We’re terrible at planning our time. Here’s how to fix it
We
work a lot less hours than we think. Here are some tips on how we can make the
most of that time.
How many hours do you work each day? If
you’re like most of the U.S. working population, you probably think you get a
solid eight hours in. That’s 40 hours a week. Around 1,800 a year (minus 2
weeks’ vacation). Not too bad.
The problem with this kind of thinking is
that just because we’re at work for eight hours a day doesn’t mean we’re doing
eight hours of work. (In fact, pretty much every statistic puts that number
significantly lower.) Assuming you have more time than you do is the
quickest route to stress, overwork, a lack
of productivity, and eventually, burnout.
So, why does the myth of the 40-hour workweek
still persist? And if we don’t have eight hours a day to do work, how much time
do we actually have? At best, you have 2.5 to three hours a day to do
focused work.
Let’s cut to the chase–psychologist Ron
Friedman told the Harvard Business Review that most
people “typically have a window of about three hours where we’re really, really
focused.” Our own data backs this number up as well. When we analyzed
over 225 million hours of working
time, we found that the average knowledge worker
(someone who deals with information for a living, like a writer, developer,
designer, or manager), is only productive for 12.5 hours a week. That’s roughly
2.5 hours a day.
That’s a far cry from the 40 hours we all
assume we have. So why are we overestimating our available time every single
day? To figure this out, let’s make some gross generalizations about what
the average workday looks like, what we want to do, and what actually happens.
WE WERE ALL HIRED TO DO SOME SORT OF CORE WORK
When you got hired, it was to do some
specific task that you’re especially good at. Maybe that’s writing, or
designing, or coding. Whatever it is, that’s what we like to call your “core
work.”
First, add up all the time that you spent
in meetings last week and subtract that from your 40-hour week. This number
depends on your company size, culture, and job role. But let’s go on the low
end and say 15%.
Next, let’s get rid of all the time spent
doing the tasks that support your “core work.” This means communication and
email.
In general, we’ve found that people tend to
spend 25%–30% of their computer time at work on communication like email, work
chat like Slack, or video calls like Skype, Zoom, or Google Hangouts.
Again, let’s be optimistic and only subtract
two hours a day for communication.
Lastly, we need to talk about all that time
spent working in a less than optimal way.
From our own research, we found that most
people multitask during 40% of their productive time. It’s widely agreed that
multitasking can have seriously negative effects on your ability to do good
work. So let’s block those out as well.
And there we have it! A realistic week of
work.
THE PROBLEM WITH THE PLANNING FALLACY (AND WHY
WE ALWAYS THINK WE CAN DO MORE THAN WE CAN)
If your math works out like ours, you’ll end
up with about one hour and 12 minutes a day for focused, productive work.
If you planned your day assuming you would
have eight hours of time for productive work, and you end up with just over one
hour, it’s going to be really frustrating.
Even worse, you’re going to keep adding more
and more to your plate, thinking you have all this extra time to do “core work”
each day.
It’s upsetting. But it’s also human nature.
For decades, psychologists have called this
behavior the Planning Fallacy–our bias toward being overly optimistic when it
comes to how much time is needed to complete a future task. In other
words, we’re notoriously bad at looking into the future and figuring out how
long a task will take us.
The Planning Fallacy has been blamed for
everything from late midterm papers to billions of dollars of unexpected costs
on airports, opera houses, and other development projects. It’s a serious
issue, and one that we have to work through if we’re going to do good,
focused, meaningful work.
SO, HOW DO WE GET OVER OUR OPTIMISTIC BIAS?
We need to realign what we think we can do in
a day and what we actually can do, which is no small task.
Here are a few proven ways to help yourself
become more realistic about what can be done in a day.
USE IMPLEMENTATION INTENTIONS
One of the biggest issues when it comes to
planning our days is not taking the time to really break down what needs to be
done. We all have good intentions. But research from the American
Psychologist has shown that intentions only account
for 20%–30% of our behaviors.
Implementation intentions are concrete plans
that accurately show how, when, and where you’re going to do your work. So for
example, instead of saying:
I’m going to write a blog post today.
An implementation intention would be:
I’m going to research and write the outline
for a blog post on the planning fallacy from 9–11 a.m. Tuesday morning.
A good implementation intention also includes
an “if-then” plan for when things go wrong.
So,
If I get distracted while writing by a
coworker, then I will ask them to come back after 11 a.m.
When researchers studied groups who had made
implementation intentions like this, they found they began work on the task
sooner, experienced fewer interruptions, and were better able to judge how long
future similar tasks would take them.
TRY THE “100 BLOCKS A DAY” METHOD
Perspective is a powerful tool when you talk
about scheduling your time. And just like we shower above when breaking down
the average workday, you can do this for your entire day.
According to the writers at Wait But Why, if you sleep eight hours a night, that leaves you with about 1,000
waking minutes a day to schedule. Or, 100 10-minute blocks.
Lay those blocks out on a grid and ask
yourself, how many are:
- Put toward making your future better, and how many
of them are just there to be enjoyed?
- Spent with other people, and how many are for time
by yourself?
- Used to create something, and how many are used to
consume something?
This isn’t necessarily a practice any (sane)
person would go through on a daily basis, but the idea behind it is sound. Know
you have a finite amount of time each day and see how many blocks you have.
TAKE AN OUTSIDE VIEW
Have you ever noticed how much easier it is
to give advice than to take it yourself? The same thing happens when we’re
trying to schedule our time.
Studies have shown that the planning fallacy vanishes when you’re forecasting how
long a task will take someone else. This is called taking an “outside view.”
So, we’re overly optimistic with our own abilities and more realistic with
others.
To get over this, you can use what’s called
“Reference class forecasting,” which is basically a fancy word for switching
your thought process from, “How long has this taken me in the past?” to “how
long does this type of project take people like me?”
One of the most frustrating things about the
modern workplace is not feeling like you’re making meaningful progress. And
while you might get paid for 40 hours of work each week, you can’t
realistically schedule 40 hours of work. We all have biases that get in
the way of scheduling our days properly. Only by understanding and
acknowledging them are we able to set ourselves up for success.
BY JORY MACKAY
https://www.fastcompany.com/90217037/were-terrible-at-planning-our-time-heres-how-to-fix-it?utm_source=postup&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Fast%20Company%20Daily&position=3&partner=newsletter&campaign_date=08132018
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