Table of Contents
Intro
Working from home gives you the freedom to choose your own working schedule tailored to your strengths. You might be active in the morning while someone’s superpowers lie towards the evening. You might already have a defined agenda for the week ahead to refer to on Monday morning, or your inbox and chat messages may be the driving force for your day and the week.
Remote workers often find it difficult to stay on track due to a lack of or ineffective time management strategies. Time management is one of the major struggles remote workers face. A FlexJobs survey cited1 in a 2024 review found that 44% of remote workers say they struggle to manage their time effectively, which is a key obstacle to productivity.
Without having a structured approach to guide you throughout your day, when you work independently, your freedom might be your downfall in productivity. In this article, I will guide you through a set of actionable steps to take control of your time in a work-from-home setup, enabling you to be more productive.
Pick your optimum times
Sit down and have a brainstorming session with yourself to find out when you are most productive throughout the day. For example, you might be good at focusing on the first thing in the morning, while some need some time to warm up. Find out when it is convenient for you to have breaks, time to reflect (e.g., self-growth) & collaborate with other colleagues. Do not forget to factor in meetings scheduled by others and where team members are scattered around the world, to ensure seamless collaboration.
Break the day into clear blocks
Now that you have figured out your optimum times, it is time to group them and record them. For example, you can group your optimum times into categories such as meetings, focus work, responding to emails/chats, breaks and so on.
- Meetings: Organised by others that you must attend. It is always best to check with the organiser whether your participation is essential for the meeting’s success. If not, ask the organiser whether you can spend time doing more meaningful work instead.
- Focus work: Work that you have to do. This could be working your way through a list of items or a deep dive into a specific topic with your team member, and so on. This will depend on the seniority and the role you are playing.
- Emails/ chats: To respond to your emails and chat messages. Use this space to create actionable items resulting from emails and chats, such as making a ticket, updating your to-do list and so on. However, you must complete the actual work during your designated focus work slot.
- Unplanned: Time to spend on tasks that landed on you unexpectedly. If not, use it for other meaningful work, such as focusing on a task.
- Breaks: Time spent away from work. For example, taking a food break, engaging in household rituals, spending time with loved ones, exercising, reading, pursuing self-growth and learning.
The following is a sample weekly timetable for an individual contributor and a manager. Please note these timetables are for guidance only. Timetables vary drastically based on the role, the seniority of your profession, preferred start/end time, holidays and so on.
Individual contributor (e.g, software developer)
Manager (e.g., head of development)
🎯 I can help you design your own timetable exclusively tailored to your needs. Visit our contact page and drop us a message.
Start the day by checking your day
Five to ten minutes before you start your day, check your timetable to assess what your day ahead looks like. Then, mentally prepare for each block and visualise yourself navigating through each block successfully. Make a habit of checking your timetable as the first thing before you delve into anything.
Develop a habit of following your timetable
It’s generally easier to talk the talk than walk the walk. Develop a daily habit to adhere to your schedule no matter what. Unexpected situations can arise and extend your dedicated blocks, potentially overlapping with others. There is nothing to worry about this. Always aim to protect your designated block.
One thing to keep in mind when working on a list of items is always to prioritise the high-priority items first.
It helps to have a printed version of your timetable on the desk where you can refer to it frequently.
End the day by ranking how well you did
At the end of each day, rank how well you did that day in terms of sticking to your timetable. You can use a simple scale of 1 to 5, where 1 is not satisfied and 5 is extremely satisfied.
To make this process easier, I have prepared a very simple Excel spreadsheet to record your daily score. I have created the spreadsheet with 2026 in mind, and each tab represents a month. Feel free to modify as needed.
The download button is below the screenshot. Use Excel or upload to your Google Drive to edit the file. Please reach out via the contact page if you need assistance.
Review & tweak your timetable frequently
Stick to the timetable for at least a month. At the end of each month, see how well you followed your timetable during the month. Then, each month, compare the score with the previous month to get an understanding of where you are heading.
If the score is improving or constantly nearing the 4 or 5 mark, you are doing really well. If not, you need to tweak your timetable slightly and stick to it for another month before making any changes and see whether this improves. Use the line graph provided in the Excel spreadsheet for each month to see your trajectory.
Share your timetable with your manager/colleagues
Share your timetable with your manager and get their feedback. Since you have already taken into account factors such as meetings arranged by others, the geographical spread of your team members & collaboration, I can’t think of a reason why your manager wouldn’t approve it.
At the end of the day, you are only trying to be productive.
Share your timetable with your family
It’s also important that you share your timetable with your family. So, your family is aware of your daily work commitments and can plan family rituals accordingly.
Forgive yourself
Even though you have a clear timetable, there will be times when you cannot stick to it. For example, a task that you blocked for 2 hours might take 4 hours instead, or might take the whole day. It’s absolutely fine. Accept the fact that your deep work slot overran and appreciate the completion of it, if you manage to complete it. Otherwise, come back on the following day with a fresh pair of eyes.
There is no need to change your timetable because you couldn’t stick to it due to an unexpected situation. However, if you think there is a pattern of unanticipated work landing on your plate on a specific day/time, you can factor that in when you modify your timetable next time.
In a Nutshell
The freedom enjoyed by remote workers could be threatened if productivity cannot be maintained. One of the major contributors to reduced productivity among remote workers is difficulty with time management due to a lack of supervision. However, a well-defined and structured approach is all that remote workers need to master time management efficiently. In this article, we explored steps for managing your time and provided sample timetables you can use as guidance to structure your week depending on your role.
It’s important to remember that only you can find your optimal schedule. Someone can certainly guide you in finding your best working times; however, only by trying them will you determine whether they suit you.
What is your go-to strategy to manage your time effectively? Let me know in the comments below👇
🔗 Read this article if you are struggling to set boundaries between work and personal life.
📄 I’ve created a simple guide: 7 ways to truly connect with your remote team, you might want to check out.
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