Happy Little Moments
Creative Time Management for the Working Mom
Mastering time management for the working mom isn’t just a skill—it’s the secret ingredient that transforms chaos into harmony, allowing you to thrive both at work and at home.
Balancing a thriving career and a busy home life with kids feels like juggling too many balls all at once. As a mom, you’re on your way to building an amazing career one moment and struggling to find matching socks the next. Your to-do list at home may be just as long as your to-do list at work, and you’re constantly shuffling between work deadlines and soccer practices.
Boy, do I get it! It’s exhausting trying to balance work and family life. And we don’t want to merely survive being a working mom. We all want to thrive in it.
On top of all that, you’re trying to find some time to breathe.
While being busy as a working parent is unavoidable, learning to prioritize tasks can bring some sanity back to your life.
In this blog post, we’ll dive into both creative and tactical time management tips for working moms. So grab your cup of coffee and let’s get started!
The Power of Prioritization: Why Having Clear Priorities Is Important
Once you become a working mom, having clear priorities becomes much more important to both your career and your home life. It’s often something that we take for granted before we have children.
Why is having priorities so important as a working mom? A life without true priorities slowly starts to rule over you. When you don’t have your own set of priorities, everyone else’s priorities will slowly take over your life. And then you wonder why your life feels out of control.
In contrast, a life with clear priorities will help you free up mental space to finally enjoy some of your old hobbies or have some much-needed time for self-care. Amazingly, you will begin to feel like you got your sanity back.
The more quickly you can parse out what’s most important to you, the more you’ll feel in control of your life.
Remember this key point: Prioritization isn’t about just getting things done. It’s about getting the right things done.
This is a crucial point that I can’t drive home enough. You can get everything done and then feel exhausted. Or, you can get the right things done, and still have energy left for yourself and your family.
This means that you may have to let some things go. And that’s okay. Your mental health is worth it.
The trick is to start making conscious choices about what’s important to you, where you spend your time, and how you spend your energy. That way, you can spend more time focusing on being present with your kids and getting some much-needed “me time,” too.
Use Priorities as Your Working Mom Superpower
When you think about your priorities as a parent, there are a few things that you may want to consider: your values, goals, and what you can delegate. Identifying these key factors will help guide you in your decision-making about your time, planning, and schedules as a mom and in your profession.
Here are a few things to think about as a family:
- What are your values? Choose 5-10 values that feel right for you and your family. Keep your list of values handy and use them whenever you need to make a decision. For instance, say one of your values is “Having Good Health.” Many of your future decisions about your health can be made based on the following question: “Is this a healthy choice for me or my family?”
- What are your goals as a family? What are your personal goals? What are your career goals? Often, these goals can be made in alignment with your value system. For example, if one of your priorities is “Having Good Health,” you may make it a goal to take a walk together as a family two nights per week.
- How can you delegate? This is a key not only for successful managers but also for successful parents. Delegate tasks to your partner or your children when it makes sense. For example, if you need to complete something in the evening for work, ask your partner to cook the evening meal – even if that means you’re having grilled cheese for the night. Alternatively, you may also be able to delegate some of your household chores outside of the home, such as using delivery, cooking, laundry, organization, or cleaning services.
By deciding the answer to these questions in advance and running your decisions through these filters, you’ll be quicker at making better decisions for you and your family.
Adopt the "One Big Thing" Rule
The “One Big Thing” Rule is a game-changer regarding time management tips for working moms. This rule means that every day, you identify one key task that, if you manage to complete it, will make you feel most accomplished for the day. Make sure to choose a task that aligns with your long-term goals and is also manageable given the time you have that day.
In my busy working life and mom life, I choose just ONE THING that must be done by the end of the day. Hint: it’s often what you aren’t looking forward to, but it’s what moves the needle most on your current goals.
Are there still things on my to-do list? Yes, but I choose the biggest thing that can move me toward my goal as my priority for the day. Hopefully, I also get more on my to-do list done that day. But at the end of the day, if I finish that one thing, I go to bed knowing I’m getting closer to my goal.
