Students, full-time employees, freelancers, and parents have all felt that uncomfortable feeling of panic when there is just too much to do and not enough hours in the day. Having a busy schedule can quickly result in feelings of stress and anxiety, which can leave you so overwhelmed that you lose your productivity.
Enter: timeblocking. This time-management strategy has revolutionised how many people manage their schedules, and can make life feel a little bit more manageable. Time blocking is the perfect solution if you:
- Have several projects or responsibilities.
- Spend too much time responding to messages and emails and not enough time getting things done.
- Find your day filled with meetings, leaving you feeling like your day flew past without anything productive happening.
- You’re constantly getting interrupted.
- You don’t have enough time to focus on big picture issues.
Time blocking is a management strategy where you break the hours of the day into “blocks”, and you only focus on one project or task for the duration of the block. For example, you can block out the first hour of your day for checking and responding to emails, the next three hours for writing that report you’ve been meaning to do, and then a quick 30-minute block for playing igames on convenient, secure, and trusted slot sites that offer the perfect break in your work day. Once the 30 minutes are up, your next block can be for the call with your management team. You get the idea.
Time blocking has many benefits, as long as you’re disciplined and don’t allow the blocks to “eat” into each other:
- Improves productivity
- Gives your day structure
- Boosts focus
- Makes you more organised
- Allows you to get to everything that needs doing
- Reduces stress and anxiety
You no longer have an open-ended list of to-dos. Each day has a clear outline, and you know exactly what you will be doing and when.
Here’s a step-by-step guide for how to start time blocking:
1.Determine which tasks you have: List everything that you want to do this week. If you don’t have this list ready to go, take a week and write down everything you usually do.
2.Prioritise your tasks: Order your tasks according to urgency and importance.
3.Create your work blocks: Assign a block of time to each task. You will likely need a digital calendar or daily planner for this step. It’s best to put high-priority tasks earlier in the day, as you have more cognitive bandwidth to work with. The late afternoon should be for less intensive tasks, like admin and emails.
4.A work-life balance: Make sure you also include a lunch break, any errands that need doing, and small breaks to recharge for a few minutes.
5.Be disciplined: Once you have your schedule, you need to stick to it. Even if a task isn’t completed in the allotted time, you can include it in a future block on the next day, instead of extending the current block.
6.Review each day: At the end of the day, you should look back at everything you have achieved and see if any changes need to be made. You should also look at the next day’s schedule and determine if any new tasks came in that need doing.
When you block your days in advance, you will know exactly what you have to do. Time blocking is one of the most effective time management strategies to get rid of stress and be more productive.
