How To Schedule Your Day For Maximum Productivity [New Guide]
Today you’ll find out how to schedule your day for max productivity.
Scheduling can be a nightmare. Everyone has a different style that suits them and it seems that no two people can follow the very same scheduling routine even when using a pre-built system.
Every office environment is a prime example of this when you see how people use different methods to block out passages of time in a straightforward common calendar program that’s used universally.
Some people will go all out with all the bells and whistles with pop-up reminders and to-do lists, while others will easily mark up entire sections on their calendar with comments in or out of the office. Some people prefer electronic systems while others depend on paper versions.
The key is finding what works for you (and your team if you have one), and finding ways to coordinate the use of those systems so that everybody can benefit from using them.
How To Schedule Your Day For Maximum Productivity
An important principle to remember is the 80/20 principle: 80% of your results generally come from 20% of the actions you complete.
Therefore, it is vital to know which actions are the most significant tasks that need to be completed and then focus on completing them first.
Any large project can be broken down into smaller steps to determine what needs to be done first. That way, items are completed in the right order and at the right time with little need for rework later.
It’s best to start your work day by spending 20-30 minutes scheduling your day so you know in which direction your workload will progress.
Then you can plan how much time to spend on each task to help you achieve your goals and set boundaries for contact with other people if needed to complete any of your projects.
You can even do this at the end of the day if it helps you sleep better at night and lets you start running in the morning. Whichever method works for you (or your team) and helps you get to the end result faster is the one you should use and stick to throughout your project.
Once you have an idea of the tasks that need to be completed on a given day, there’s a need to prioritize your workload.
Take a close look at the tasks that bring you closer to your specific goals and determine if they’re urgent, important, both or neither, and organize them according to your to-do list.
You should also consider whether the task can be safely delegated to someone else to complete and if so, move on.
A good rule to follow: if it can be done in under two minutes, do it and get it off your list as quickly as possible.
It’s also important to decide, before you begin any task, how you’ll know if you have succeeded. If you jump into a project without knowing how it will look when it is finished, then you will not know when you finish a good project.
Therefore, take a couple of minutes to determine the desired end result; what is the very best outcome and what’s the lowest acceptable outcome.
While you clearly want to aim for the best results, knowing what results are considered acceptable will provide you with the freedom to adapt a task that becomes unattainable along the way into something that will still allow you to accomplish your end goal.
If you are in command of a group of individuals, it is vital that everybody uses the same system and has a clear understanding of how the system works.
In a team setting, nothing is more frustrating than a member who cannot be contacted either because they do not understand the system in place for contacts, or because they do not know how to inform other team members how to reach them effectively.
At the start of any project, the team should clearly define ground rules for contact frequency, expectations for response, and have a clear understanding of the project’s timeline, goals, and expectations.
Everyone on the team should know who to contact if anyone has a question and that contact should be totally familiar with the system and prepared to help anyone having trouble using it.
As we have said, people generally have their own preferences for scheduling techniques (1). Some like an hour by hour routine while others prefer a general to-do list. It’s best to experiment with all the available options to find what works best for you and/or your team.
It does not really matter when you’re working individually to choose a scheduling technique so long as you use it regularly. When a team is involved, it is sort of essential that electronic systems are in today’s fast-paced society of workforces.
That does not imply that somebody cannot combine a paper scheduling system with an electronic one in cases where they haven’t got access to the electronic version, but it does mean additional work on the person’s part to keep both systems up-to-date. all the time.
Again, experiment to find out what works best and once you have determined which system you are going to use, stick with it (beyond updating).
The only other problem with a inflexible scheduling system is the unforeseen events that every now and then occur. We cannot plan what we do not know and since of that we run into problems.
Unexpected phone calls or people who just walk in unannounced can ruin our entire day and destroy our best schedules.
It is important when scheduling your day that you take this into account and place a buffer in your day. Whether you do this by leaving certain areas unscheduled or by overscheduling items is totally up to you, but be prepared for the unforeseen.
Another area you should watch out for is time stealing. Phone calls and emails are perhaps the worst waste of minutes that our minds forget to factor into our daily schedule.
A prime example is if you check your e-mail every hour for an eight-hour period and take fifteen minutes every time, you have worked up the full two hours of your eight-hour schedule.
Unless your world is a complete mess because you do not get emails that fast, try checking your e-mail three times a day, once at the start of your working period, once in the middle of your working period, and once before you leave for work. day.
At that rate, you have cut your e-mail time all the way down to roughly forty-five minutes, freeing up an hour and fifteen minutes to spend on the actual project that needs to be done.
You are responsible for your time, even if you work for somebody else, to some degree. Some people have more control than others, but that should not stop you from using whatever control you have.
Tell friends, family, neighbors, co-workers, and anyone who contacts you regularly, that there are specific hours that you can’t be reached except in an emergency.
Tell them to leave a message and you will get back to them within hours and then stick with it.
It’s very difficult if you have a habit of treating every phone call, e-mail, text message, or interruption as if it were a crisis, but if in reality everything can wait an hour and you tell it, you will find that you can be much more productive without all the interruptions.
In the long run it will look better if you tell your coworkers that you cannot chat because you have a project rather than telling your boss that your project is not done because you have to talk with your coworkers. worker.
When you consider scheduling, do not forget that you’re human; You will need rest (2). Lunch, potty, coffee, stretching, or simply a mental break, everybody should ultimately stop what they’re doing for a couple of minutes and take a break.
If you ignore your body’s need for rest, it will slow down on its own and your work will suffer.
While you cannot pinpoint precisely when these breaks will be needed, you can plan for the inevitable need for them when looking at your overall schedule.
At least five minutes out of each hour should be spent moving if you want your mind to keep working properly. And these moves aren’t the same kind of moves you’d make for your job.
This type of movement should be something different that makes the mind and body pause from what you have been doing.
Thanks for reading this article on how to schedule your day for max productivity and I actually hope you take action on my advice.
I wish you good luck and that I hope that its content has been a good help to you.
