I was recently watching a Thomas Frank video where he was talking about batching tasks to save time and energy. The concept is simple: You take tasks that are similar and do them all at once. He uses the example of how he batches his high energy tasks earlier in the day when he has more energy and saves his lower energy tasks for later in the day when he has less.

This technique also has the advantage of avoiding what they call “context switching”, a mental cost you pay every time you switch to a different type of task. Just like you often have to setup to do physical work, your brain has to setup to do mental work. If we change tasks a lot, our brain has to setup and tear down a lot of different modes of thinking. Frequent switching also tends to lead to distraction on tasks that don’t really matter.

I’ve found this technique to be useful. I wasn’t thinking about it at the time, but it came in handy when I batched my phone calls earlier this week. God showed grace when I was calling medical places in that most of the medical offices I wanted to contact were open and able to get my the information I needed. I called or contacted nine medical offices and two medical billing departments in about an hour and a half. By batching all of my phone calls together, I saved time and energy while accomplishing more. You can do the same.

A Question for You

What tasks could you batch together to save time?

Josh

You can watch the Thomas Frank video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c92hhEFCcGw

Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash