It often feels as if we’re dealing with a never-ending flow of to-dos and demands on our time. To keep up with these tasks, while maintaining our well-being, we have to carefully prioritize and structure each day. So, what’s the secret?
Time blocking.
It’s a technique that helps individuals increase their productivity levels. It’s simple and effective—a technique you can start implementing today.
Let’s look at what time blocking is, its key benefits, and five steps you can take to get started.
What is time blocking?
Time blocking is a time management strategy that divides your day into smaller blocks. During each block, you focus on a single task or a group of similar tasks.
Unlike a to-do list, time blocking tells you what to do and when. It’s time dedicated to completing work. In 2022, Zippia, a career advice and job search resource, researched the average worker’s time management approach. The study found that 82% of people don’t have a time management system. Only 20% of those individuals feel they have control over their workload.
Time blocking is a simple strategy to regain that control.
The key is to focus on only the assigned task for the given period of time and without interruption. It helps you avoid context-switching. Instead of slowly chipping away at several different tasks, you fully check them off your to-do list.
Here’s a tip: When you set aside time to focus on a given task, pause all incoming notifications from email and Slack. It’s an extra step that can help you stay focused on the work at hand.
Why does time blocking work?
Time blocking works because it requires a weekly review of your schedule. You start by making a large to-do list for the entire week. Next, you rank tasks based on their priority and devise a daily schedule.
In essence, time blocking prompts a breakdown of a large workload into manageable tasks. You’re transforming everything on your plate into bite-size pieces that are then added to your calendar.
The trick is sticking to the task during its assigned time. Luckily, blocking each task into your schedule makes this easier. If you ever wonder what to work on next, refer to your calendar. Here you’ll find which task you scheduled for each hour of the day. You’re not wasting time or mental energy deciding what to work on next.
Here’s a tip: It’s wise to review your priorities and schedule at the end of each day. Doing so ensures that you account for any unfinished items and new tasks.
In addition to aiding in scheduling, time blocking leverages single tasking. Single tasking is the act of performing one task at a time. Its counterpart, multitasking, divides our attention and ability to focus. In turn, it hinders productivity levels. You’ll work more efficiently by not jumping between tasks.
Time blocking benefits
Once you’ve gone down the road of time blocking, some longer-term benefits will emerge. You may work more efficiently because you can focus on the task at hand. It’s also possible that you achieve a greater work-life balance.
Here are other time blocking benefits you may experience:
- Time blocking allows you to renew your commitment to priorities and what matters. You can balance task completion and doing activities that help you feel fulfilled.
- Time blocking is the key to eliminating procrastination. By scheduling tasks, you’re committing to work on them during the allotted time. In doing so, the strategy helps overcome procrastination.
- Time blocking helps you become a master over meeting disruptions. If you’ve blocked out time for meetings, you won’t feel bad for turning down new ones that are not on your block.
- Time blocking allows you to be more efficient. The strategy invites you to optimize your working hours. Techniques like grouping similar tasks into a single block can help you work deeply and cruise through those to-dos.
- Time blocking helps you understand how long it takes to complete tasks. This knowledge will help with future scheduling and making commitments.
- Time blocking gives you more power over your schedule. By staying focused, you can be as productive as possible without overworking.
For some individuals, time blocking is a great approach to accomplish tasks. However, it doesn’t work for everyone, depending on personal schedules or preferences.
Time blocking method criticisms
Not everyone is a fan of time blocking. It’s true that there are times when it’s not practical. These are some of the main critiques of the technique:
- Your job demands don’t fit a structured schedule. The strict scheduling of time blocking doesn’t allow for impromptu meetings—or immediate requests from superiors. When an issue is urgent, you can’t say no because it doesn’t fit in your schedule.
- Your schedule consists of urgent matters. You may make an effort when planning your day, only to see things fall apart when you encounter one urgent task after another.
- It’s a significant investment. Time blocking requires time and energy every day to be effective. It’s not a simple to-do list.
- Your schedule is inconsistent. Time blocking is easier when you’re working with a clear set of daily tasks during set hours.
Any time management strategy you implement is highly personal. It needs to align with your preferences, tasks, and schedule. That said, it can also be shaped to match your needs. For example, if you’re always dealing with urgent requests, try time blocking administrative tasks. Most emails aren’t urgent, but they do need a reply. So, they’re the perfect time blocking task.
Is time blocking right for you?
If anything in the list below sounds familiar, time blocking may be an excellent strategy for organizing your schedule:
- Your work life is so busy that you can’t find time to focus on big-picture items like your long-term goals.
- You’re ruled by meetings and can’t focus on what matters.
- You feel as if you’re constantly answering email requests throughout your day.
- You have trouble breaking down and planning out larger tasks.
