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You are probably already using one or more calendars in your life. There may be one on the fridge for your personal and family life, one on your phone, and one on your computer. It keeps track of meetings, bank holidays, birthdays, and travels.
But calendars can do so much more for you — especially if you are running a business. They can become more all rounded time management tools that actively help you save time, manage your team, and find resources.
In this article, I will discuss the ways in which calendars can boost your productivity and even save as much as 8 hours of your time every year. I use Google Calendar, but these tips apply to most programs.
How Calendars Fit in Your Productivity Framework
I said it before: productivity optimization is all about framework. Instead of applying a few tips and use a new tool, try to think of your productivity as a system made of goals, strategy, and tools. Once you have that clear, it will be easier to find out what works best for you.
My framework, for example, is all about time management. And good time management comes from good time tracking. If I don’t know how long it takes me to complete a task, I will not be able to accurately manage my projects and teams. Fortunately, calendars are among the most useful tools to improve your time tracking and management — especially when it comes to recurring tasks.
Once you figure out that it takes you one hour to write an article and you decide that you want to publish one new article on your blog every week, the calendar will make sure that that hour is consistently accounted for in your weekly schedule. This way.
- You will not forget the task.
- You will be able to block time for the task.
- Others can see that you have that time blocked and book meetings with you around that.
- You will be more realistic and efficient should you decide to delegate the task in the future.
How to Make the Most Out of Your Calendar
So far so good. You figured out that it takes you one hour to write your weekly article and made sure to have that time booked every week. But calendars can go much further than that.
Let’s say that your writing time arrives. Your calendar reminds you of your task and you start creating your article. But before you can do that, you will need to access a number of resources, such as the correct drive folder, the template for the article, sources you want to quote, potential design tools you want to use, and the final platform you will publish your article on.
A calendar can help you transition to the actual task much quicker by including all the resources you may need for that task in the calendar event. Simply add all the links you know you’ll need as you create the event to have everything in one place.
Even if opening all folders and resources only takes 30 seconds every day, those seconds will amount to 500 minutes over a year. As to say, 8 hours of your precious productive time. And if you create task events for your team, you will not only save them time but also minimize potential mistakes, as they will be able to access all the correct resources at once.
You can see now how using your calendar to its full potential can really make a difference for you and your team.
via https://productivity.academy/how-to/how-to-be-more-productive-with-google-calendar/ at The Productivity Academy
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