Batching Tasks: The Ultimate Strategy for a More Productive Life
We all want more time
You’re constantly saying you wish you had more time in your day.
In an attempt to make your wish come true, you’ve been looking for ways to increase productivity.
How can you get your tasks done in a shorter amount of time?
If you’ve done any Googling, consumed some Tim Ferriss content or read random blogs like mine… You’ve heard of batching tasks.
But you haven’t started doing it, nor do you know how to do it.
After a lot of experimenting, I’ve found the best way to batch tasks is to start by splitting them up based on timelines.
Let me break down how to do this for you.
Batching tasks on the daily
Separating your daily tasks into batches is the easiest way to remain productive throughout your day.
On average, it’ll take you 15 minutes to switch from one task to the next. So, batching will help keep your workflow at a maximum.
The best way I have found to batch my daily tasks is to base it on the location I am completing my tasks.
For example, if I am at a coffee shop on my computer, I will be doing everything I need to do on my computer at once.
Emails
Writing
Video calls
Spreadsheets
Social media posts
Reading newsletters/blogs
The same rule can apply when you are sitting on your couch (reading/phone calls), at the office(computer/meetings), in your car (phone calls) or even sitting on the toilet (that’s when I do my Chinese lessons).
The real magic of batching happens when you start batching your weekly tasks though.
Batching tasks on the weekly
I mentioned emails in the daily batching, but if you can batch all of your weekly emails into 1 or 2 times a week - that is magical.
You should do the same thing with running errands too. If you are going to be on the road in your car, you should save all your errands for 1 or 2 times a week.
Pickups
Drop-offs
Shopping
Dry cleaning
You may not realize it, but you are likely wasting a lot of time on the road every day. Either that or you realize it and aren’t sure what to do about it!
There are other tasks which you would save a lot of time in batching weekly.
If you post regularly on social media, you should try using a program to schedule your posts. This way, you can spend time once a week making every post.
This will save even more time when you count the doom scrolling you do before and after each time you post.
I also recommend batching your meetings if possible. My goal every week is to get all my meetings done on the same day.
Of course, there are exceptions and depending on where you are in life, you may need to be more flexible with meeting times, but batching meetings is an incredible life hack.
Batching tasks on the monthly
To be able to batch your tasks on a monthly basis, you need to have a lot of control over your calendar.
For some people, batching social media posts, errands and meetings on a monthly basis is possible. Personally, I’m not there yet and I’m guessing if you’re reading this post, you aren’t either.
But, there are a couple of tasks you can batch on the monthly.
Mainly, your bills or your bookkeeping.
It’s easy to get caught up checking your banking apps every day, multiple times a day.
Or, even having the habit of paying your bills the moment you get them.
I want to challenge you to batch all of your bills, banking and personal bookkeeping into 1 day a month.
If you absolutely must, do it 2 times a month. For example, on the 15th and 30th of each month.
You’ll not only save yourself time, but you’ll save yourself from the stress of constantly thinking about bills.
Closing thoughts
The art of batching tasks was popularized years ago, but it seems like a lot of people have either stopped batching or forgotten about it.
This is likely because we are so connected to everyone and everything that it has led to us feeling like we need to do everything immediately.
But, this will waste a lot of your time and increase your stress.
So, review all the tasks you do in a month, and figure out where you can batch them to help save yourself time and increase your productivity.
Thanks for reading!