- Your job requires you to juggle many responsibilities, tasks, and projects.
- You’re struggling with work-life balance and fitting in time for fun.
- You want to try a new style of working to boost your healthy productivity.
- You want to achieve more of your goals.
- You’re looking to do more deep work. Deep work is the act of focusing on one task for an extended time instead of shallow work when you’re constantly switching tasks.
If you’re still unsure if time blocking is the right time management technique for you, it never hurts to try it out. Plan one or two weeks that use time blocking and see how it feels.
5 steps to get started time blocking
Now that you understand the pros and cons of time blocking, let’s look at some practical steps you can take to make it work for you:
1. Decide what tools you want to use to plan out your day
If you’re just starting with time blocking, the first step is deciding on your tools.
For example, do you use a physical planner or a digital one? Where do you capture all your tasks? You may use a digital calendar like Google Calendar to schedule meetings. If so, block out your time here. Remember, the most effective time blocking usually happens within digital tools. It’s easier to adjust your time blocks when it’s a simple drag-and-drop motion within your calendar.
Sometimes, leveraging a project management tool such as Trello or Asana may prove helpful for some individuals. The point is to use whichever productivity tools and resources will help you be successful.
Here’s a tip: Time blocking also works for your personal activities. If you go for a walk every day or take a lunch break, add it to your calendar. It’s a great way to implement time blocking to ensure you take breaks.
2. Write out your to-dos and schedule them
Once you know what you care about most, the next step is to write out your daily to-do list.
Be sure to include both personal and work tasks. Group these items into the appropriate time block, such as “meetings,” “email,” “family time,” and any other high-value projects.
Here’s a tip: If prioritizing tasks is tricky, try combining a prioritization technique along with your time blocking. Strategies like the Eisenhower Matrix or Eating the Frog can help you rank tasks before adding them to your schedule.
Start by adding mandatory tasks to your calendar. High-priority tasks, like finishing a P&L spreadsheet or creating a pitch deck for a new client, should be at the top of your to-do list. Once these items have landed on your calendar, fill in the gaps with smaller tasks or breaks. Small tasks could be activities like quickly checking your email. Likewise, a break could look like taking a 15-minute walk around the block.
As you schedule your day, remember that our brains can’t maintain deep work for eight hours. Most people manage about four hours of deep work every day. So, you should only block about four hours of focus time to avoid overworking.
3. Find your "best" time
One of the key benefits of time blocking is that it allows you to schedule focus time for when you’re most productive. Our biorhythms often determine our ability to function well while doing a specific task. Some of us do our best work in the early morning, while others perform better in the afternoon.
The key to productivity is working in alignment with your schedule. If you’re a morning person, schedule deep work for the early hours. On the other hand, if you’re a night owl, adjust your working hours accordingly.
With time blocking, you can shape your calendar to allow for more focus on critical projects during your most productive periods. When you’re less sharp, you can block time to do more mundane recurring tasks, like organizing your computer files.
4. Anticipate unforeseen demands
Even the best schedule can fall apart when you’re faced with urgent demands. Last-minute and unanticipated events are a reality of the workday. It’s important to adjust to them as they happen.
But one of the biggest criticisms of time blocking is its rigidity. While you may not be able to fully time block your day if you have these demands, you can have some wiggle room in your schedule to accommodate for potential interruptions.
So, how can you use time blocking to account for these important action items?
Create a daily block for urgent tasks to address unforeseen emails or critical last-minute items. If you don’t have any last-minute emergencies, use this time to get ahead on tomorrow’s work or take a much-deserved break.
When you time block this way, you increase efficiency by protecting the time and attention required for more important tasks.
5. Don't forget to pencil in personal time
Optimizing your work schedule is a great technique to get everything done. However, it’s essential to time block personal time as well. It could mean blocking out an hour for lunch or scheduling daily afternoon breaks.
If you work from home, time blocking is also an effective strategy for ensuring you finish chores. Say you have a huge pile of laundry to fold. Add a 20-minute block to your calendar during which you’ll put away your clean clothes.
In short, box any task you dread doing into a period of time. Once the time block is over, so is the task. Use it to ensure you have personal time and check everything off your task list.
But don’t just use time blocking for unpleasant tasks. After all, the time blocking technique is designed to help you manage your schedule. It doesn’t need to be limited to work, chores, and other life tasks.
Schedule time for hobbies that help you relax. You can also schedule time for exercise. By adding these activities to your schedule, you ensure they’re prioritized. You can even take it as far as booking time for rest. Ample time for rest and recovery is important for maintaining our well-being. So, when we sit down to work, we’re attentive and energized.
3 different time blocking methods
1. Task batching
Task batching is when you bunch together several similar tasks into one work sprint.