By focusing on making one step each day toward your biggest life and/or working goals, you’ll feel less overwhelmed, feel a sense of progress, and feel a sense of accomplishment.
Have Specified Work Periods
This time management technique means establishing focused work intervals followed by short breaks. For instance, the Pomodoro Technique is a popular way to utilize this method. Using the Pomodoro Technique means that you focus and work for 25 minutes and then give yourself a 5-minute break. Essentially, you work in cycles all day long.
This technique can be used for focused career work, playing with your kids, or accomplishing any household chores on your to-do list.
Personally, I use a similar technique, but for career work, I use 60-90 minute focused sprints instead of only 25 minutes. At the end of my interval, I take a break for about 10 minutes. However, the Pomodoro method works nicely for doing things around the house.
When it comes to having focused time with my children, allowing myself to have a set time that is all theirs allows me to be more present. Since I have this time designated to my kids, I don’t need to focus on the stacks of laundry or cleaning I need to do. Knowing that I have allotted time with my kids is extremely helpful in putting those tasks out of my mind for the moment.
Manage your energy
The above has so far been about managing your time more effectively. However, another strategy is to intentionally manage your energy.
Different tasks require different types of energy. And throughout the day, you’ll notice patterns in your own energy levels.
Start by figuring out what brings you energy, what drains your energy, and what times of the day you have the most and least energy.
- Try tracking your energy levels throughout the day for at least a week. When are you most alert? When do you start to fade each day?
- Categorize your tasks: Are there certain tasks that give you energy? Are there certain tasks that require a lot of energy? Are there certain tasks that don’t require much energy for you?
Start playing with your schedule and match your energy levels with the tasks that need to get done. Feel free to play around with this until you get it right.
Perhaps you’re most high-energy in the morning. Thus, working out or doing household cleaning may be best done early in the morning. Alternatively, you may be most tired in the evening, so the best time for low-energy tasks would be in the evening or at night.
Time block your schedule
Time-blocking your schedule means dividing your day into dedicated time slots for certain tasks. The beauty is that this can also be done in coordination with the energy management strategy above.
Just as we talked about identifying times of the day when you may be up for high-energy tasks or low-energy tasks, you can time-block these accordingly into your schedule.
For example, if you’re great at writing early in the morning, time-block your writing projects in the morning. If your body is ready for a high-energy workout midday, block that out as your workout time.
Time-blocking also helps minimize distractions and ensures that everything gets attention without overwhelming you. Here’s a few tips to help you get started:
- Use a digital calendar or planner.
- Assign blocks for work meetings, administrative tasks, family dinners, self-care, errands, etc.
- Create a color-coding system for tasks for quick reference (e.g., green for work, blue for family, red for urgent).
Don’t forget to include buffer times between tasks to account for delays. For example, block out some time between a work meeting and school pick-up so you have a chance to reset.
Try the Eisenhower matrix system
The Eisenhower matrix is an extremely helpful time management tool to help you with the prioritization of tasks. Essentially, you separate all the tasks you have into 4 quadrants based upon urgency and importance:
- Important & Urgent: Do these tasks immediately.
- Important & Not Urgent: Schedule these for later.
- Not Important & Urgent: Delegate these.
- Not Important & Not Urgent: Eliminate or minimize these.
Example:
- Important & Urgent: Submit a project due tomorrow.
- Important & Not Urgent: Plan your family vacation.
- Not Important & Urgent: Reply to a non-essential email.
- Not Important & Not Urgent: Scroll through social media.
master the art of saying no
As a working mom, for many of us, our first inclination is to say yes to everything – from volunteering at school to being the lead on work projects. However, spreading yourself too thin doesn’t allow you to be as effective. Learning to politely say no is necessary so that you can focus on your own goals and priorities in life.
How to Say No Gracefully:
- Use a kind but firm tone: “Thank you for thinking of me, but I can’t commit to this right now.”
- Offer an alternative: “I can’t participate this week, but maybe next month?”
