USING COLOUR FOR TIME MANAGEMENT

Just as a colour map is better than a black and white one, a calendar with colours helps you to see more easily, at a glance, exactly how your time is allocated. By using specific colours for different items or categories of appointment or work, you can see where you are spending your time and where you may be out of balance. The colour scheme you employ will depend on how you want to measure your time. For example, if you run your own business and want to measure revenue-generating work and you designate that in blue, when you look ahead you will know how much such work you are doing that week by how much blue is in your schedule.

Designate each type of work with a colour. You can base it on your job type or your life balance. For example:

• Executive: managing others, meetings, key projects, career critical, relationship building.
• Life balance: work, family, friends, travel, vacations, purpose/career development.
• Banking: pitching, execution, follow-up, long-term planning, learning.
• Salesperson: client visits, prospecting, closing, admin, calls, presentations.

  

  USING COLOUR FOR TIME MANAGEMENT

• Business owner function model: sales, marketing, finance, maintenance, leisure, production/operation.
• Project manager: specific projects, leisure, meetings, calls, follow-up.
• E-myth model: technician work, manager, entrepreneur.

Below is a simple colour system, based on business work, meetings, personal, routine items, critical meetings and vacations (there are more examples on www.energyequationbook.com/resources).

In this case, the slots were already set up in advance, and the new appointments were scheduled the day before.

SIMPLE COLOUR SYSTEM

Using these simple calendar techniques will significantly improve your productivity and peace of mind. The more certainty you have, the more you will feel in control of your life.

Now that we’ve covered the importance of using your calendar and how to structure your time using the slot system, not only will you find yourself more productive, you will also have more free time for yourself.

Longer term planning

Most of what we have done so far is day-to-day, week-to-week planning. But life can be boring when our days are the same old routine. Planning for the longer term is a matter of zooming out and looking at the year. You can divide the year into quarters or even months and start at any point. During the year we need points in time when we recharge our batteries, so schedule some relaxation, recovery and fun.

Let’s take a step back and look at the year in terms of the months and quarters. Now add in the holidays or breaks you are going to have. I recommend a long weekend break of five days in total (including the weekend) at least once a quarter. Then allocate your vacation days as makes sense to you with the view of having sufficient rest and recovery time.

By looking at your year in this view it allows you to see what rest points you are creating for yourself