Time flies when you’re having fun (Part 2)…

or If you decide that monitoring time would be useful then how do you go about doing it?

In our last blog we shared the benefits of monitoring your time - and having a true understanding of how you are spending your time; hopefully over a week, or maybe two, to give you a really good picture and to balance out any unusual days (are there any “usual” days when you run a small business?!)

This is all good and well, but how should you go about this task - it’s all good and well agreeing to give it a go, but if you’re going to do so then let’s make sure that you use a method that is helpful, but that - more importantly - works for you

Note: This blog is based purely on my opinion.  I know that there are lots of tools out there, but this is what works for me, and some of the other options that I recommend to others who want to learn more about how they are spending their time.

Tips and Tricks for Monitoring Your Time

What to track

Firstly, it’s key to decide what you want to track.  It’s going to add a bit of time to your day whilst you do this, so it’s important to work out whether you need to write down every little thing, or just something a bit more high level. I would suggest finding a happy medium; I will track time spent on LinkedIn, for example, but not whether I’m posting, commenting, or spending time learning from others - for me this is all “social media”.

Secondly, keep it consistent.  Once you’ve decided what to track then there is a huge benefit in noting things consistently through the week.  Not only will you end up with data at the end of the week that is hugely valuable in terms of everything you’ve done - but also how much time is spent in different areas of the business.  Using the example above, I know that I spend time on LinkedIn daily for at least 30 minutes - and actively choose to do so. 

Thirdly, how often to track.  This is a big one and depends hugely on the work that you do.  I used to track time to the nearest 5 minutes but realised that this was a sign that I was jumping from one thing to another, and I made changes.  Now, I track my time in 15 minute intervals.  This allows me to get into a task and I try to spend chunks of time on something before leaping to something new as this invariably disrupts me.  I can feel some people shaking their heads even as I write this; they have too many tiny tasks that need to be done and spend a lot of their days jumping around from one thing to the next firefighting, but go back to the first point and think about what you’re tracking - are you tracking “email to John”, “email to Ben” and “email to Jane” as 3 separate tasks, or tracking “email / inbox”?  

Once you know what you’re tracking, you’re monitoring it consistently and have an idea of how often you want to track it - then you can start to make changes, and see some of the benefits that we covered in the first part of this blog.

How to track it

This is the big one.

I use Clockify and have done for over 5 years.  It’s a simple piece of software that allows me to group activity by clients and then to put the tasks into projects. I only use the free version, and it does everything that I want.

Other specific time tracking software is available but I won’t include here as I haven’t needed to use anything else since I started tracking my time on a regular basis.

Other ways to track your time - 

Write it down on paper - it doesn’t have to be complicated! Keeping a notepad on your desk throughout the day is a great way to keep track of things although it can be more difficult to compile what you’ve done and look at it in different ways if everything is on paper.

Print off your calendar and write it down - a similar thing and all about putting pen to paper, but having your calendar in front of you for the day  is often a good prompt for people to remind them to write things down (particularly until you get into the habit!)

Calendar apps - whether you’re a fan of Microsoft, Google or something else, most have the facility within them to look back and track what you’ve done, instead of just looking forward to what’s coming up

Existing software - there are many pieces of software that you may use already that have the functionality to track tasks.  As an example, If you’re involved with project management then software such as Asana, Jira and Basecamp will all allow time tracking.

However, you choose to track - the key is to do it, and if you forget then just leave a gap and keep going. Like anything, this is a habit that will take time to form, but I can assure you that it’s worth it!

If you’d like some help with tracking how you are spending time then get in touch. I’m always happy to sit down and go through different ways to make this as easy as possible for you!

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Juggling Octopus is a virtual assistant agency based in Derby, UK and is run by Sarah Moore.  Always happy to talk about all things Octopus and outsourcing and to learn more about other businesses, get in touch if you’d like to chat.