How to plan your week in 20 minutes

1. Look back at last week (3 minutes)

Open last week and ask three questions: what did not get done, what took longer than planned, and what did you not plan at all but had to do anyway? The first goes on this week's list. The second makes this week's estimates better. The third is time you should reserve this week too, because it will happen again.

2. Put in what is fixed (3 minutes)

Classes, meetings, appointments, training, the train. Anything with a time someone else set goes in first, because everything else has to fit around it. If your calendar already holds these, check it for clashes now rather than on Thursday.

3. Pick three priorities (3 minutes)

Not ten. Three things that would make this week a good week if they got done: an essay, a proposal, a conversation you keep postponing. Everything else is allowed to slip; these are not. For each, write how many hours it needs and by when.

4. Give the priorities time before anything else (5 minutes)

Put your three priorities in the calendar as blocks of one to two hours, in your best hours of the day, before the smaller things. A priority without a block is a wish. Spread a big one over several days rather than one long block; see time blocking for how to size and place the blocks.

5. Protect sleep, meals and exercise (3 minutes)

These are what a busy week eats first, and they are what keep the next week possible. Put in your nights, lunch and two or three sessions of exercise with a rough time window (“gym between 17:00 and 21:00”), and treat your night as untouchable: an early start moves your bedtime, never your hours of sleep.

6. Leave a fifth of the week empty (1 minute)

Something always comes up. If every hour is planned, the first surprise knocks over the whole week; if a fifth is free, it lands in the gap. Look at the week once more and make sure each day has an empty stretch.

7. Check each morning (2 minutes a day)

Each morning, look at today only: is it still right? If a meeting appeared on top of a priority block, move the block to another free slot this week rather than dropping it. That two-minute check is what keeps a Sunday plan alive until Friday.

If you are a student, the weekly study schedule goes deeper into spreading assignments over the week.

How Orondia does this for you

Orondia does steps 4 to 7 for you, and keeps doing them. Fixed events come in from Google Calendar. Your priorities are tasks with hours and a deadline, cut into sessions in your free time. Sleep, lunch and the gym are habits with a window, and can be protected so nothing is planned over them. A habit can be “three times a week, on whichever days suit”.

When something new lands, the planner moves only what is in the way, to the next slot that fits, and tells you what it moved and why, with an undo. The day panel shows today as a dial like the one above, with every move the planner made that day.

Make a free account; the welcome asks what you plan, suggests habits to start with, and plans your first week before it ends.