How you spend your time is a reflection of your priorities. If you want to be successful, you need to learn how to plan your week in a way that maximizes your productivity. 

Leaders and Executive Assistants often feel like their work week is filled with randomly scheduled meetings and tasks that don’t flow together. This can lead to a lot of wasted time and energy. 

In this blog post, we will teach you how to plan your week in a way that aligns with your energy highs and lows, so you can be more productive!

Calendar management

Your calendar is a tool that should work for you. You should feel in control of your time…not the other way around. We have a saying we use internally, “If something isn’t scheduled, it doesn’t exist.” We believe your calendar should reflect all of your personal and professional priorities. Does your calendar reflect how you want to spend your time? 

There are three things you need to consider when planning your week: 

1. Your Energy Levels
2. The Priorities of Your Job 
3. Your Personal Priorities 

Let’s break these down one by one. 

Energy Levels

Despite your best intentions, you cannot be “on” at all times. Throughout the day and week, you have energy highs and lows. Are you a morning person or a night owl? Do you have more energy at the beginning or end of the week? Knowing this will help you plan your days and weeks accordingly. 

Let’s think about this practically. If you feel your best before lunch, schedule important tasks that require your attention and focus first thing in the morning. If you routinely have an afternoon slump, schedule work that is rote or mundane. 

Work with your Executive Assistant to identify these patterns. Research shows CEOs are already spending too much time in meetings. Work with your EA to protect your free time for work that requires you at your best. This will help you be productive and prevent burnout.

Pro-Tip: Batching, or grouping like-tasks together for the same block of time, helps you work more efficiently and prevents context-switching. This preserves your energy and creates more flow in your work week. 

Priorities of Your Job

Every job has priorities. These are the goals or outcomes you are responsible for achieving each week, month, quarter and year. Your calendar should reflect the work you need to complete each week to move your priorities forward. 

In theory, your priorities should be your “genius work” as a Leader. This is work only you can do, such as sales calls, keynote speaking, writing, consulting, etc. 

Genius work is the best use of your time. Work with your EA to reserve calendar space for these professional priorities. Too often, Leaders spread themselves too thin by accepting meetings that don’t really require their attendance. 

This is counterproductive and keeps you from work that can actually move the needle in your business.

Related Content: 7 Signs You’re Managing Your Calendar All Wrong

Personal Priorities

Along with the priorities of your job, you also have personal priorities. These are the goals or outcomes you want to achieve in your personal life. Maybe you want to read one book a month, or exercise three days a week. Or, maybe you want to end your work day at a reasonable time each day to guarantee dinner with your family. 

Remember our mantra? If it isn’t scheduled, it doesn’t exist. All of your goal-setting and personal planning is for nought if it doesn’t translate to your calendar. Your calendar should always represent both personal and professional priorities.

Work with your assistant to make time for yourself, your family and your friends. By honoring your needs outside of the office, you will feel more balanced — and less burnt out.

Final Thoughts

If you want to be productive, you need to reserve your time strategically. Work with your Executive Assistant to identify your energy highs and lows, and then schedule work around them. Make time for the priorities of your job, as well as your personal priorities. And finally, batch like-tasks together to create more flow in your work-week.