For example, you might block out time on your calendar to reply to emails once per day. Instead of responding to emails as you receive them, you combine them into one large task. In doing so, you stay on top of your emails and avoid context-switching throughout the day.
In addition, task batching works by breaking larger tasks down and combining them. You complete a small part of a big task. This approach can help you reduce feeling overwhelmed when faced with a massive project.
2. Day theming
Day theming is a more advanced form of time blocking. In short, you dedicate specific days to a category of related tasks or projects.
For example, if you’re an executive, you may spend Monday dealing with sales and marketing work. Then, on Tuesday, you may focus on accounting and finance tasks.
Building your schedule like this allows you to maintain a rhythm. Your mind is honed in on a specific area of work, allowing you to achieve new levels of deep work.
3. Timeboxing
Similar to time blocking, timeboxing is blocking out a specific unit of time within your calendar to do a task. It specifically refers to boxing time to commit to a large project. You may not complete it entirely, but you’re slowly working on it.
The idea is that you’re locking an endless task within a given time frame. Timeboxing hinges on Parkinson’s Law, which states that work will expand to fill the time allotted to it. Timeboxing forces those kinds of tasks into a set period of time.
6 common time blocking mistakes
If you’re new to time blocking, there are some common mistakes to avoid:
- Underestimating the time it takes to complete a task. When creating a new block, it makes sense to “add” the time so you don’t grow frustrated with the process. With practice, you’ll gain a better understanding of the time it takes to complete a project, so that you can plan accordingly.
- Forgetting to take breaks. It is essential to create a block for lunch and regular breaks. Creating breaks between tasks gives your mind rest to help you stay as productive as possible.
- Rigidly sticking to your schedule. There may be days when you need to walk away from your schedule. A daily routine is good, but you can’t expect to stick to it perfectly every day. Time blocking isn’t a rigid system but one that supports your productivity and growth.
- Believing you need to follow time blocks exactly. You don’t always have to follow your time blocks exactly for them to work. While you should respect your time blocks, unexpected demands arise. Don’t stress too much if you must move some of your schedule around.
- Creating time blocks that are too general. You won’t know what to work on if you aren’t specific. Try to break down all of the steps for larger tasks. Then, estimate how long each bite-size step will take you.
- Forgetting to schedule certain activities. Even activities like scrolling through social media can be organized into your calendar. By scheduling out time for things that are typically distractions, you can limit them. This leaves you time to scroll through Instagram or Facebook without feeling guilty. But once the time block ends, it’s back to the important work.
Effective time management looks a little different for everyone. And time blocking may not be your best option. What’s important is that you pick the technique that works best for you.
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What to try if time blocking doesn't work for you
Time blocking doesn’t work for everyone. The good news? There are many other techniques to manage your time that could help:
- Pomodoro Technique: This is a method of periods of focused work followed by a break. In theory, you alternate between work periods and breaks until the task is complete.
- Eisenhower Matrix: This technique organizes your tasks into four quadrants: urgent and important, not urgent, meaningful, and not important. Slot each of your tasks into one of these boxes. You should focus on tasks in the urgent and important quadrant. Likewise, you can remove any tasks that fall into the not urgent and not important category.
- Pickle Jar Theory: This helps you prioritize your task list. Imagine a jar filled with sand, pebbles, and rocks. The sand falls to the bottom while the rocks sit at the top. Your “sand” tasks are small, relatively inconsequential to-do items. But your “rock” tasks are the most essential tasks you must complete today.
- Eating the Frog: This time management technique comes from a quote by Mark Twain: “Eat a live frog first thing in the morning, and nothing worse will happen to you for the rest of the day.” In short, it means prioritizing completing your most challenging or important task first. Then, your biggest task is out of the way, and you start the day already feeling accomplished.
- Two-minute rule: The two-minute rule is a simple and effective strategy to avoid procrastination. It states that if you can accomplish a small task or action in two minutes or less, do it immediately. For example, if you spend two minutes every day picking clothes off your bedroom floor, it won’t take 30 minutes to clean your room during your free time.
It will only be helpful if it works with your schedule and tasks. If you try one that doesn’t work, don’t hesitate to test out another.
Start time blocking today
Let’s face it: Our busy lives and over-full calendars can make accomplishing all our priorities difficult. The better you can manage your calendar, the better you can manage your life.
Fortunately, time blocking provides a time management solution that can give us far greater control, creativity, and peace of mind. It can help us complete important work tasks and reserve time for the activities that make us feel fulfilled.
If you’re having trouble managing what matters at work, BetterUp’s coaches are skilled at helping you discover greater self-awareness. Our assessments can help you identify your strengths and areas for development. Then, we can provide coaching to meet your current needs and challenges.
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