Time management is a topic that's on my mind a lot; I'm always trying to optimize better how I spend my time to get the greatest value in the shortest period of time that I can.
Something I've found helpful for this is the concept of 'block time,' which I heard first from Brendon Burchard. The basic idea is that you block your time into chunks and heavily focus on one area during that dedicated time. He suggests setting block time in one-hour segments and taking a break between them to let your mind rest and recompose.
This means that you have to remove distractions from your surroundings, notifications, checking your phone, and people. Complete and intentional focus can yield double the productivity or more!
Right off the bat, this doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Spend less time on the same project, and interrupt our flow of thought to take a break? The longer we spend on a project, the more our minds get bored with the topic and start to float of thinking of other things, losing our intentional focus. Brendon Burchard found this typically happens after the 90-minute mark, so coming in early and forcing yourself to break the train of thought will pause your flow to recharge yourself, then come back with full focus for another hour.
We work better when we are wholly focused on one topic and can get a lot of valuable work done with uninterrupted time blocks. I've found this works really well no matter what I'm working on, and forcing myself to take a break at the end of each hour is difficult but absolutely worth it for the focus you get after.
Key takeaways:
1) Get more things done by setting your tasks in hour blocks
2) Taking a break during the flow will help you recharge and be focused more for a longer
3) It isn't easy to pull yourself away, but it is more productive in the long run
4) Complete intentional focus brings more value in less time