Welcome back to Startup Curious, where we discuss things you should know if you’re thinking about working for or starting a startup.
Today, I want to discuss a really handy method for getting more out of your day - timeboxing. As both a startup founder or potential employee, you’ll likely find yourself with way too much to do, getting pulled in all sorts of different directions. There’s not really any way to avoid it.
However, there are lots of things you can do to make sure you use your time as wisely as possible, and timeboxing is a really popular one.
So, what is timeboxing? Pretty much what it sounds like - you “box” or limit the amount of time you spend doing certain tasks.
For instance, say you need to respond to customer emails, write up a marketing plan and review applicants for a job position you opened up. You could decide that you’re going to spend 9am-10am on miscellaneous small tasks, 10am-12pm answering customer emails, 12pm-1pm eating lunch, 1pm-3pm writing the marketing plan, 3pm-4pm reviewing job applications and 4pm-5pm on small tasks and wrapping up the day. Leaving time for those random small tasks is important!
Structuring your days like this can be helpful in a few ways. Setting an “end time” to a task for the day is nice - there are so many tasks that can wind up taking your whole day if you let them, even if it’s not really necessary. In a perfect timeboxing model, once you hit your limit you set it aside to move onto the next thing.
Knowing that you’ve set aside time for something is helpful as well. It means you can put more of your focus into the current task you’re working on, because you know you’ve set aside time for everything else later. When you haven’t done that, it’s easy for stress about other tasks to creep in and distract you.
For many people who practice timeboxing, they literally put the blocks on time on their calendar, so that both they and their coworkers are aware of how they intend to spend their days. It also can help to prevent last-minute, non-urgent meetings from making their way onto your calendar, since it’ll show up as busy.
Of course, it’s not a perfect solution - real life does get in the way of perfect timeboxing. There will always be an urgent question from someone, or you’ll get a sudden inspiration around a different task than the one you had planned, or you absolutely need to get the thing done even if you’ve run out of your allotted time.
However, I’ve found that even taking a few minutes to attempt to plan your day like this is still incredibly helpful. It’s a little more robust than writing a to-do list, because you also need to think about the amount of time you might possibly spend on things. It also forces you to take a look at your calendar and make sure you actually have a reasonable amount of time to spend on the things you want to get done. Nothing like making a to-do list only to realize you’re in back to back meetings all day and you have to scrap it!
And, to give my usual caveat when it comes to frameworks like this - if standard timeboxing doesn’t work for you, that’s okay! Modify it to fit you and your working style. The goal is to help you become as productive as possible, not adhere perfectly to a framework or process.
Thank you for joining us! If you found this episode useful, please remember to subscribe and share. Our goal is to make startups more approachable for everyone and the only way we can do that is to get the word out!
Suggestions
If you have a topic you’d like to learn more about, or you’re a founder who would like their story featured on this show, send me an email at v@thescrappyoperator.com.
What is timeboxing? (and how can it help me?)