Productivity Hack: Schedule Work and Focus!

In this post, I’ll talk about the power of using a schedule for tasks, such as work or school projects, and to committing yourself to follow through on your scheduled tasks.

First, What is a Hack?
I’ve used the term “hack” before. “Hack” can mean a lot of different things. The way I’m using the term is as slang to express a shortcut, a workaround, or a way to do something better, or in a way that is not usually done. You’ll see hack used in this way to denote ways to travel cheaply (e.g., travel hacks) or tips to live in a more efficient manner (e.g., life hacks or lifehacking).

The productivity hack of scheduling work is a way to do something better — that is not to leave your work or school projects to “whenever” but to schedule time on your calendar to really focus on your projects. Once you start planning your work more deliberately — and following through by doing the work you have scheduled — you’ll see that you will feel more in control and your stress from last-minute efforts or all-nighters will dissipate.

Make Scheduling Your Work a Habit!
“Something that can be done at any time, often happens at no time.” Gretchen Rubin, writer, blogger, and podcaster
Gretchen Rubin writes about happiness and good habits. I’ve told you in previous posts that I am a SuperFan of Gretchen’s. Her books are insightful and her podcast, Happier with Gretchen Rubin, (hosted with her sister Liz Craft) is entertaining and informative.

I reviewed her book, Better Than Before in a previous post. In this book, Rubin has outlined 21 strategies for positive habit formation. The Strategy of Scheduling is one of those strategies. The Strategy of Scheduling means “setting a specific, regular time for an activity to recur” (2015, Kindle location 1210).

If you are committed to being successful, you should get in the habit of scheduling the time to tackle your tasks. Depending on our life situations, we all have different tasks to complete.

When you are going to school, your big tasks include studying for exams, collaborating with your small group, searching for evidence, writing research papers, or completing assignments.
As a practicing nurse, your big tasks may be working on a report for a unit council you lead, coordinating annual staff competency checks, revising the preceptor packet, or teaching the critical care class.
As a parent, scheduling is a must for keeping track of after-school activities and social events.
For everyone, exercise, social interactions (coffee with the girls, movie night, etc.), tasks and errands that need doing, and especially downtime, are things that could be scheduled.
For all of the above, you need a schedule for all of it!

Schedule with Intent: Scheduling seems so simple, even trivial – if you do it mindlessly by just jotting down things on a calendar. The scheduling I’m talking about is for you to make an appointment with yourself to get your work done. Rubin stated, “putting an activity on the schedule tends to lock [most people] into doing it” (location 1210). If you can make an activity automatic — e.g., do the readings for Theory class every Tuesday from 3-6p and draft/complete assignments on Saturday from 8a-12p — it is more likely to become a habit. Your courses will change of course, but while in school, you might carve out Tuesday from 3-6p for reading and taking notes, and Thursday from 7-9p and Saturday from 8-12p for working on assignments.

That’s 9 hours of prep and school work time for one class. I know, right? But if you don’t schedule this time, you are more likely to put it off and then have to scramble to catch up later.

Just a reminder that outside of the time it takes to attend class (e.g., 3-hour face-to-face class or online class activities), most instructors expect you to spend 3-4 hours PER course credit PER week doing prep work and homework (reading the assigned text/articles; group work; research for discussion board postings and papers, etc.). So your one 3-credit class equals 9-12 hours per week working on that class! (This is a convention in universities across the nation — I didn’t make up the rules!)

When you get in the habit of scheduling — and stick to the plan — you’ll find that you’ll make progress in your projects. Scheduling works for any type of project or tasks, from work to school to exercise to life!

 

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