Irrespective of being a new or an experienced remote employee, you would already know how hard it is to create an effective work schedule. Every morning you get up drowsy with no professional activity such as commutes or team chats that imbibes work mindset in you. And when you finally feel you are on a roll and prepared to do everything on your to-do list, you realize it’s already dark and you have worked straight through the dinner.
Although you might come across schedule mishaps occasionally, you would not want it to be a regular affair. Moreover, working late nights are great for a prospering career, but doing them regularly can have a severe impact on your mental health, work satisfaction, and work-life balance. Speaking of remote work, poor scheduling has a bigger impact on your life. According to some research, it shows that remote employees work for longer hours compared to in-office employees. Remote work also results in a feeling of isolation, loneliness, and disconnection.
We have discussed some common ways by which you can create an effective weekly schedule allowing you to stay on task, manage projects, and maintain a work-life balance.
Block Non-Working Hours
The biggest challenge faced by remote employees is their inability to tune out and unplug after a long day at work. As there aren’t any social cues indicating it’s time to leave the office, most remote employees work for longer hours and have less time for social interaction beyond their house.
Being a hardworking remote marketer, you often feel that you should always be online. However, it should not be the case. As a remote employee, you should always set boundaries for your schedule early on. Some employees often end up getting in the trap of working throughout the day but still feeling that they have wasted their time and need to work extra in the evening.
Hence, update your working hours, preferably on Google Calendar. It easily indicates the calendar viewers with gray lines meaning that you won’t be available at those times during the day.
Schedule Time For Regular Weekly Duties
Each job has multiple weekly duties that you need to do once or twice a week. For isolating such regular duties, so that they don’t impact bigger projects, consider scheduling a time for doing them each day. For instance, you can schedule your time to produce and send marketing emails. This will help in getting your emails sent early so that you can focus on more creative projects, other heads-down tasks, or strategizing. It will also allow you to add structure to the day, especially while working remotely.
Create Blocks Saying “Please Request Time Before Booking” When Doing Big Projects
At times you require some time of uninterrupted period for doing a project thoroughly. Meetings often interrupt such times and may throw you off your train of thought or affect your creativity. Hence, to do such tasks effectively, schedule time for doing important and unchanging tasks required for doing creative projects. It will help you stay centered around your routine and do the work and allow you to pivot the unexpected tasks.
Besides the above important tasks, some additional things that you should be doing to schedule and carry out tasks with ease have been discussed below:
- Schedule regular Check-ins with colleagues you communicate less
- Include the morning routine that is common for start each day
- Allocate time for breaks each day
- Allocate time for your work-life-balance activities
- Leave some slots to accommodate urgent or unanticipated things each day
Communicate Your Schedule
Any great schedule to be successful requires you to communicate about your work hours and boundaries to the team. For ensuring you maintain a weekly routine, make sure you are discussing the schedule you finalize with your manager and later notify your colleagues about the time you are unavailable. It thus becomes a solid communication and helps in ensuring that you develop working hours that are both effective and respected.
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