Time management is the foundation of consistent productivity. Learning how to manage your time means you don’t waste time between tasks and instead spend your finite mental resources where they are needed most each day.

Manage your time: time blocking

Sometimes people ask why I bother with such a detailed level of planning. My answer is simple: it generates a massive amount of productivity. A 40 hour time-blocked work week, I estimate, produces the same amount of output as a 60+ hour work week pursued without structure.

Cal Newport, productivity expert

The first place to start with time management is time blocking. Time blocking means breaking your day down into blocks of work that can each be completed in one go. This can involve splitting up big tasks into smaller sub-tasks that take an hour or more, or grouping up small tasks into more substantial blocks of at least half an hour. This approach has a number of benefits:

No downtime. When your day is divided into time blocks for each task, you always know what you should be doing at a given moment.
Easy to reschedule. By fitting all your work into standardized chunks of time, such as multiples of half an hour, you can fit new tasks in without any overlap or awkward gaps.
Better time visibility. Scheduling tasks according to the time they take gives you a much better idea of how much time you are going to spend on each type of work. This gives you the opportunity to more evenly distribute hard and easy tasks for the right times of day across the week.

Manage expectations

Effective time management includes managing expectations. You can’t dedicate big time blocks to a task if you are also expected to drop everything the moment someone makes a request or needs a reply. Besides cutting into your deep work time, task switching has a lasting effect on your productivity through debilitating effects of attention residue. You can’t give your project full focus when your brain is still attending to a previous task.

According to Building 20 research, we spend almost 2 hours every day on emails, instant messaging and colleagues visiting our desk:

That’s almost 2 hours a day you planned to spend on more important tasks.

Make sure your customers and colleagues know you don’t reply to messages before a certain time, and signal to your coworkers when you can’t be disturbed. This can be through a simple door open/door closed system or some other visual cue like wearing headphones when you are busy. In a virtual team, make use of Offline and Do Not Disturb statuses in your messaging apps to discourage non-urgent messages during deep work.

It can be harder to resist giving customers an immediate response when they get in touch, but always remember good time management results in a better service for them.

It ensures that 100% of your time and effort is focused on the task at hand. And secondly, structured communication with customers forces the client to think deeply about what they want to say and give you all the information you need in one go. As a result your discussions are more productive and cost a lot less time for both of you.

Know your rhythms

Humans naturally follow a circadian rhythm. This is just a fancy way of saying we have evolved to make the most of daylight hours by working hard in the morning and settling down before nighttime. This rhythm is the key to how to be productive every day.

As a result, timing is everything. Most of us are at peak performance in the morning, in terms of both energy and focus. We complete more tasks around 11am than any other time of day, and after 4pm there is a significant decline in our focus and motivation. Block your time to load your deep work in the morning, and leave the easy stuff for the afternoon.

Working with your body’s circadian rhythm when time blocking makes it much easier to maintain high productivity and motivation when you need it, while still making good use of the rest of the day.

How to be productive: eat the frog

If it’s your job to eat a frog, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning. And if it’s your job to eat two frogs, it’s best to eat the biggest one first.

Mark Twain

The idea behind ‘eating the frog’ is simple - get the hardest or most unappealing tasks out of the way first.

To take full advantage of the circadian rhythm, you need to manage your time to ensure you are tackling the right tasks at the right time of day. This means that your most intensive tasks should happen in the morning when you are able to focus and push yourself for long periods. Meanwhile, your smaller duties need to be clustered together into time blocks that can be handled as a single task.

By climbing the biggest hill at the beginning of the day when your motivation and energy are at their peak, you can look forward to a downhill ride for the rest of the day. Furthermore, getting stuck into a difficult task straight away gives you a sense of accomplishment that can provide some momentum for the rest of the day’s work. You get to face the rest of your tasks having already shown yourself how to be productive.

Time management: coast to the end of the day

Instead of fighting against your circadian rhythm and attempting to plough through difficult work all day, accommodate it by scheduling your easier tasks later in the day.

This shallow work includes repetitive data-entry, replying to emails and your low-priority meetings and calls. Decision fatigue is real and has a major impact on your performance, so give yourself a break at the end of the day where you can relax and get the job done without pushing yourself too hard.

Go home at the same time, every day

Shutting down at the same time every day is an important part of time management. Besides preventing overworking and encouraging you to get everything done before it is time to stop work, a fixed shutdown time is necessary to be able to relax and recharge.

Without a clear stopping point it is much harder to stop thinking about work, as you never reach a point when it is definitively time to stop worrying about work and engage with your home life.

To combat this, create a shutdown routine that ties up the loose ends, gets your mind off stressful topics and sets you up for a productive morning the next day. Appropriate shutdown tasks include:

Tidying your desk

Tidying up is a simple but satisfying task that gives you time to clear your head, while ensuring you won’t get distracted by the clutter tomorrow.

Review your messages

A final check of your messages before ending the day ensures the ball isn’t left in your court, and you won’t end up spending your evening sending off your responses.

Schedule your to-do list

New tasks can pop up throughout the day that you will need to handle later. Running through you to-do list and ensuring everything is accounted for lets you relax with the knowledge you won’t have to scramble to fit those tasks in at the last minute.

Set out tomorrow’s top priorities

Knowing what to focus on tomorrow means you can stop worrying about it today. Time management the next day will be easier when you have already identified your goals, starting the day with a clear direction.

Plan an evening activity

Deciding what you are going to do after work lets you finish with a positive note, and ensures you don’t waste your free time. This daily reminder to spend your free time wisely helps you re-engage with your home life after work.

Conclusion

These time management techniques will enable you to maximize the work you get done each day, while reducing your stress at the same time. Learning how to manage your time benefits the quality of your work, the quality of your life outside of work, and your relationships with clients. Find out more about how our team productivity training can identify and resolve the issues holding you back.

How to be productive: 6 steps to effective time management