Time Management tips?

[amapples]

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I find that I often underestimate the timing of something a lot. I have zero time mgmt skills. I was wondering if anyone had any advice for time management and how to maintain discipline? This is in regards to everything - classes, ECs, etc.

 

[JackieChanFan]

For time management, I find it useful in the mornings to plan out the rest of my day in detail. For example this morning I woke up and planned out my day on my way to work-my plan for the day is something like this: finish my experiments by 1pm, eat, read a protocol, chill for a bit, leave at 3, go to library and work on presentation until closing (7pm), go home, eat, work out, go to cafe & work on a research proposal until closing time. Don't need to write it down, just keep it in the back of your mind. It's important to have a realistic expectation of how long you will do each task, otherwise you will fall behind on schedule

For maintaining discipline: I am awful at discipline, but what I've found to be useful is to physically relocate myself to an environment where I can be more productive (e.g. studying at library, writing word doc in cafe, NOT studying at home because I know I'll just procrastinate). Hope this helps

 

[emraldragon]

There are a ton of websites out there with time management suggestions. I suggest googling them and trying what they have there. You will have to experiment and find which techniques work for you. I find if you want something bad enough, you make the time for it.

 

[DrShephardWannabe]

Start by over-micromanaging everything.
What I did (That took me from a 2.7->4.0) was bought a monthly calendar, and every Sunday I planned out my week on it. For example Monday might say "Class 8-12, lunch 12-1. research 1-5, ochem hw 2 5-7, dinner 7-8, netflix 8-9, sleep @10." Tuesday "Class 9-12, lunch 12-1, clinic 1:30-5, physics office hours 6-7" etc.

Over-schedule time for things like HW/studying at the beginning of every semester. For example at the beginning of the semester I had 4-5 hrs/day set for like two homework assignments and I learned throughout the semester that those two classes only needed two hours a day. You'd much rather have wiggle room that you can slowly replace with extracurriculars than frantically try to catch up when you get behind.

Of course learning how to study efficiently goes hand in hand with time management as well.

 

[panda16]

I put a lot of time into making daily lists with to-do's down to the very minute detail (i.e. "eat dinner" and stuff like that), and put little boxes that I can check off. The dopamine motivates me to keep going!

 

[Confusedandlostone]

Not a medical student, but my time management skills are horrible also. What I found that helped was reading a book called "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" by Steven Covey, and another book called "Getting Things Done"(which I have yet to finish reading). Basically you should put all your important due dates( i.e. assignments, tests, projects) on a calendar. Then buy something like a "time board"- a huge board with dry eraser and marker and plot out your week on the board. For example, on my board I'll have mon-sunday columns and make each row with a time frame. On monday 8:30am I'll go volunteer, then 1:00pm bring my grandmother to do groceries, then 3:00pm go to the gym, 5:00pm read some chapters, etc. On the board I also have a small section that says "Things to do this week" and I'll check off all the items I wrote on that by the end of the week. Also at the end of the week, you should do a "planning day". Plan everything that needs to be done for the next week. For example, every sunday I'll look at my board and add whatever needs to get done on the things to do this week section and carefully fit it in the available blocks of time I have on my board. Also use your phone as a reminder to keep track of small tasks. The app "google keep" on my android phone has worked wonders for me and I don't know how I could manage without it. Hope this helps! Everyone is different, my brother is more tech savvy and can simply use his macbook to plot his month/week whereas I am more old fashioned and need the visual cues to orient me. Experiment and see what works for you.

 

[TaroBubbleTea]

I think the most important thing when it comes to time management is to lay out what you want to accomplish for the day. As long as you clearly know your goals for the day, you will be able to use your time more efficiently.