December 23rd, 2023 – How To Manage Work Time And Family Time During The Holidays
My family is a BIG Christmas family, and I’m a workaholic. I love working, I love my job. However, spending time with friends and family is incredibly important, especially during the holidays. I truly enjoy doing it, but over the years I have found it is necessary to plan how I divide that time. In the last few years, I discovered that if I don’t plan it, I’ll spend too much in one place and find myself lacking in the other.
That leads me to this week’s blog post. I want to share with you some of the things I have started doing that make it easier for me to enjoy holiday time with my family while staying effective and punctual in my job.
1. Priorities
Making lists and prioritizing your tasks will be more beneficial to manage your time than you imagine. So, let’s start at the beginning.
First, make a complete list. Write down every task you can think of that you must achieve between your current moment and the end of the holiday season. This includes work and family functions or events. I bet that list looks long and daunting. Don’t worry, we’re not done.
The Eisenhower Matrix
Next, you need to prioritize that list into a few main categories. Pipefy.com has an excellent article about prioritizing effectively using a four-quadrant Eisenhower Matrix. I use this often in my own life, but I want to tweak this method slightly to include your family events.
Do: Requires your specific knowledge/expertise, or your direct presence. This has a fast-approaching deadline or is considered crucial for other tasks and events later.
Decide: Is an important task, but others do not hinge upon it. It can be pushed to a later date with no long-lasting or unsolvable consequences. It may have a deadline that is further in the future and will not impact you immediately.
Delegate: Important task, but can be done by a member of your team.
Delete: Will have no negative consequences if not completed and will only serve as a distraction from higher priority tasks.
Honesty
Finally, be honest with yourself. It’s one of the most important – and hardest!- lessons to learn when trying to effectively manage your time. I know you think a task can only be done by you. You may think that your expertise is mandatory to its successful completion. Maybe you believe a task is the highest possible priority. Delegation is an option, you need to put faith in your team – if you have one – to complete the task in your stead. Be willing to relinquish some level of control for the sake of your work-life balance. That earlier task might be something you could leave until a later date.
Your family time does require your presence, but not all work deadlines do.
2. Create Space. Set Boundaries.
It is very easy to let your work and personal lives collide when you work from home. An effective method I have found to avoid this is creating a designated workspace. I am a person who requires hard lines and boundaries, or my ADHD will find a way to blur them. My office is on the third level of my home. My personal and living spaces are on the first and second floors. Find a method that works for you to designate workspaces from personal spaces, and don’t let those lines cross. Communicate these lines with the other members of your household and ask for their help in allowing these spaces to remain separated.
When you keep your work and personal spaces separate while also setting aside time for yourself, you can keep burnout at bay. You may need to do something as simple as go for a walk, read a book, have coffee with a friend, or go to the gym to maintain a level of calm and a clear head. Managing your time during the holidays is not only about productivity, it’s about maintaining proper health and stress levels during a time when stress is high and health is low.
3. Use Your Time Wisely
When I was working as a teacher in Korea, I was astounded at the level of commitment those kids have to their studies. Not just the students, but the government, other city members, and the schools. The whole country stops for the school entrance exams.
This meant that managing time was a lesson students were expected to learn, and I was expected to teach them. In preparing for those lessons, I learned a lot about how to manage my own work-life balance and make the most of the time I allotted for my tasks. Below are a couple of the methods I used and taught.
Time Boxing
Time boxing is a method I use on a small scale. It involves choosing a task that you will work on uninterrupted for a fixed period of time. Decide when this task is over and at the end of your time box, the task is finished. You do not work on anything else while in this time box, nor shift focus from your immediate task even slightly. During these times I silence my phone, close all other open task windows, and do only the task I determined. I am honest with myself about how long it will take me to complete the task as long as I am not plagued by other distractions. Finally, I give myself this allotted time and get to work.
I have found this works for me because it puts me under pressure. If I don’t finish the task in the allotted time, it doesn’t get done. I am not allowed to return to it. I find I am very motivated inside of the time box, focusing solely on one task gives me the drive I need to complete it.
Schedule
Schedules are a great way to divide your tasks into manageable chunks in designated time periods. Once you have prioritized your tasks, and decided the time you need to achieve them, then you can put them into your schedule or agenda and see exactly how that task affects your week. This is not set in stone, and don’t fall into the trap of believing that schedules cannot be altered. You should be reviewing, evaluating, and consulting your schedule regularly as you add prioritized items.
Previously I wrote about some of the apps and tools I use to organize myself and boost my productivity. Those apps are especially useful during the holidays while I try to keep up with both my hectic work schedule and my holiday family events.
Photography by Farah
4. Be Mindful
The holidays are a busy time, and they can be stressful. Remember that this is meant to be a time to enjoy being with your loved ones, and to be grateful for all the people and things in your life that make it more joyous. With that at the forefront, keep this in mind during your time management:
Take Care Of Yourself
Burnout is real both in your work and personal life. It can be stressful to feel like you have to please everyone, see everyone, and do everything. You don’t. Your peace of mind is worth protecting and you deserve to enjoy your holidays with the people who make your life LESS stressful, not more. Be mindful of what brings you joy and what doesn’t, and be careful to prioritize events or tasks accordingly. Check in with yourself regularly and evaluate your feelings and motivation levels. You may need to make some time to breathe, relax, and regroup.
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I hope everyone has a great holiday season! I hope you keep these tips in mind so you can create a positive work-life balance during the holidays this year. If you liked this post, please leave a comment down below and make sure to come back to see a new post on the Next Step Scopist blog!
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