Do you have a personal Kanban board? I highly recommend it; even though I honestly do not use one any more myself. Here’s why.
Multitasking
Humans are pretty darn bad at multitasking. We generally do not perform well when working on more than one thing at a time. Go look up some studies (I’m lazy and will just assert my position rather than looking up the data again).
Kanban boards are great at allowing you to see all of your work, prioritizing it, and working on one thing at a time. Using a physical board is also greatly helpful with this, as the space is limited, so it forces you to be picky about the work items on it up front. You cannot fool yourself into thinking you’ll get to that certain thing once everything else settles down. If it isn’t on your board, you aren’t going to get to it.
A physical board will also help you to limit the states of items on the board. You cannot have multiple columns that end up boiling down to either “waiting on somebody else” or “will get to someday”. Those things go away. Or you end up pestering the crap out of somebody until they make movement because the sticky is still on your board too.
All these are elements of limiting work in progress. Limiting your focus to one thing at a time.
Communication
Does somebody need to know (such as your boss) when you will get something done? What you are currently working on? Do they interrupt you to ask you?
If you have a board that is clearly visible, perhaps they can see the answers to their questions without even bothering you. Perhaps that can also even drive meaningful conversations around why you chose such-and-such priority for such-and-such work item. Rather than them asking when you will work on something and you come up with some BS answer that will make them go away for a short time.
Accountability
A personal Kanban board can also keep you accountable, most notably to yourself. It serves as a constant reminder of what you should be working on, should you stray off course. You can see what is next up to work on, rather than spending time trying to remember, or goofing off for a while until somebody notices.
The Problems
Now, I said that I no longer use a Kanban board like this. It isn’t because I’ve found a better way. I just couldn’t handle it. I work part of the week in the office, and part of the week from home. Even though I tried to have a small board (single sheet of paper), it could not perform the way I needed it to. I think this is most effective when the board’s size can be measured in feet, rather than inches.
Software versions of these also just do not hold up. They become just another browser tab, and get buried. If you are disciplined enough to make this work, fantastic. I am not. Yet.