Time Blocking – An Efficient and Productive Way to Manage Your Time
Hear me out…
Anyone who’s ever worked in the restaurant industry will probably understand this: we are taught to multi-task. Multi-task like it’s an extreme sport. It’s like, maybe one of the few industries where multi-tasking is efficient. But otherwise, it just creates overwhelm, a mess, and quite frankly, nothing gets done. Or at least, it doesn’t get done well.
So What Exactly is Time Blocking?
Time blocking is defining and scheduling in specific blocks of time for a specific task or set of tasks. During that scheduled time, you focus only on that task at hand.
What’s the Point?
To keep you on track and focused. Think about it: how many times are you sitting down to do a task and out of the corner of your eye you see your phone light up. A DM just came through and, I get it, it’s sooo hard not to immediately read the message and respond. And before you know it, you’re scrolling through Instagram for the next 20 minutes.
Or, we’re switching from working on a project to phone calls to emails to the project again and back to each and every email as they come through.
The Benefits
This actually SAVES you time. Here’s an example: as a blogger, I need to always have photos on hand for my posts. It wouldn’t exactly be convenient to take photos every single time I’m ready to write a post, would it? That involves waiting for the right lighting, moving some things around, pulling out my props, setting up my camera, taking everything down, uploading, editing,… you get the point. So, it makes much more sense for me to plan out a bunch of photos I want, and spend an afternoon taking photos for the next month worth of content.
Get Started
Whip out your Google Calendar. Let’s go…
Your non-negotiables
I like to start here. Open your Google Calendar and start scheduling in the things you absolutely cannot miss. For example: I know I have to leave by 2:30 every day to pick up my daughter from school. From there, it’s homework, playing, dinner, bedtime. So I block off family time from 2:30-7. I don’t even think about work. Then, schedule in any classes you take, appointments, meetings, etc.
Next, start scheduling in things you’d like to make time for: workouts, time to read, date-nights, etc. This helps you to prioritize and schedule it in to make sure it happens.
Work and tasks
If you’re like me and always have a million things on the go, it can be hard switching from one business to another or one type of task to another. Consider doing themed days if that helps. Can you schedule all your calls for Mondays? So then on Tuesday you can focus on one aspect of your business and on Wednesday another? Or maybe you’re most creative in the morning so you schedule creative tasks before lunch and emails and paper work for the afternoon while you’re sipping your second cup of coffee.
Allow Yourself to Be Unavailable
OMG does this ever feel good. Turn off your phone, leave it in your bag, whatever. Don’t even think about checking it until your task is finished. Don’t worry about emails – if they were urgent, they wouldn’t be in an email.
Combine with the Ivy Lee Method
I wrote a whole post on the Ivy Lee method, but basically, this method gets you to write out your top 7 priorities and number them in order of importance. Don’t move on from task #1 until you’re completely finished, and so on.
The Result
Increased productivity, efficiency, and honestly, fulfillment. Whether it’s work, lunch with a friend, or playing with your kids, there is so much joy in being fully present in whatever it is you’re doing.
BONUS TIME BATCHING TIP
Batch your social media. We can get lost in the scroll and in the DM’s. I try to avoid scrolling too much, although, I follow so many accounts I love and want to keep up with them. I try to get intentional with my time on social media – usually after the kids go to bed, I run a hot bath, apply a face mask, and get caught up on DM’s, check out my favourite accounts, and make sure to go give some virtual love taps to people I want to support and connect with. This helps keep my social media a positive and productive space and helps me to be intentional and not get lost in the scroll.