vol. 1

I've included an entire chapter devoted to helping you curb the behaviors that are destroying your time management efforts. You'll learn a 10-part system for breaking these bad habits and replacing them with patterns that boost your productivity.


Take Action Today!

Download your copy of The 30-Day Productivity Boost Vol. 1 today! Take action to improve your time management, and free up more time to spend with your loved ones and pursue your passions.

Click the orange "Buy Now" button at the top of the Amazon sales page to grab your copy and start designing a more rewarding lifestyle!

148 pages, Kindle Edition

Published February 3, 2016

3221 people are currently reading
961 people want to read

About the author

Damon Zahariades

43 books319 followers

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5 stars
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156 (24%)
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33 (5%)
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14 (2%)
Displaying 1 - 30 of 57 reviews
Profile Image for Alicia Fox.
473 reviews24 followers
June 3, 2018
This isn't so bad in terms of it being a book of work productivity books (that is, productivity books aimed at employers rather than the self-employed). If you're hoping to do more work at your job, this book may help. But it will do you a disservice, like others of its genre, by never answering the question of why you're expected to devote a chunk of your time and money on figuring out how to do more work for your employer for the same pay. More precisely, it deals with how to get the 60 hours of work you're given down to the 40 hours of work you're actually paid for.

One of the productivity tips is to stop paying attention to current events. Seriously--the conditions of the world around you are considered by this author to be a distraction.

And for the love of all that's holy, don't waste your time helping a coworker! Why would you waste time neglecting your own tasks to do something for a struggling coworker which s/he will get credit for!?

This book scares me. We're so far in the dark hole of winner-take-all, look-out-for-yourself-or-you're-next-on-the-chopping-block capitalist ideology that hundreds of thousands of us read this sort of antisocial, inhumane trash and never question it.
Profile Image for Emma Sea.
2,214 reviews1,226 followers
May 16, 2017
I own WAY TOO MANY books on productivity because I continually hope one will be the book that magically turns me into a capable, confident person who is on top of their shit. Alas, every time I read the last page I am still myself.

But you know what? This book is great. Seriously, if you are looking for a book on productivity tools/hacks, get this one. It's succinct and to the point, the techniques are sound, and it isn't full of hype-y "The Secret" crap that achieves nothing but the inflation of the author's bank account. He closes each chapter with "Action Points" i.e. do this now. I like that.

Day 24 is Stop Keeping Up With Current Events. Zahariades suggests a news fast. For at least two weeks. A month if you can do it. And now I have to face the fact that I've been hooked on the news since 2001. September 2001, to be precise. I slept with the TV on for a week (hah, I still had a TV then, isn't that quaint? A box that does only one thing, and no way to skip the ads!) not wanting to miss anything, and I've never really stepped away. Hi, I'm Emma, and I'm addicted to my international news feed. I'm afraid of missing out. Afraid of not knowing. And yet the last six months all it has done is sink me into despair (also caused a lot of head desking).

I am too scared to try the news fast. I'm not in control of this habit and I'm scared I will try to quit and fail. Which means I should probably do it.

Well played, Zaharides, well played.
Profile Image for Tara Brabazon.
Author 41 books513 followers
July 18, 2020
Productivity books make me want to cook meth. Self evident nonsense duels with pseudo-religious affirmations... It often feels a lot easier to cook meth...

This book was a surprise. While there is nothing here that summons the hallelujah chorus, there are strong daily strategies offered which ensure considered uses of time, motivation and energy.

It is well written and considered. Strong. Recommended.
Profile Image for Matias Myllyrinne.
145 reviews5 followers
October 23, 2018
The literally equivalent of instant noodles. Where it tries to be positive it is naive, when it tries to be broad and worldly it is soggy and without focus.

The tips to health and burnout are cringeworthy. The biggest problem with burnout seems to be it hurts your productivity in five ways. Focusing exercise on movements that bares results ignores muscle imbalance etc.

Wanted to like it. But this is a literary delight you want to send back to the kitchen.

Profile Image for Sura Siri.
346 reviews5 followers
March 27, 2025
เนื้อหาที่เพิ่มประสิทธิภาพการทำงานให้ผู้อ่าน โดยใช้หลักการที่ดีสร้างประสิทธิภาพการทำงานขั้นสูงสุดที่นำเสนอให้อ่านทุกๆวัน วันละบทซึ่งทำให้อ่านแล้วไม่น่าเบื่อ มีทั้งหมด 30บท ไม่ซ้ำกันและค่อยๆเพิ่มความเข้มข้นไปเรื่อย อ่านแล้วได้หลักการเพิ่มประสิทธิภาพในการทำงานหลายข้อเลยทีเดียว
Profile Image for Maria Isabel Chang.
156 reviews2 followers
July 8, 2024
I loved the 30-day format and straighfordwardness of this book. It basically contains 30 pieces of actionable advice to improve your productivity. I have taken several notes and created a plan to apply what I learned from this book in real life. I will definitively be reading volume no. II.
Profile Image for Christine.
935 reviews18 followers
June 30, 2020
A Very Timely Productivity Guide

"Psychologists and researchers claim our brains need up to 25 minutes to regain our momentum after each distraction."

