Over the past month, I’ve gotten sucked into a few projects that have demanded the vast majority of my time. There have been times when I’ve felt overwhelmed with my to-do list, and only a disciplined approach kept me going at all. In talking with other self-employed individuals, I know this is something we all struggle with on a regular basis. In the interest of solidarity, I’ve decided to share some of my time-management skills:
A To-Do List is Essential
A solid to-do list is the cornerstone of my time management process. I use an application for my laptop, called Things, which I can also sync to my iPhone for adding/managing tasks on the go. Before that, I used a paper to-do list designed by a friend of mine, which included a self-organizing element to help determine priority. Theoretically, I don’t actually need a to-do list. I have a freaky memory and I never forget about a project or deadline. But using a to-do list helps me to prioritize the projects I’m working on, and deal with them in manageable chunks. It’s also really satisfying to cross things off when you finish them; you get a sense that you’ve actually accomplished something.
Break Tasks Up into Manageable Pieces
Some tasks take a lot of time. I’ve had projects that take days or weeks of my time. It’s hard to feel like you’re making progress on those tasks because they’re so time-consuming, and it can get discouraging. I find it really helpful to break tasks up into manageable pieces. If I’m writing a book, I might make my goal to write 5 pages each day, and then I can check off my five pages. If I’m doing a project that consists of 20 articles, I might set myself X articles per day or week, depending on the size and scope of the articles. Making this steady progress and being able to cross things off my to-do list keeps me moving forward.
Prioritize Fast Tasks
Sometimes you have a lot of tasks on your list, and a good strategy to handle the workload is to prioritize based on the time the project will take you instead of when it’s due. For example, if you have a big project and three small projects all due in two days, it makes sense to do the small projects first. That way you can knock things off your to-do list, and if the big project runs long, you won’t be late on the other projects, too. Sometimes it also makes sense to handle smaller projects first even if the bigger project is due sooner for that very reason – when big projects run long, they can set your entire workflow behind.
Leave Room in Your Schedule
One of the keys to me as a self-employed individual is to leave room in my schedule. If I fully-book my schedule, that’s inevitably the time when one of my projects will run long or require extra revision. If you leave a bit of room in your schedule, you have flexibility if you’re running close to deadline or a project takes longer than you expect. It helps to have some small ongoing projects you can use to fill the gaps, or you can spend your extra time working on marketing if you finish your projects early.
Plan Your Breaks
I may have a propensity to procrastinate. I’ll be starting to work, and then I’ll think of something I should look up or do. When I find myself distracting myself from work, I actually schedule my breaks. I’ll keep a separate running to-do list for things I think of while I’m working, and wait until my scheduled break to look them up or do things. Sometimes I say “I’ll work until X time,” or sometimes I give myself a break after completing a certain number of articles or a certain part of a project.
Reward Yourself When Necessary
There are times when I take on really massive projects that require me to work long days, and even sometimes the weekends. These projects usually pay pretty well (which is my primary motivator to taking them – or else I’ll do it for an existing client) so I “reward” myself for completing the project. There was one project I completed in May that paid nearly $3,000 but required me to work a lot of 12-hour days, so as a reward, I bought myself a $300 “sale” item I’d been wanting. For smaller projects, I’ll do smaller rewards; I might buy a new book after a particularly rough week, or take my SO out to dinner if I’ve been working particularly hard or feeling stressed.
Time management skills are something that everyone needs to practice. Do you have any time management secrets you’d like to share?
