A Remarkably Effective Time Management Method

The Pomodoro Method is a productivity and time management method based around working in bursts interspersed with small rest periods, the idea being that the short working periods aid in concentration and make large tasks seem more manageable by forcing you to break them into small chunks, while the brief pauses between them prevent fatigue and aid in absorption.

I picked up the method after almost failing a university module due to extremely poor time management and coming across it while learning about effective study methods, a year later here I am, still using it.

(The pattern I use is 25 minutes work, 5 minutes break, 4 sessions per set, sets separated by a 15 minute extended break)

Its enabled me to make significant changes in both my personal and professional life while not requiring any real investment on my part. It’s highly effective, but I do have some issues with it.

The Good

I think the greatest benefit I’ve got out of using the method is a work around for issues of executive dysfunction.

Many of the common solutions touted for executive dysfunction are really aimed at people that just procrastinate or have very mild dysfunction, they don’t work for people with real issues getting shit done. I doubt on its own it would make much a dent in the issues someone with severe ADHD may have but for the merely discombulated its pretty good.

I struggle constantly with difficulty starting tasks, particularly when they are unpleasant, anxiety inducing or too boring to bother with. I will delay doing a five minute job until it escalates into a crisis, for example, booking my car into the mechanic or paying a bill. The Pomodoro method has helped enormously.

To combat this I often use my timer in reverse, i.e., I will take the 5 minute break before the work session as a kind of warm up to being productive, letting me have that extra few minutes lying in bed or watching crap or just sitting doing nothing before working productively for 25 minutes, then having a few minutes of leisure before going again. Having a structure set for me to just fall into has given me some semblance of control over when I am productive, something I’ve lacked for most of my life. It has also let me actually use todo lists as something other than a tool for shaming myself, as I will now actually complete the items on the list in some semblance of a sensible order.

I went from constantly being behind on my coursework, embarrassingly easy as most of it was, to completing every module early. Similarly, while I’ve always taken pains to at least be slightly above average at work I have now become productive enough to take on more responsibilities while spending less time actually doing my job each day.

Outside of that, it has been fantastic for learning and retention, the pattern of a focused hard pace work period followed by brief rest and reflection works well for avoiding fatigue from going too long at once while at the same time reducing the chance of me becoming too frustrated to continue and quitting prematurely. I don’t think I would have been able to build this website, ramshackle as it is, without the method, and I’m sure much of the progress I’ve made with the tools I use professionally is owed to the same effect.

It is also broadly applicable, I have been using it for nearly everything, from cleaning to meal prepping, even how long I spend in the shower (I am one of those people that step into the shower and lose all sense of time passing, I can literally spend an hour in the shower, until the automatic cutoff engages and I realise I’ve made myself late for work.)

Lastly it synergises well with other productively and lifestyle improvement habits, an obvious example being using it along with a todo list, but I have also been habit stacking using the timer as part of the stack, every 5th rest period in my timer routine is a longer 15 minute break, in that time I have a habit constructed to finish my water bottle, do some pushups and pullups, and clear any messages I have been delaying responding to.

The Bad

The timer is reliant on you initiating it, sometimes I forget to, this is obvious, stupid even, but I feel it is worth mentioning, if you cannot simply integrate the habit of using the timer you need to set an alarm or some other trigger to make sure you use it. I have alarms set to start the timer everyday, and backup alarms to that alarm, sometimes I manage to miss these and will remember halfway through an oddly uproductive day that I need to actually use the tools I’ve acquired to get the results I’m used to.

It isn’t useful for every kind of task, and in certain environments you may not be able to follow it, because you aren’t able to use a timer or you have no control over what your workflow looks like.

Sometimes it can be oddly disruptive, while I usually struggle to stay on task if my work is dull or unpleasant I can sometimes enter a flowstate when I’m enjoying puzzling something out or just because the stars were right that day for me to be particularly focused and I can work at a high intensity for hours on end, or I would, if my phone didn’t vibrate to tell me the work period was over and it was time to step down to recuperation mode again, if I’m really vibing with what I’m doing I can blow past the distraction no problem but in those moments where I’m just killing some dumb, soul destroying bullshit my hotstreak will be ruined and probably won’t be there 5 minutes later when the next work session starts.

Tools I Use

If you go by the letter of the method you’re supposed to use a kitchen timer or other similar physical timer (It’s called Pomodoro as the guy that came up with it used a tomato shaped egg timer) but I use an app called Good Time Productivity Timer from F-Droid which is totally free, lightweight, and has a fair number of features to mess with. I carry around enough bullshit already without carrying a kithen timer with me and I dislike noisy alerts and alarms generally so wouldn’t use one even if I didn’t have to remember to bring it with me.

Should You Use It?

I think it is worth trying for almost everyone, I can’t promise it will be as transformational for you as it has for me, but it is a very good, ready made, free approach to managing work so it couldn’t hurt to give it a go.