Should You Time-Block Long and Static Tasks?
Chapters
0:0 Cal's Intro0:16 Cal reads about Time-Blocking static tasks
0:37 Cal thinks it's fine
1:14 Cal Time-Blocks 90% of his days
00:00:00.000 | [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:00:05.220 | We'll start, as always, with questions about deep work.
00:00:10.620 | Our first question comes from Sabine, who asks,
00:00:15.900 | in your opinion, is it worth time blocking days
00:00:19.320 | that don't involve jumping around
00:00:20.920 | with different types of tasks?
00:00:24.160 | There's some elaboration here.
00:00:26.080 | Sabine says, I am self-employed and on a regular basis
00:00:29.520 | have days when I work on my routine work projects that
00:00:32.280 | can take two days to finish without having
00:00:34.200 | to switch to anything else.
00:00:36.760 | I think that's completely fine to non-time block really
00:00:40.280 | focused days, or days where maybe you're not
00:00:42.840 | doing too much professionally, except for maybe one thing.
00:00:45.800 | So it's a weekend day that you largely aren't working,
00:00:49.440 | but you're going to write for three hours.
00:00:51.520 | No need to time block that.
00:00:52.640 | Or if it's a regular weekday and you're coding all day,
00:00:55.760 | you know what you're doing.
00:00:56.920 | You use Scrum, here's the feature story
00:00:59.600 | you're working on, and that's what you're locked into.
00:01:02.880 | I think the time block in those occasions,
00:01:04.800 | though it's fine to do, might feel like it's
00:01:06.720 | an exercise in just formalism.
00:01:10.800 | I think it's completely fine not to time block those days.
00:01:13.160 | I probably time block 90% of my work days.
00:01:17.800 | But there's work days I don't have to.
00:01:20.040 | I mean, sometimes it's because it's routine, too.
00:01:22.080 | That's the other thing I'll throw in.
00:01:23.620 | I mean, I know if it's a Monday for me,
00:01:26.360 | I got to drive to campus, I'm going to teach,
00:01:28.200 | then teaching is followed almost immediately by office hours.
00:01:31.120 | And then office hours actually take me pretty late
00:01:33.240 | into the day, and sometimes it's pretty clear.
00:01:35.840 | I prep in the morning, I go to campus, I teach,
00:01:39.640 | I do office hours.
00:01:41.560 | I'll often have maybe one variable block in that day.
00:01:45.760 | What do I do right after office hours?
00:01:47.440 | And sometimes if that's the only variable that's different,
00:01:50.440 | it feels weird to write it down.
00:01:51.960 | So I'm with you.
00:01:52.960 | Time blocking is useful when it's
00:01:54.360 | unclear what you want to do with your time,
00:01:57.520 | or your plan is way too complicated to keep track of.
00:02:00.080 | But if it's one thing, or it's a schedule
00:02:02.400 | you've done week after week after week with very minimal
00:02:04.780 | changes, it's fine by me.
00:02:05.960 | I'm not going to be mad at you if you don't time block that.
00:02:08.680 | [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:02:12.040 | (upbeat music)