Minimalist Time Management: Keep Your Day Open

There are the super-organized among us — those who schedule every minute and stick to the plan to the letter — and then there’s the rest of us. We schedule a lot of plans, but our days don’t usually resemble the plan very much.

That’s because things change, of course, and we have to be able to go with the flow. Time management, especially for the more fluid work arrangements of many freelancers, doesn’t have to be a rigid or time-consuming process.

For those who are overwhelmed by a schedule, and would like to take a more open approach, I suggest minimalist time management. Instead of allowing your life to be ruled by your calendar, let your life be ruled by the moment.

Here’s how:

1. Don’t schedule appointments. This will be a radical departure for many people, but it’s not a new idea and it’s worked for others. If someone requests an appointment, tell them that you don’t schedule appointments. Instead, ask them to call you a little before they’d like to meet to see if you can make it. If you’re free, take the meeting. I suggest keeping your meetings to a bare minimum if you want to get a lot of work done.

Now, there will be some things you’ll want to note on a calendar (I use Google Calendar, accessible from anywhere). These are events that you’d like to have on your calendar, but you don’t necessarily have to go to them. The calendar, then, serves as a way for you to see what your options are, but not as a tool to rule your life. I suggest not keeping too much on the calendar, though.

2. Know what you want to accomplish today. Have a short list of three things you’d really like to accomplish today. Your three most important things. You can have a short list of other small tasks you’d like to do in a batch (save them for later in the day), but the focus of your day should be the list of three important things. Let this list, and not your schedule, be the ruler of your day.

3. Focus on one thing at a time. To get your short list of three important tasks completed, you’ll need to focus on each one of those tasks in turn, and try to focus on them to completion. This will also be a radical departure for the multitasker in all of us. But single-tasking is not only more productive, it’s more relaxing as well.

It will take a little while for you to get used to single-tasking, if you are used to jumping from one thing to another and back. That’s OK. Just gently bring yourself back to your task, every time you feel yourself being pulled away. Keep at it and you’ll soon be knocking off your most important tasks easily.

4. Note tasks as they come up, to consider for later. As you’re working on your important tasks, and trying to focus, other ideas will come up, and other requests will come in. That’s normal, of course, but you can’t let those ideas and requests rule your life. Make a note of them on a sheet of paper or a small notebook (or wherever you write your list of 3 important tasks), and get back to the task you were working on. When you’re done with that task, you can take a look at your list to see what you should be working on next.

That’s it. Minimalist time management is keeping your day wide open, focusing on a small number of tasks you’d like to accomplish today, doing them one at a time, and prioritizing your tasks in the moment. For that, you only need a sheet of paper or a small notebook, and a calendar to put reminders of events that you can (but don’t need to) attend.

Timer – 簡易時間管理工具

作為 freelancer，因為收費是按 project 而非按時計的，時間就是金錢，收入跟效率成正比，提高效率對我來說十分重要。因此這個聖誕假期花了些時間用 Adobe AIR 寫了個 time tracker。

目前 AIR 上的時間管理軟件可謂五花八門，但沒有一個是完全合我所需的。Adobe AIR 上的 time tracker 有 Klok、Compuccino time track 和 Kronos 等，都是很優秀的免費軟件。當中我最喜歡的是 Tick 這個服務（有提供 AIR 版本，可同步至網站），可惜它是付費軟件，我倒是沒打算為了個計時器而每年付幾十美金。反正也想練習一下寫程式的技巧，所以就決定依 Tick 為藍本自己寫了個相似的 app。

如果以上介紹的 app 都不能使你滿意的話，不妨試試我的這個 app－Timer。它的功能很簡單－在開始工作時打開 Timer 並開始計時，工作結束後指定一個相關的 task。日後便可以在 reports 頁面查看你在每項工作所花的時間，及該項工作佔整個 project 的百分比。相信這些數據能助你日後更準確估計出每項工作的所需時間。

下載點：http://www.box.net/shared/c3a6rocirz

雖然我知道目前功能還是不太完善，以及有很多 bug，不過由於假期快結束，大概日後也沒辦法花太多時間在它身上，所以決定現在釋出 beta 版。對於那些會 Javascript 的 developer，大可以動手修改本程式。反正 source code 都是公開的，打開 C:Program FilesTimer 直接修改即可。

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Tags: Adobe AIR, app, Compuccino time track, freelancer, Klok, Kronos, project, time tracker