Whether you realize it or not, there’s an ebb and flow to you energy throughout the day. You probably feel like you’re sluggish after lunch or you work best at around 10 in the morning. For each person it’s different. If you can discover your energy cycles and work with rather than against them, you can work smarter.

Your Workday

In each workday, most marketers tackle various types of tasks. There are times when:

– You need to think of new ideas and be creative.

– You have to concentrate hard and really focus on what you’re doing.

– You have to communicate with others.

– There are mundane routine tasks that take zero brainpower whatsoever.

– You need to analyse data.

For each of these types of tasks, there’s a best time of day to do them. Speaking for myself personally, early morning is best for focusing and creativity. Late morning is a good time to communicate with people. During the afternoon I’m best at doing mundane tasks (that’s when I want to take a nap and my brain is shut off completely). And in the evening, I’m in reflective mode.

Creating Your Perfect Schedule

Like what I just said in the above paragraph, you may already have a good idea of how you function throughout the day. But there may also be quite a bit you don’t know and it may surprise you.

The best way to discover your energy cycles is to make a schedule. Just as I’ve done, schedule certain tasks for particular times of the day. As you work, pay close attention to your productivity. Whenever you feel like you’ve gotten a lot done and been productive, take note of it. When you feel like working is pushing a boulder up a mountainside, take note of that too.

I got a special calendar for taking note of my energy cycles. I would periodically check in and take notes throughout the day to keep track of how I was doing.

Switch It up

This sounds like a bit of work, but I recommend monitoring like this for a week or so. Then, make some changes and keep monitoring. The reason I suggest a week is that you can sometimes just have an especially bad (or good) day. If you look at five days or so, patterns begin to emerge.

Once you’ve tweaked your daily schedule over the course of a few weeks, you’ll find yourself getting more done than ever before. But you’re never really quite finished. Your energy cycles change over time, so whenever you notice your motivation flagging a few months down the road, take measurements again.

This is an almost scientific method that reveals to you your natural energy cycles. It’s fascinating once you start doing it, and it really pays off in the end when you find yourself getting more done than ever before.

Tony

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