I know this sounds counterproductive, or even backwards. But use your Lunch time everyday to your advantage. Almost every day I use my lunch time to get done multiple minor tasks that I simply haven’t had time to do through the rest of the day. There are a couple of tricks that are required to get the most bang for your buck.

• Take an early or late lunch – Go to lunch before or after the rest of the office has eaten. The wonderful bonus to this is that you effectively double the available lunch quiet time to accomplish your tasks. While the rest of the office is at lunch you can churn and burn as many little tasks as possible with minimal interruption because everyone else is out of the office or stuffing their face.
• Take your lunch – Or at the very least don’t go any farther than a block away for food. Or depending on your area, somewhere close by that has free internet access. Use as little time as possible to acquire your food, as this will give you even more time to get your little tasks accomplished.
• Make it Obvious Not to Be Disturbed – Set Outlook to Offline. Set your IM to DND. Set your Phone to DND. Close the door to your office or put up a sign in your cubicle that says “Out to Lunch”. Make sure your food is out in the open and clearly visible. The more you can inconvenience someone that wants to talk to you, the less likely you will be to hear from them during your lunch break.
• Do not engage anyone – Do not, under any circumstances make contact with anyone during this period. No phone calls, no e-mails, no instant messages. Once you have engaged anyone, you instantly lose your “Do Not Disturb Barrier”. You will suddenly become deluged with requests of your time and completely defeat the purpose of your Lunchtime solitude.

The biggest sneaky part about this entire process is especially if you are engaged in work activities while on your Lunchtime of Solitude, you can typically increase your Lunch by 25 to 50%. Eating, at least to me, is very little of a distraction, so I get lots done during my lunch periods. People and outside influences on the other hand can be horribly distracting. Once you’ve completed your lunch for the day, put Outlook back Online and watch all your responses you typed during lunch spew forth like a tidal wave.

Best bonus from this process: Getting an extra hour or more of interruption free work time a day without extending your work day.