10. Time Management

"The secret to doing good research is to always be a little underemployed; you waste years by not being able to waste hours." — Amos Tversky

• Opposite of "traction" is "distraction".
• Making time to make time - weekly reflection on your previous week, be deliberate about your upcoming week.
• Tracking and awareness is the first step to acknowledging and improving.
• How I've been using a calendar instead of a todo list for a few weeks.
• Pomodoro technique – try it for the most challenging tasks!
• Meetings can be incredibly disruptive – I share a few tips on how to be more careful with meeting time management.
• Enable "Do Not Disturb" on macOS and iOS.
• Having Slack and your email inbox open throughout the day can be incredibly distracting. Try to open them at fixed times and batch up this work.

Actions / take aways

• Take time each week to reflect, and map your time. Book in 15 minutes this week.
• Try using a calendar instead of your todo list to plan your tasks.
• Keep meetings to fixed days in the week – like Mondays and Tuesdays, to free up your other days for deeper work.
• Wrap up meetings with 5 minute breaks in between to refresh and re-energise.
• Close your email and only open it at fixed times in the day.
• Enable "Do Not Disturb" on your devices.
• Don’t be afraid to pause, and make time for you. You can’t spend every waking hour being productive - you will eventually crash. But we each have different limits – so try to find what works best for you.

Links and further reading

• Nir Eyal: https://www.nirandfar.com
• Superhuman (email client I use): https://superhuman.com
• Mailman (tool to batch up your emails before they hit your inbox): https://mailman.to/james-8ntrxq
• Remote meetings (an article I wrote on some tips for better remote meetings): https://www.jamesgill.co/remote-meetings/
• Lifeline Pomodoro Timer for Mac: https://www.saent.com
• Good piece on how one CEO spends their time: https://review.firstround.com/an-exact-breakdown-of-how-one-ceo-spent-his-first-two-years-of-company-building
• New "Focus Mode" coming to iOS soon: https://www.macrumors.com/guide/ios-15-focus-mode/

Thanks, and see you next time!

P.S. I'm on Twitter https://twitter.com/jamesjgill

Music: Jakarta by Bonsaye

Podcast hosting: Transistor