Michelle Obama is also a fan of this hack!
Unfortunately, there are not enough hours in the day to complete all the tasks on your list. If you have a day full of deadlines, it can be nice to start the day productively. And you do it this way!
Work-life balance
Top woman at one of Wall Street’s most powerful companies and mother of five children, Shekhinah Bass, shares her secret for a productive day. She started working at Goldman Sachs when she was just 22 years old. She revealed to CNBC Make It that improving her time management skills has helped her be more productive and avoid burnout. Especially as she moved up the ranks at the company; She is not only head of strategy at one of the most powerful companies on Wall Street, but also runs a family with five children. An impressive combination, from which we can learn quite a bit.
“I used to be jealous of all the bigwigs running to meetings and now I’m jealous of my younger self; how few meetings I had in my agenda at the time,” she says. “You need to take time to recharge and do things you enjoy,” she says. “There have been times when I haven’t created that space, and that can be very draining. By setting those boundaries, you will see yourself excel.” There’s one time management hack in particular that the top executive swears by to maintain a strong work-life balance: namely timeboxing.
Timeboxing
She says the technique is simple: give each task on your to-do list a certain amount of time, schedule it in your calendar, and then block out all distractions while you’re doing it. Continue working on it until the allotted time has passed, assess your progress, and move on to the next item on your to-do list.
At the beginning of each week, Shekhinah divides her agenda into different blocks. For meetings, tasks that require concentrated work and also for breaks – even if it’s just 15 minutes for a quick walk. She recommends scheduling work that requires significant concentration at times when you have the highest levels of focus and energy. For her, this usually means between 8 and 10 a.m. “When my brain is fresh and the coffee has just been made, that’s my moment,” she says.
The benefits of timeboxing
Regular to-do lists often don’t take into account the time it will take you to complete them. “Timeboxing, on the other hand, gives you a clear plan for what your day will look like, so you’re less likely to get sidetracked and feel overwhelmed by your to-do list,” says Shekhinah.
And that fact does not just appear out of the blue. An analysis by tech company Filtered shows that of the hundred productivity hacks they investigated, timeboxing is the most effective. Leaders like former first lady Michelle Obama, Virgin Group founder Richard Branson and former monk Jay Shetty all use versions of timeboxing to balance work and home life.
Finally, Shekhinah says: “Timeboxing saves me hours of time during my working days, so I have more time and peace for my family. And whether you have children or not: creating space for yourself to recharge is very important, not only for your career, but also for your peace of mind.”
