In trying to plan out my schedule, the one thing I need to keep in mind is that its never just the task. There is the preparation before and the cleanup after that sucks up time.
The most glaring example is a meeting. It’s a set amount of time, but there is the lead up to it, preparation and a commute, and then return to the office and often a few things to do items that were not previously anticipated at the start of the day.
So how do I account for this fuzzy time? In private practice, it was relatively easy – I was always tight on time, so there wasn’t much I could do about it. But now as a client, I’m often processing items which take just a short amount of time before the ball is passed off to the next party. So sometimes a task that seems daunting, resolves itself (at least my portion of the responsibility) much quicker than I would have expected.
I guess it’s just a matter of practice and experience. But I wonder how to speed up the learning curve. Maybe it’s time to pull out the Pomodoro Technique again.