- Be honest with yourself: Ask yourself if the request aligns with your priorities, values, and goals.
The truth is, if a request doesn’t really align with your priorities as a working mom, then the answer should likely be a “no.” (There may be occasional exceptions to this but not many). Placing a question or a decision in front of your values and goals assists your ability to say no and gives you justification as to the reason why.
Commit to Weekly Planning and Review
Each week, set aside some time on Sunday evenings to review and set your schedule for the week ahead. This will help you set your own priorities in advance before everyone else bombards you with theirs. Remember, anything that doesn’t align with your family/career goals or values may need to be postponed until a later date.
It’s also equally important to set some time aside at the end of the week to reflect. Think about what worked and what didn’t work that week. What needs your attention in the future? This helps you stay proactive instead of reactive, and you can adjust your priorities for the next week accordingly.
Use Time Batching for Tasks
Using time batching for household and work tasks is incredibly powerful. Time batching simply means grouping similar tasks together so that you can get them done more efficiently.
This may mean that you choose a certain time of the day to make phone calls, check emails, or respond to messages. Or, you may time-batch all of your errands together in one afternoon.
By moving all of your similar tasks together, you are saving lots of time instead of switching between tasks. Because let’s face it, we cannot realistically multi-task effectively. At best, our brain ends up switching from task to task, but it takes us several wasted minutes for our brains to catch up to the new task at hand, which makes “multi-tasking” inefficient.
Focus on one task at a time and group similar tasks together so that your brain does as little switching as possible, allowing you to use your time more efficiently.
If you’d like to learn more about time-batching, check out my blog post: 8 Time Management Tips for the Busy Mom.
Try Using a "Minimalist Mom" Approach
If you’re struggling with trying to get it all done and you can’t, try using a more minimalist approach:
- Regularly review your commitments and strategically cut out anything that doesn’t align with your priorities and family values. Keeping your commitments and your priorities in alignment will help you preserve your sanity as a working mom.
- When you take on a new commitment, try removing an existing commitment from your schedule. This will help you keep your time commitments in balance.
- Look for ways to streamline your daily processes, such as creating morning and evening routines with your children, learning to cook in batches, or delegating household tasks such as cleaning, laundry, or grocery shopping.
Implementing Your New Prioritization Strategies
We’ve gone through lots of time management methods in this article. However, I understand that trying to implement all of this at once can be even more overwhelming. So here are some tips to help you implement these into your life without becoming more overwhelmed than you already are:
- Start small. Don’t overhaul your entire working mom life all at once. Changing too much too fast is a recipe for failure. Instead, choose one or two strategies to start with and gradually add more over time.
- Be flexible in your approach. Remember, what works one week might not work the next week. Be prepared that each technique you use may require adjustments day to day and week to week.
- Involve your family. Try getting your partner or kids involved in establishing these systems in your home. Make it a team effort to choose and keep your priorities and values as a family.
- Take time to reflect. Set aside time each week to review your progress. Figure out what’s working for you and what isn’t, and then adjust your systems as you go.
- Give yourself grace. There will be days or weeks when things don’t go as planned. Remember that balancing work and a family is challenging, and some days will be easier than others. If one day gets completely away from you, tomorrow is a new day.
- Make Time for Self-Care. In the middle of your planning for work and your family, don’t forget to prioritize yourself. Self-care isn’t selfish – it’s necessary. If you take care of yourself, you’ll be able to take care of those around you.
In Conclusion: Embracing the Chaos
At the end of the day, being a working mom is about taking all of the chaos in stride. Unfortunately, no prioritization system is perfect. There will always be days when our perfectly laid-out plans must be thrown out the window.
By implementing these strategies, you’ll be better equipped as a working mom to navigate your busy life more intentionally. Then, you can focus on what truly matters and let go of what doesn’t.
Remember, you’re raising your children while also making an impact on the world and providing for your family. None of those three things is easy, but they are all incredibly rewarding. You don’t have to do it all—you just have to focus on what’s most important.