From the course: Time Management Tips

Handling tasks that take too long

From the course: Time Management Tips

Start my 1-month free trial

Handling tasks that take too long

“

- Do you find it's a challenge to estimate how long something's going to take? In my course, Time Management Fundamentals, I suggest that people schedule time in their calendar. Well, that means that you're going to have to estimate how long something's going to take. But, what if you thought that it was going to take 30 minutes to accomplish something and it really took an hour? What do you do in that situation? Here are a few tips, first to keep that from happening, and then second, what to do when it happens. First, keep in mind that estimating time is like a muscle. I have seen many clients get better at it over time. If you feel like you need more help with it, start by using a timer. Whatever you're going to do next, use that timer to estimate how long it's going to take and play a game, let's see if you got it right. The more you practice doing this, the better you're going to get at seeing how good you are at estimating and that muscle will build. Number two is over-estimate. As a general rule, I suggest people estimate an extra 50%. So if you think something's going to take an hour, estimate that it's going to take 90 minutes. At the very worst, if you find yourself with extra time, it's going to feel like you got a bonus and you can use that time to get caught up on something else. And that leads to tip three, which is add buffer space in your schedule. You do not want to have a schedule that's completely full, back to back to back appointments. That's leaving you with no room for error in a day where all of us are going to get interrupted. Instead, make sure that you've got an extra space here and there, and extra half and hour here and there to allow yourself to catch up if you underestimated how long something was going to take. Now, what if you do go over? In that case, if you run out of time, stop. Do not try to continue working and then make everything else get late. Instead, re-gather it. What I mean is, whatever you are in that project or that item that you are working on, put it down in an approved gathering point. Send yourself an email, write down something in your notepad and then that leads to step five is, re-process that note later from what you gathered. And then put it back in the calendar with the extra time. The more that you do this, the stronger you will get at it and estimating is a powerful skill to helping you with your time management.

Contents