Your Schedule Needs a Reset
Here’s How to Do It Without Losing Your Mind
I talk a lot about if you fail to plan, you plan to fail.
But, what happens when you take a couple hours to make a plan for the month and get all organized, only to wake up the next day to an email that will completely derail it?
Yea, that was me this week, and that email completely meant a revamp of my June plan for work ...
Can you relate?
You're running meetings, handling home life, trying to eat right, and still want a minute to breathe.
Well, revamp is exactly what I did. I used this week to make changes and adjustments to the plan that I had already worked hard to make.
Instead of spending hours making a new plan, I just did a full pivot and used this week to tackle the new cases so that I could get back to the scheduled program but with an added asterisk, because I had actually built a few days into the months plan that had nothing scheduled.
Summer doesn't change your desire to get it done.
But, what should potentially change is your approach.
Just because it's summer, the work doesn't stop, nor should it have to.
Instead of cramming every single task into your day, why not simplify your schedule to get more done with less?
🔑 3 Key Ways to Work Smarter (Not Harder) This Summer:
1. Create a Power Hour
I love a good timer to keep me focused on getting work done.
Whether it's my time before work, things I'm focusing on at work, my lunch break, or my weekend focus sessions, I'd rather have focused work time over multi-tasking and task hopping any day.
What you might not understand is that one focused, uninterrupted hour is more powerful than a distracted day full of multitasking.
Identify what it is that you want to focus on during the hour, break it up into pieces, stay focused, and get the work done!
2. Align Your Schedule with Your Energy
I've talk a lot about how we need to work with our bodies instead of against our bodies.
This is about creating and aligning your schedule with your capacity to get things done which is both about your focus and energy levels, as well as your actual availability and time to get things done.
Stop just plugging tasks and appointments into open slots in your day or on your calendar.
You have to pay attention to when your energy peaks, when do you have the most focus and when do you have the least focus, what are the things that you need to do that requires all the focus and attention, and what are those things that you could do with your eyes closed and don't need much mental capacity.
3. Turn Your Massive To Do List Into a Focused To Do List
If you think that everything is important, then absolutely nothing is actually important.
Stop putting everything on the list as something that you need to work on and focus on RIGHT NOW!
We just talked about aligning your schedule with your energy and how you're not going to always want, or feel like, doing work all day. If you can take that massive to do list and start to simplify it by ranking and prioritizing your tasks as what you: have to do, need to do, and want to do.
Once you do this, you can focus on the top 3 things that will move the needle that day, get those done, and call it a win.
If you focus on the true priorities first, especially during that focused power hour, as you have more time, you can then work your way down your list.
Want to apply these to your life this summer?
You understand the big picture of this ... But what can you do on a more practical level?
Identify your “non-negotiables” — Start by listing the things that must happen in your day (client meetings, work tasks, appointments, family time) and leave room for everything else.
Batch tasks — Taking time to group similar tasks (emails, calls, errands, planning) together can help you to get ahead by cutting down on decision fatigue with you having to think about what to do next. This helps you stay in the zone, keep working, and not having to keep stopping to ask yourself "what's next".
Limit distractions — If you’re going to get anything done, you need clear blocks of focus time. Use Do Not Disturb, temporary mute, leave your phone in another room, or set time limits for social media. When you're focusing and limiting, or better yet eliminating, distractions, make sure that you focus on one task at a time.
Stay flexible — Life’s unpredictable, not just in the summer, but sometimes especially in the summer! Leaving buffer and breathing room in your schedule isn't a waste of time. Not only do we often underestimate how long it takes to get something done, but having this buffer time helps us to pivot and adapt as needed without feeling overwhelmed. This is just like what I did this week after getting that email. Don’t pack your calendar so tight that there’s no space to think or shift when life happens.
Simplifying your schedule is a game changer for productivity and peace of mind.
Once you manage to do this, you'll feel more accomplished with less stress.
The big takeaway: You don't need to do more to achieve more, you just to do more of the right things.
Struggling to create a summer schedule that balances work and downtime? Let’s chat about it!
Grab your copy of Lee’s Laws of Productivity or book your Personalized Productivity Audit to work smarter, not harder.
💜 Put the keys to work … Your goals depend on it!
