60+ Productivity Quotes to Keep You Motivated to Conquer a New Workday

Keeping motivation high is key to improving productivity in the workplace, especially when it comes to remote work.

As data indicates, 77% of remote workers report being more productive when working from home. This may be thanks to the fact that they have fewer distractions at home. You don’t have to worry about breaks every 20 minutes ruining your focus on a task.

What’s more, remote working gives you the opportunity to live a more balanced life, saving time previously spent on commuting. Whatever the reason, the facts and numbers speak for themselves.

However, even for generally productive people, there’s no guarantee every day will be a productive one. You know how it is; unfortunately, sometimes inspiration just doesn’t knock on the door. This reduces productivity and increases mistakes which affects the quality of work done.

60+ Top Quotes on Productivity

However, there are times when creativity is required, especially when working in creative industries. You need to be able to summon inspiration, but from where and how?! In times of need, other people’s experiences and sayings can be an exceptional guiding light.

Therefore, for those days when you need some motivation. Here are 61 famous quotes about productivity and creativity to lift your spirits.

1. “Productivity is being able to do things that you were never able to do before.” — Franz Kafka

2. “I always had the uncomfortable feeling that if I wasn’t sitting in front of a computer typing, I was wasting my time–but I pushed myself to take a wider view of what was ‘productive.’ Time spent with my family and friends was never wasted.” — Gretchen Rubin

3. “Your mind is for having ideas, not holding them. If you don’t pay appropriate attention to what has your attention, it will take more of your attention than it deserves. You can do anything, but not everything. You don’t actually do a project; you can only do action steps related to it.” — David Allen

4. “There’s a tendency to mistake preparation for productivity. You can prepare all you want, but if you never roll the dice you’ll never be successful.” — Shia LaBeouf

5. “Whenever you are asked if you can do a job, tell ’em, ‘Certainly I can!’ Then get busy and find out how to do it.” — Theodore Roosevelt

6. “Over the long run, the unglamorous habit of frequency fosters both productivity and creativity.” — Gretchen Rubin

7. “Focus on being productive instead of busy.” — Tim Ferriss

8. “Creativity isn’t about wild talent as much as it’s about productivity. To find new ideas that work, you need to try a lot that don’t. It’s a pure numbers game.” — Robert Sutton

9. “Productivity is never an accident. It is always the result of a commitment to excellence, intelligent planning, and focused effort.” — Paul J. Meyer

10. “Don’t confuse activity with productivity. Many people are simply busy being busy.” — Robin Sharma

11. “Knowledge is the source of wealth. Applied to tasks we already know, it becomes productivity. Applied to tasks that are new, it becomes innovation.” — Peter F. Drucker

12. “Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just get up and go to work.” — Stephen King

13. “Working on the right thing is probably more important than working hard.” — Caterina Fake

14. “You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” — Martin Luther King

15. “The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.” — Walt Disney

16. “Nothing is particularly hard when you divide it into small jobs.” — Henry Ford

17. “Great acts are made up of small deeds.” — Lao Tzu

18. “Do the hard jobs first. The easy jobs will take care of themselves.” — Dale Carnegie

19. “If you have time to whine then you have time to find a solution.” — Dee Dee Artner

20. “Continuous improvement is better than delayed perfection.” — Mark Twain

21. “Start by doing what’s necessary, then do what’s possible, and suddenly you are doing the impossible.” — Saint Francis of Assisi

22. “Time management is about life management.” — Idowu Koyenikan

23. “Soon is not as good as now.” — Seth Godin

24. “If you spend too much time thinking about a thing, you’ll never get it done.” — Bruce Lee

25. “It’s not always that we need to do more but rather that we need to focus on less.” — Nathan W. Morris

26. “Efficiency is doing better what is already being done.” — Peter F. Drucker

27. “Take time to deliberate, but when the time for action has arrived, stop thinking and go in.” — Napoleon Bonaparte

28. “Ordinary people think merely of spending time, great people think of using it.” — Arthur Schopenhauer

29. “Efficiency is doing things right. Effectiveness is doing the right things.” — Peter F. Drucker

30. “Success is often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable.” — Coco Chanel

31. “Far and away the best prize that life offers is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.” — Theodore Roosevelt

32. “Time management is not a peripheral activity or skill. It is the core skill upon which everything else in life depends.” — Brian Tracy

33. “The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.” — Stephen R Covey

34. “Action is the foundational key to all success.” — Pablo Picasso

35. “Don’t wait. The time will never be just right.” — Napoleon Hill

36. “You were born to win, but to be a winner, you must plan to win, prepare to win, and expect to win.” — Zig Ziglar

37. ”The true price of anything you do is the amount of time you exchange for it.” — Henry David Thoreau

38. “There is never enough time to do it right, but there is always enough time to do it over.” — John W. Bergman

39. “It’s not knowing what to do; it’s doing what you know.” — Tony Robbins

40. “The greater the obstacle, the more glory in overcoming it.” — Jean-Baptiste Poqeulin (Moliere)