Had I been teaching at school, much of this may not have applied. Teaching remotely from home,I found myself falling into unproductive. Patterns. This book got me back on track!

Between Google Classroom notifications, emails and phone calls, I was getting very little done. These types of distractions don't normally interrupt teaching in a school room. (Although during prep periods they may!)

This book was recommended by Michelle Ferre' who is a teacher, coach and vlogger. Her website, and more importantly, her youtube station "A Pocket Full of Primary" have helped my tremendously during the Covid 19 quarantine.

As I read this book it occurred to me: time is structured in a school so that teaching cannot/should not be interrupted.


This book makes suggestions that help you self-regulate your time.
For instance:
"Set specific times of the day to check your email. Pick two and treat them like appointments with yourself."
This may seem obvious to people who regularly work from home, but as a teacher, I did not check email more than 2 times a day... 6 am and 2:30 pm, due to scheduling and teaching obligations.
Having access to distractions became problematic because teaching remotely is so isolating. I had to take action! As Zahariades recommends, I closed my email software and made self-imposed restrictions on my schedule.

"Being perfect is more than just unnecessary. It’s harmful to your productivity...It’s easier to continue working on a current task than to start a new one, especially if the new one requires stepping outside your comfort zone."

This is another important recommendation for me. During a class period, all teachers do the best they can, but no lesson is perfect. How can it be? You cannot account or predict the turns real human interaction can take. Virtual lessons can be rewritten, reformatted, reworded over and over again! This was making me very unproductive!

"Embrace your mistakes. Instead of criticizing yourself, use mistakes as learning opportunities."

In short, I had to learn that students needed specific content, and my delivery, especially in video lessons, need not look like a text book or Hollywood production!


2 reviews
May 16, 2022
THE book to read

If you want to break bad habits;
If you want to be more productive;
If you want have good time management;
If you want to feel good about yourself;
If you want to feel good about your life;
If you want to get somewhere in life;
If you want to gain some sense of control over your life;
Read this book.

I’ve read so many self-help books covering the above, and bits and pieces of them have stuck in my mind, but for the most part I dropped away from doing what they instructed after the first relapse into bad habits, or after one failure or another.
This book, however, is different.
It is concise.
It doesn’t waffle.
It states the bad habit,
Why it is bad,
And then the actions you can take to overcome it.
Yes, it states, I will fail at times, but it has given me actions and plans on what to do when that happens.

Please, to whoever takes the time to read this review: do yourself a favour, read this book. And reread it.
10 reviews
February 3, 2021
This book is pure fluff. Vanilla. Must have been written in a day. The 30 "bad" habits aren't anything that hasn't been said over and over again. Some are counterintuitive to success. I.e. "Stop trying to be perfect".....I'm pretty sure Michael Jordan never said that. You won't ever be perfect, however that's a terrible reason not to try. And that's time well spent.

The time management techniques all boil down to the idea of doing less, i.e. "stop working overtime", "stop saying yes to commitment". There's maybe 3 or 4 nice ideas among the 30 topics, but again nothing earth shattering.

For anyone that wants business success, personal achievement, or just day to day joy -- you're better off never opening the front cover. I don't need a book with a whole chapter to say "stop eating junk food".
11 reviews
September 11, 2017
Simple but effective

Productivity is something I've had a lot of trouble with throughout my life. Why be productive when I can play videogames, surf the web for hours, or binge watch TV? But being in a band has led to a change where I HAVE to stay productive in order for us to achieve our goals.

This guide is pretty straightforward and simple. To be honest, most of the steps are common sense. But it's really good to acknowledge that these things are interfering in your productivity every day. This is a guide that I feel like I can revisit every 6 months to a year and reaffirm the steps, noting where I've improved and working on the areas where I've failed. That seems pretty valuable to me.
1 review
January 1, 2023
Better Title: Productivity Mindset

Right off the top I want to say I really enjoyed this book, but it is not at all what I was expecting. From the title highlight it would provide 30 actionable items with metrics and measurable (like use the washing machine present to run a load of laundry before you wake up, then toss in dryer as you head out the door). Instead of was something more valuable - a guide to productivity mindset which I will continue to strive towards....but I'd still love to a find a book with those 30 action items.
Profile Image for Bakari.
Author 2 books56 followers
June 1, 2017
Too preachy

This short guide to being more productive has some good suggestions, but the writer's tone is too preachy. Instead, I would have been more engaged if he shared personal stories and antidotes that suggest ways to be more productive, rather than numerous paragraphs and chapter headings starting in the negative: stop this, do this, don't.... Again, the book has good suggestions, but you may not find the writing inspiring.
Profile Image for Nunya Byznass.
443 reviews41 followers
August 4, 2018
Good Read, BUT...

