This article was originally posted on LinkedIn on 23rd Mar 2022.

Being a remote worker often means you have the ability to manage your own schedule. However, most of the time we are not able to take advantage of new innovative ways and tools for calendar management. Harness the power of enhanced calendar planning and practices such as time blocking to kick start your remote work routine today!

In the good ‘ol days when we used to commute to a physical office at our start and end of the day are over. The structure based on that physical commute or travel to our work destination is now lost. Now, as we embrace remote and home working many of us can master and manage our own schedule proactively, planning each day with intention. Often, however, that schedule is dictated by work rather than your own needs. Starting with an approach that reviews a calendar, placing work tasks first only makes it likely that you will fit your needs around work rather than truly placing yourself and your needs first. How can you practice life-work-integration if work is the top priority in your thinking and approach?

Putting me first in my planning! - Try this exercise - ask yourself, what would happen if your needs, health, family and social commitments came first into that approach to your scheduling. What would a week look like where all your lunches, breaks, self-care activities, like exercise classes and social commitments etc. were added FIRST to your calendar. I have often spoken about self-care seeming to be a selfish act and it is, but you won’t master self-prioritisation unless you do just that, put yourself first in your planning. Two key steps to these are:

1. Take some time to plan ALL of the repetitive scheduling for yourself and your priorities and add them to your calendar. For example lunch and other breaks, regular classes and personal commitments, ensure you use the “repeat weekly” feature in your calendar software to ensure these get scheduled on repeat.

2. Friday focus - I have a recurring reminder on a Friday morning in my calendar to plan for myself, me and I on a Friday AM for the following week. Adding this reminder gives you the chance to stop for 5 minutes and reset your next week's priorities, reacting to any new needs and activities, keeping the focus on your need proactively before we enter a new work week and also before you finish for the weekend.

Home-working in a crisis can upset the best routine - Some words of consideration on how home working in a crisis or under the “cloud of covid”, with distractions and other stressors, can impact the best routine planning and intention - this is totally the case. Back in March 2020, Matt Martin CEO of Clockwise, a software that optimises calendars, gave some key tips for time management adjustment in Covid times, including:

• This is a unique time and it is ongoing, acknowledge it and show yourself self-compassion and understanding. For some people, it could be the recovery phase

• Proactively manage your calendar, by planning to manage your calendar in time; weekly, start and end of day - and during the workday as needed

• Accepting meeting requests could be higher than usual, again, proactively manage these

• Maximise the time in between meetings, which can be used for breaks, resetting, breathing time and small tasks

• Speak transparently with your manager and team - home obligations and commitments need to be clearly communicated

• Ensure your boundaries are clear to yourself first and then to others (as per the point above)

Enhanced calendar management via time blocking - If you are already practising many of the tips laid out above, you may be interested in taking your approach to the next stage. Time blocking as a practice, is illustrated well in the image below:

This method recommends you divide your workday into blocks of time, with each block dedicated to a specific task or group of tasks, known as task batching. Pay particular note to the significant blocks of time allocated, to support deep work focus and concentration. In essence, trying to avoid the pitfalls of context switching, potential distractions and interruptions and aiming to reach a “flow” in your work tasks. The same article by Doist covers off the other ways to time block and batch, under the categorisation of day themes and also time boxing, suggesting these as alternative yet effective approaches.

Proactive calendar management and organisation is an evolving (and almost never-ending) task in itself, but I hope that you honour and set aside your time to review your calendar, prioritising your own needs first and blocking and batching work tasks with intention, like I do every Friday. Afterwards, the end result is a sense of satisfaction and clarity for what is planned for the coming week, safe in the sense that your own needs and wellbeing are a priority, reflected fully in your final calendar planning.

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This article was originally posted on LinkedIn on 23rd Mar 2022.