By Robert Collins
Many accountants can relate to the importance of time management while working full-time and studying 20-odd hours per week to complete their CA/CPA studies.
Throw into the mix renovating a house, and most importantly, high-intensity training in the Distance Culture squad, and you need to have very good time management skills.
When COVID hit, most of us found more time in our day. Working from home, less frequent (or no) commuting to work, travel restrictions and a reduced social life are several examples.
This has meant we could occasionally fit our training in at more ideal hours, which was a nice change.
However, as we start to get back to our ‘normal’ pre-COVID lives, we all need to brush up on our time management skills.
Here are a few tips that I use to keep on top of a busy schedule:
- Plan and prioritise your tasks for the upcoming day/week. This helps you to form a clear picture of your day ahead, and not get distracted by other minor tasks.
- Turning the daily commute into an opportunity to tick off your training for the day. I really embraced this concept while living in London, and a lot of the local athletes do the same as part of their training schedules. It was also a fantastic way to explore the city and avoid peak-hour 'Tube' rides.
- Running from home, rather than travelling to another location to train. It might mean running the same ‘boring’ routes, but it does help to maximise your time to fit in all your tasks for the day. Plus, when you do get time to travel elsewhere for a run, you will appreciate the change of scenery that much more.
- Why not work on your core strength and flexibility while watching your favourite footy team on TV?
- Plan your day around set, non-negotiable sleeping hours. We’re all training hard, and our bodies need adequate sleep to properly recover. Going to bed later than planned indicates we are trying to fit too much into our day, or we need to better manage our time.
- As my first boss told me, ‘If you have time to lean, you have time to clean’. I’m no longer working in a restaurant, but I still apply this principle by stretching and foam rolling in front of the TV each night.
Happy training, and see you all at a race soon.
Coach's Note: Rob is under-selling himself here. He juggles full-time work, part-time study, the biggest training volume in the squad and a home life with his long-time partner Claire. These tips are from a man in the know. He is undoubtedly the most professional runner in our squad and someone I, and everyone else, looks up to in this department.