Life Hacks - How to Map Your Time

I was chatting with a colleague recently who was struggling to fit everything in and getting a bit overwhelmed with, well, life in general I suppose. I asked her how she maps her time for the week and she told me she didn't. I was, honestly, really surprised! I thought everyone would map their time in one way or another. 

I showed her my week by week map I use to map out my time and my tasks and she said I should share it in my blog so...here it is! 
*apologies it's slightly larger than the page!

So, essentially, as you can hopefully see each day is broken down by the hour and each day is split into work and family. I then add my codes from the table below.

This allows me to allocate EVERYTHING which needs to be added into my working week. 

I use the calendar to map...

Clients work - To ensure I have allowed myself enough time to deliver the work I map all work to last letter and always give myself some extra hours to allow for contingency

Business growth and general management- All the things I need to ensure I keep my business in a healthy position. This includes;

• General admin and invoicing
• Marketing - Blogging and reading other blogs/keeping on top of any changes 
• Servicing - Looking after my clients

Personal - I map everything I need to keep on top of in my life including:

• Children - extra curricular activities, school activities as well as downtime
• Life admin -doctors appointments, dentists, banking etc
• Exercise -I like to ensure I allocate hours to exercise weekly and it is so much easier if you plan when that is going to happen
• RR-which is my time to relax.
• 
  

The key to a good time map boils down to the following:

Leave no stone unturned! Make sure you map EVERYTHING that needs to be done no matter how small it is. It will help manage stress levels knowing you have everything planned for and the time to do it.

Be realistic - Don't allocate an hour if you know it takes two. It isnt realistic and will throw your plan out of balance

Be flexible - If things need to move, switch don't sweat it. Just decide which item is least important for that week so you can bump it off the weeks plan and move it to the next week

Keep on top of it - Keep the plan open and stick to it. Ensure you do a new plan each week. You will find some weeks you have more time for rest or maybe exercise of time with the children because you have less life admin that week etc. 

Remember YOU are in control!

There are 24 hours in a day and you CAN fit everything in (although I get it means life can be very busy) if you are organised. Just remember to work with a bit of give and take and ensure you balance work hours and life stuff on your plan. My next plan is to colour code and weight work and home stuff to ensure i'm balanced but i'll keep you updated on that one!

If you still struggle with time management and think there are not enough hours in the day why not talk to us about how we can help and OUTSOURCE some of your work to us. We can manage your home life with our PA and Concierge services or support your admin needs with our admin support services. 

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