This quick to read book is packed with great ideas but it is a little repetitive at times. (Although, I was listening to his ‘Fast Focus’ book as an audiobook in the same time, period I was reading this, so maybe that’s why it seemed repetitive?).

Also, reading this is a waste of time if you’re not prepared to implement any of the strategies and techniques given by the author. 😳
Profile Image for Teejay.
156 reviews
September 19, 2019
Some great tips for anybody who is even remotely self-aware about their productivity habits. Not everything here will apply to everybody, but Zahariades doesn't expect that. He also doesn't expect you to read in one sitting, but rather take it one day (or week) at a time to implement small changes. This will also be a great reference to open from time to time to review tips and steps to take to get back on track!
6 reviews
August 15, 2017
Well organized, to the point

The book is well laid out. Some redundancy, but nothing is belabored. Action plans make sense and are offered cafeteria style - use what fits your situation. The different "tracking" suggestions are fine if one is really clueless about one's daily life, but for the most part, the tracking eats up too much time.
Profile Image for Daniel Dineen.
8 reviews2 followers
November 16, 2017
Great tips for taking action to improve productivity

I enjoyed this book. It was a very quick read with lots of useful advice for breaking bad habits and replacing them with better habits.
The chapter on burnout really hit home for me. Looking forward to using this book as a guide for making small improvements over the next several months.
Highly recommended.
Profile Image for Sean Flatley.
324 reviews2 followers
July 11, 2020
Read this book. It helped me enormously.

As a dyslexic and ADD man, I have to say that it was a real pleasure reading this book and making notes from it.
I definitely will be putting the great advice here to good use both in my working life and personal life. I have already purchased the next volume of 30 day productivity.
Best. Sean
Profile Image for Denise.
580 reviews
January 30, 2023
While there are some good ideas here the content makes no allowances for differences in job types.
The very first entry - only check your email 2x per day - made me laugh out loud. In my position failure to respond quickly to certain emails could have disastrous results. So from there I took what I read with a grain of salt.
Profile Image for Sean Sharp.
12 reviews1 follower
March 24, 2025
I liked his other books like The To Do List Formula and The Time Chunking method better than this. Overall this is a set of good reminders on how to break bad habits but much of the book is self explanatory and has been said before a hundred times over. There is very little in the way of new concepts here, but I will credit the fact that it's quick and digestible.
Profile Image for Jacqueline Mora.
8 reviews
March 7, 2019
Excelente Lectura

Práctica , enfocada en resultados, simple y sobre todo que llama a una reflexión profunda, pero entregando una guía simple para transitar en el camino de la productividad
Profile Image for Sabrina Dunford.
51 reviews
May 9, 2019
Great information

Lots of great information but it’s written like a research paper. Even still, the content is good. If you’re simply looking for a list of great ideas this is the book for you.
Profile Image for Rowan Rook.
Author 49 books27 followers
December 31, 2019
Straightforward and actionable. It doesn't delve particularly deep, but that also means it's a quick, easy-to-digest read. It serves its purpose well. I'd recommend this book over many of the other productivity books I've read.
8 reviews
April 26, 2020
Amazing book with a wonderful plan
I think we have to read this book more than once and try to apply the recommendation and action step in our daily life
Although some of the items are well known but the author give a key steps how to solve and get rid from some bad habit
Profile Image for Jaime Maresh.
12 reviews
November 23, 2020
Great read

I really enjoyed this book. Lots of great tips and actionable items that can be applied immediately. I started using some of the tips at work and already noticed a difference!
Profile Image for Joan Baker-Young.
Author 2 books
March 25, 2021
Sent my drunken butterfly to AA

I have ADD and this got me back on track, covering everything from rising early to blocking stress. My favorite chapter? Procrastination, aka ADD management. Thanks, Damon.
Profile Image for Yulia Basenko.
122 reviews3 followers
March 7, 2025
Если бы я села писать свою книгу или вести блог, то написала бы что-то похожее. Согласна с большинством советов. Нравится, что в каждой главе есть механика, почему это важно и почему у многих не работает, и план на 1-2-3, как это внедрить.
Profile Image for Karen Hewitt.
318 reviews2 followers
May 24, 2017
Good tips

Love how it breaks down the why of each tip, found that I may be guilty of more than one
Profile Image for Nizzy.
39 reviews23 followers
August 29, 2017
Get your life together!

Great tips on how to become more productive. A bit repetitious on each day, but this time that's a good thing so that each tip is drilled into your head.
168 reviews
December 17, 2019
Helpful

A helpful book with good data . It is well organized into crucial chapters. It moves along at a good pace.
1 review
March 2, 2020
Awesome book

This book have a lot of great practical knowledge. There is so much that I have taken from this book and will use in my life.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 57 reviews

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