41. “It is not the strongest of the species that survives, not the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.” — Charles Darwin

42. “You can’t get much done in life if you only work on days when you feel good.” — Jerry West

43. “No great achiever—even those who made it seem easy—ever succeeded without hard work.” — Jonathan Sacks

44. “Greatness is sifted through the grind, therefore don’t despise the hard work now for surely it will be worth it in the end.” — Sanjo Jendayi

45. “The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity” — Amelia Earhart

46. “Work like there’s someone working twenty-four hours a day to take it from you!” — Mark Cuban

47. “The critical ingredient is getting off your butt and doing something. It’s as simple as that. A lot of people have ideas, but there are few who decide to do something about them now.” — Nolan Bushnell

48. “You don’t have to be exceptional every week but as a minimum you need to be at a level that even on a bad day you get points on the board.” — Sean Dyche. 

49. “Your talent determines what you can do. Your motivation determines how much you are willing to do. Your attitude determines how well you do it.” — Lou Holtz

50. “Someday is not a day of the week.” — Janet Dailey

51. “Plans are nothing; planning is everything.” — Dwight D. Eisenhower

52. “Procrastination is the fear of success. People procrastinate because they are afraid of the success that they know will result if they move ahead now. Because success is heavy, carries a responsibility with it, it is much easier to procrastinate and live on the ‘someday I’ll’ philosophy.” — Denis Waitley

53. “The simple act of paying positive attention to people has a great deal to do with productivity.” — Tom Peters.

54. “You’ve got to get up every morning with determination if you’re going to go to bed with satisfaction.” — George Lorimer

55. “Effective performance is preceded by painstaking preparation.” — Brian Tracy

 56. “People overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in 10 years.” — Bill Gates

57. “I do not equate productivity to happiness. For most people, happiness in life is a massive amount of achievement plus a massive amount of appreciation. And you need both of those things.” — Tim Ferriss

58. “The really happy people are those who have broken the chains of procrastination, those who find satisfaction in doing the job at hand. They’re full of eagerness, zest, productivity. You can be, too.” — Norman Vincent Peale

59. “Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand. The sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus.” — Alexander Graham Bell

60. “Nothing is less productive than to make more efficient what should not be done at all.” — Peter F. Drucker

61. “Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.” — Steve Jobs

Important Lessons From These Famous Productivity Quotes

The productivity quotes for work above are not just some cliche quotes on productivity and efficiency. They’re the product of some of the greatest minds in the world, of people who have known incredible success through hard work.

However, we all know success is not achieved simply by thinking of it. Gaining true success requires, above all, perseverance.

To sum up the most important takeaways from these quotes on productivity, we’ll give you the following four actionable insights that we hope you’ll find useful.

1. Boost your productivity with better time management: Prioritize what’s on your schedule. Sometimes, it looks like multitasking is really switching back and forth between multiple tasks with no clear purpose. If you feel that your workload is too heavy, talk about it with your superiors. Solutions can always be found, but remember to be honest about your work volume.
2. Avoid distractions: do what’s in your power to not get caught up in things that can interrupt your focus, especially if you have control over some of these factors. Things like having the TV on, or opening tabs in your browser with your social media accounts are better avoided during the workday if you genuinely want to be productive.
3. Segment bigger tasks into smaller sections: Setting milestones when working on a more complicated project will prevent you from feeling overwhelmed by its many components. Moreover, by checking each milestone accomplished off the list, you’ll have a feeling of satisfaction that will act as a drive toward the completion of the remaining ones. Let’s not forget that Rome wasn’t built in a day.
4. Combat procrastination by deciding to act right away: People procrastinate when a certain assignment troubles them. If you’re doing it, then perhaps you don’t have experience handling such a task. So, think of it like this: what better way to start learning than by doing, right now? The sooner you face the challenges it poses and make mistakes you can learn from, the better for you. You’ll develop your skills faster and improve your work performance. And as you might have guessed, consistently providing quality output is the key to achieving long-term success.

Having a productive day depends on how you choose to spend it and how you direct your energy and attention.

How Can Brosix Help You Boost Your Productivity in the Workplace?

Successful communication between employees is one of the most important aspects of productivity in the workplace.

As an easy-to-use instant messaging platform, Brosix is one of the most effective solutions to homogenize an organization’s internal communication.

Thanks to its ability to improve communication among co-workers, which ultimately leads to improved results and, therefore, increased work productivity, Brosix may be the tool your company needs for more motivated employees!

Final Thoughts on Work Productivity Quotes

Being productive at work is influenced by so many factors. From the way you woke up, to how a meeting went during the day.

Hopefully, these 61 productivity motivational quotes will help you improve your productivity and creativity for those days when tasks actually seem overwhelming.

Now your turn: do you have any quotes for a productive day that you’d like to share? Feel free to let us know in the comments.