So You Want to Plan an All-Female Hackathon? Article 2: Time Management
For most students, including myself, it is difficult to find the time to organize a hackathon. Internships, jobs, and school eat up so much of our time and energy that it is easy to get overwhelmed when attempting to organize a big event. Thus, time management is an essential skill an organizer must learn. Not only for the better of their event but for their own well-being.
Below are three time management tips, I learned from planning SheHacks Boston. It is these tips that helped me achieve work-life hacker balance.
1. Categorize Your Life, Then Make A lot of Lists
Every Sunday, I sit down at a cafe or library and revaluate my life. I start this task by categorizing each of my responsibilities. Then I make a list of tasks for each of those categories. This is helpful for many reasons, including:
- Seeing which tasks each week aren’t getting done. If it’s on my list for 3 weeks straight, there is a problem that I need to address.
- Anticipating my work week, so I can adjust my schedule accordingly.
- Staying aware of items that I would have otherwise forgotten about and de-stressing about tasks that are out of my control.
- Reflecting on which responsibilities are taking up most of my time.
2. Make Use of Every Minute
The second semester of my Sophomore year was insane. I had many responsibilities, but somehow I still found time to workout almost every day. How?
I worked out in the hour between one of my classes. Now I understand that not everyone wants to go to class sweaty, so my advice isn’t to work out between classes. That would be the smelly option. The alternative that I recommend is to make the most of every minute of your day so that you can have time for activities you enjoy.
Several ways, I make the most of my time, include:
- Planning out my day the day before. This prevents me from wandering out without purpose and keeps me motivated from task to task.
- Ensuring that for one hour every day, I’m doing something that makes me happy no matter what. For example, finding time to go for a run even if it means going to class smelling like dirty socks.
- Disconnecting from social media. I’ve been pretty bad about this lately. However, I have found that I have more time when I’m not wasting it scrolling on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.
3. Wake Up Early
Waking up early isn’t for everyone, but I strongly recommend it. By waking up early, you will:
- Have so much more time in your day for the things that you enjoy, which will decrease time anxiety.
- Not have to wait in ridiculously long breakfast lines at Starbucks.
- Be able to enjoy the sound of the birds in the morning, which I promise is something you don’t want to miss.
- Get an infinite number of Instagram worthy sunrise pictures.
There are a lot more concrete tips and tricks I have for how to plan a hackathon. So, if you want more articles like this, be sure to leave a comment. Until then, I shall continue trying to refrain from scrolling endlessly on Instagram. It’s not my fault, Doug the Pug is too damn cute.
