The Power of Time Blocking

There are tasks on our “to do” lists that never seem to get done.  They are even very important tasks and sometimes tasks we even enjoy but they always seem to fall to the bottom off our list or even fall off completely.  For me, blogging is one of those.  I truly enjoy blogging.  It’s a great marketing tool, it’s therapeutic and it is an overall great idea but for some reason it always seems to fall off my list when things get “busy” and when aren’t they “busy”?!

Something that I have implemented in the past that truly worked for me was time blocking.  I used to be a religious time blocker and then just like good eating, exercise, meditation, laundry…I fell of the wagon and forgot how well it worked for me until a friend and fellow entrepreneur Kelly Elsner, owner and founder of Brandtopia (awesome business focused on helping companies save up to 40% on promotional merchandise), reminded me of the importance of time blocking to keep you focused on important tasks.

What is time blocking, you ask?  It’s so simple yet so powerful.  You simply start by creating an action list for the day, or for the week.  These are the important tasks that, once completed, will frame your week for success.  You put these items in your calendar first.  You MAKE time for them and fill in the rest of your week around those tasks.  For example, you know that you need to blog, make follow up calls to prospective clients, send thank you cards to current clients & send invoices.  You block a certain amount of time to focus on each of those items throughout the week.  Maybe Tuesday you block 2 hours making phone calls to prospects and Wed you block 1 hour to send Thank You cards.

Making your calendar with the tasks is the easy part.  The hard part is holding yourself to the tasks at the given time!

I admit, sometimes it feels so good just simply creating the calendar and having the intention of completing the task and then, sure enough, the time comes and there is something so urgent and pressing, (like the dishes for you work at home folks) that seem to take precedence over whatever is on my list at the moment.  DO NOT FALL INTO THIS TRAP!  You must stay faithful to the process for it to work.

Yes, at times there are true fires to put out at the time a task pops onto your calendar.  There is a big client that MUST meet with you during your time block to update your CRM with the new business cards you have collected for the week.  That’s going to happen.  Then you re-schedule the time block, just as you would a meeting and stick to it.  A good rule of thumb I have is once I have re-scheduled an item twice, I “can’t” re-schedule it again.  It becomes concrete and I HAVE to stick with it the third time.

So, give it at try.  See if it helps you really bust through some of those important yet mundane tasks that fall off the radar.  See if it helps you to minimize your ADD tendencies where something shiny de-rails your concentration and you end up mixing your billing time with your prospecting time and your facebook time.

What else helps keep you focused?  I want to hear about it!