A Not-So-Big Time Management Tool For Girls with Oh-So-Big Dreams
We're eight weeks into 2024. Have you it figured out yet? Your goals for the year? How to trim those resolutions you wrote down? Did you even write them down? Are you the calm and contended optimist, satisfied by last year's progress, and struggling to come up with measurable goals for 2024? Or are you the self-improvement rabbit, drowning in to-do lists and bubbling up with optimism for a fresh start? Regardless of your disposition, implementing quarterly planning for your personal and professional ambitions can help you organize the year like the most effective project manager, and knock out tasks like kangaroo jack no matter how much time has passed.
One major aspect of how we manage our time is how we perceive it. If you feel like time is moving at an odd pace, or even faster than usual, you're not alone. A survey conducted in the UK determined that over 80% of participants experienced time distortion during the COVID-19 lockdown of 2020. While this specific study has not followed up with its subjects since COVID protocols have relaxed, many people have expressed a lasting shift in their relationship with time across social media. Yuki Noguchi expanded on this study's impact in her article "How did COVID warp our sense of time? It's a matter of perception", which states that although time is factually linear, any changing sense of emotion, social satisfaction, stress, and mental engagement can cause you to become much more aware of how you spend time. At the onset of displeasure in these areas, you might benefit from renewing your perspective on time, so that your task list renews as quickly as the days do.
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While time itself isn't tangible, time management tools certainly are. More than just office supplies, an entire market depends on us 20-something busy baddies with a 9–5, entrepreneurial dreams, and creative hobbies shelling out for organizers and software every time we get a new idea. Big Marketing is well aware that we're easy targets for leather planners, dynamic calendars, and digital OneNote iPad templates. TikTok's so-called "clean girl aesthetic" preys on those who are so dedicated to productivity that they're willing to pay for it, by advertising women as prettier and more successful when they hoard excessive amounts of colored pens and plastic totes. While office supplies can be useful, they are not essential tools for time management. I would argue that you can get your ducks in a row with one single tool…
a quarterly Gantt Chart.
Considering that I used iPad notetaking throughout college, erected a flashy 24 x 36 whiteboard for my first job, and own no less than 16 half-used wide-ruled artisanally crafted journals, I feel confident when I say that a free Google Sheets template can be the end of your eternal search for trendy planning apparatuses, and the start of your improved relationship with time management.
Gantt charts are a preferable project management tool because they allow you to scope out entire projects over the course of the quarter. While they feature clerical details such as the project title, and necessary tasks, (or "work breakdown structure"), they mainly focus on the progression of the project over time. Centering the time it takes to get work done keeps you from getting distracted by the flowery minutiae of the task or the other millions of uses you may have for your planner- like when to anticipate the next HelloFresh delivery.
A Gantt chart is as no-nonsense as time is linear. By affixing a project timeline to boxes that represent days, the chart allows you to visualize time as measured opportunities for progress. And while I would recommend a digital cloud-based template for easy editing across desktop and mobile devices, Gantt charts are print-friendly as well!
At the top of the year, I adopted this method and created four quarterly Gantt templates for 2024. Next, instead of spreading out my New Year's resolutions over the year, I put them all into Q1. This is my second line of defense against the dysmorphic feeling of quickly elapsing time. Sure, I'm setting my expectations high, but I'm also decreasing the possibility that I'll get to Q4 and look back wondering where yet another year has gone. My Gantt chart consists of four "90-day years" that allow me to interpret quarters as more complete units of time where more is possible.
If incrementation is your jam and you're interested in even more ways to break down your time, I suggest dividing every day's waking hours into quarters. Seizing the day four hours at a time can help you take stock of your most productive zones and be honest with yourself about what times of the day are most opportune for you to get things done.
Gantt charts and effective use of the 90-day year serve both big-picture and detail-oriented planners well. If you implement these tools, it's unlikely you'll leave the year feeling unaccomplished. We're two months into 2024. Or 60% done with Q1. No matter which format resonates more with you, don't let time pass you by. Set your sights high and you may surprise yourself with all that you accomplish.