{"id":1,"date":"2017-07-20T15:14:03","date_gmt":"2017-07-20T13:14:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogger.amazingmarvin.com?p=1"},"modified":"2025-04-22T16:28:04","modified_gmt":"2025-04-22T14:28:04","slug":"5-benefits-of-using-time-estimates-in-your-to-do-list","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amazingmarvin.com\/blog\/5-benefits-of-using-time-estimates-in-your-to-do-list\/","title":{"rendered":"5 surprising benefits of using duration estimates in your to-do list"},"content":{"rendered":"

When it comes to productivity,\u00a0different things work for different people.<\/strong><\/p>\n

But there are some productivity hacks that work for most people. Using task duration estimates aka time estimates is one of them.<\/p>\n

\"benefits
The surprising benefits of using time estimates<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

What are time estimates?<\/h2>\n

The idea is simple:<\/p>\n

Whenever you create a task you also include how long you think it will take you to complete the task.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"time
This task will approximately 20 minutes to complete<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Whenever I introduce this strategy to a client they get super excited to try it out. And later they come back raving about how much it’s helped them with their work.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sadly, few people actually use time estimates<\/strong> because they either don’t know about it or don’t use an application that supports this feature (almost none of the popular to-do list apps do \ud83d\udc4e).<\/p>\n

But in this post I show you 5\u00a0surprising ways time estimates can boost your productivity and help fight procrastination<\/strong>. At the end I also included some ideas on how you can implement this strategy into your workflow right now.<\/p>\n

1) Time estimates make a long to-do list less intimidating<\/h1>\n

less to-do list overwhelm, less procrastination<\/h3>\n

Imagine you look at your to-do list for the day and thirty tasks are staring back at you: instant overwhelm and dread.<\/p>\n

The longer your to-do list, the more you want to avoid it.<\/strong><\/p>\n

But long lists can be deceiving<\/strong>. If you have a bunch of quick phone calls to make and a ton of little mini tasks that you collected over the week, then your to-do list can quickly become a mile long without actually requiring very much time to complete.<\/p>\n

Without time estimates all we see is a seemingly endless list.<\/strong> But once you attach a time estimate to each task and look at the total, \u00a0your perception of the list can instantly change:<\/p>\n

\"Long<\/a>
So many tasks!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"using<\/a>
30 minutes? I got this!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

2) Time estimates help you get started sooner<\/h1>\n

overcome the “I can do this later today” fallacy<\/h3>\n

Many people have a warped sense of time.<\/strong>\u00a0For example, I used to believe that time magically expands the later it gets in the day.<\/p>\n

Somehow the time left in the day seemed almost infinite.<\/strong> This led me to have absolutely no sense of urgency when it came to my tasks for the day. As long as it was not dinnertime yet I felt there was still plenty of time left to get through all my tasks somehow. Ha!<\/p>\n

Had I actually gotten any work done in the morning I would have realized how quickly an hour goes by! And obviously an hour in the morning is just as long as an hour in the evening.<\/p>\n

Time estimates give you the facts.<\/strong>\u00a0A time estimate for your entire to-do list lets you see how much time you need to get through all your tasks (assuming you have already honed your estimation skills) in black and white. And your watch will tell you how much time there is left in the day to work… you can do the math.<\/p>\n

Most often seeing the total time of your to-do list will give you a\u00a0little kick in the butt to get started sooner rather than later.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The same principle also applies to projects. Understanding how many hours it takes to complete an entire project will help you get started sooner.<\/p>\n

3) Time estimates can make a difficult task less intimidating<\/h1>\n

the less intimidating a task, the more likely you will do it<\/h3>\n

Without a time estimate we only see what the task entails<\/strong>. So our\u00a0focus is on the activity we have to do. If a task is unpleasant in any way or particularly difficult we will have a natural aversion towards the task and tend to avoid it (hello procrastination!).<\/p>\n

But when you add a time estimate to a task, you now have something else you can focus on: how quickly this unpleasantness will be over. To\u00a0most people even\u00a015 or 25 minutes seems like a short period of time. <\/strong>This fact works to your\u00a0advantage when you add time estimates to your tasks.<\/p>\n

\"time<\/a>
Ugh, cleaning toilets vs. Nice, this task only takes 5 minutes!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This has worked particularly well for me when it comes to an activity I dread immensely:<\/strong> making phone calls! I would often not cut my hair until I looked like a jungle creature just because I dreaded making appointments over the phone.<\/p>\n

After using time estimates daily I am now used to looking at the number beneath the task to assess its “difficulty”. So when I have a phone call on my list now, I immediately see the “1min” and it becomes one of the “easy” tasks on my list. Tricked you, brain!<\/p>\n

Obviously, this can backfire if you make tasks that take a long time (which is not a good idea for many reasons). So if you want to take advantage of this, then it’s extra important to\u00a0keep your to-dos short and snappy <\/strong>(especially tasks that you are dreading). Any big task can be split up into smaller tasks<\/a>. It just takes a bit of practice and know-how.<\/p>\n

4) Time estimates help you become a better time estimator<\/h1>\n

level up your project planning skills<\/h3>\n

If you use time estimates in combination with time tracking<\/strong> (measuring how long it takes you to actually<\/em> do the task) you will notice patterns about which tasks you commonly underestimate and which tasks are actually much quicker than you think.<\/p>\n

Raising awareness about this discrepancy in task duration will make you better at estimating task length in the future.\u00a0<\/strong>And knowing how long individual tasks take is an important part of being able to estimate how long entire projects take.<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is obviously a super important skill for many people:<\/strong><\/p>\n