Summary
This blog post explores why productivity often declines during the holiday season and offers a practical “12 Days of Time Management” approach to help individuals and teams stay focused through year-end. From planning schedules early and prioritizing high-impact tasks to setting boundaries, reducing meetings, leveraging automation, and tracking time, the post provides actionable tips to manage common holiday disruptions like PTO, distractions, and shorter workweeks. By making small, intentional changes and using time data to inform decisions, businesses can maintain momentum during the holidays and set themselves up for a strong, productive start in January.
12 Days of Time Management Tips for This Holiday Season
Productivity takes a nosedive for most workers by mid to late December. This is not just a casual observation, but rather the findings of a survey reported on by CPA Practice Advisor. That survey showed that roughly 50% of US employees believed that productivity in their workplace would decline starting around December 15th or 16th and not return to normal until the beginning of the new year. This assumption is likely to manifest into reality when you consider the vast number of reasons why productivity may fall off a cliff during the holiday season. Some of those reasons include:
- Shorter Workweeks Around the Holidays – Depending on which days of the week certain holidays fall, many employees are likely to experience significantly shorter workweeks than usual. This can be a drag on productivity, as employees may not be as motivated to put in their best effort during a short week.
- Increased PTO Requests – Many employees tap into their PTO reserves during the holiday season to extend their vacation periods. This leaves offices shorthanded and can negatively impact productivity.
- Holiday Distractions – Who among us isn’t distracted at least some of the time by all the events and celebrations that take place during the holiday season? This is an understandable reaction, but it can also lead to dips in productivity.
While these factors might make it seem like productivity during the holiday season is an impossible goal, that is not the case. There are some small steps that anyone can take to ensure that productivity doesn’t completely collapse. We believe in the 12-day approach to productivity, and we are going to break it down for you now.
1) Plan Your Holiday Schedule Early
You know when the holidays are scheduled each year, so there is no real excuse for not planning your holiday schedule ahead of time. You should take a moment to review pending holiday deadlines and deliverables. The purpose is to identify the most critical tasks that must be handled before the year wraps up.
The fact that things tend to slow down a bit during this time of year can work in your favor. It offers you the time that you need to figure out what truly needs to be done right now.
Leverage time tracking data to determine how long various tasks will take and create a realistic timetable for yourself regarding when certain tasks will be done. Once you have all that in place, you and your team can dive into the particulars of each task that needs to be handled.
2) Prioritize What Actually Matters
It can feel as though every potential task laid before you are important and must be handled right away. However, that simply isn’t the case. Certain tasks are far more important to finish than others. Use the 80/20 rule to identify and prioritize the tasks that really need your attention. The 80-20 rule, also known as the Pareto Principle, is a familiar saying that asserts that 80% of outcomes result from 20% of inputs. The general guiding principle of the rule is that a smaller proportion of items causes a larger proportion of outcomes.
When you put forth your best effort into the tasks that produce most outcomes, you can get more done with less effort. Just make sure you aren’t spinning your wheels on “busy work” tasks that don’t advance your overarching goals.
3) Schedule Around Time Off (Yours and Others’)
Shared calendars are a wonderful tool to use during this time of year. These calendars let you see when everyone in the organization has scheduled time off (including yourself!). That bird’s-eye view of the schedule lets you allocate human labor and other resources where they are needed, even during periods when many people may be using their PTO.
Be mindful of potential bottlenecks in work coverage and avoid them by ensuring you have enough coverage for vital tasks every day during the holidays.
4) Set Clear Work Boundaries
A major component of proper time management is knowing when to say, “enough is enough”.
Everyone deserves the opportunity to unwind and recharge, especially during the holiday season. There should be clear boundaries and expectations set regarding when work is expected to be completed and when employees are to be left alone to relax.
Setting these boundaries offers a host of benefits, including:
- Reduction in Cases of Burnout – It is easy for someone to experience extreme burnout when they are always expected to be productive and on the go. This is an unreasonable expectation that no one can meet, and there is no value in trying to push for this level of perfectionism. Instead, setting clear boundaries ahead of time allows everyone to get the rest that they deserve.
- Better Focus and Productivity – Another benefit of time to rest is that it helps employees improve their focus and productivity while on the clock. They have had the time they need to let their brains rest and recharge, and that inevitably leads to better outcomes when they put out work.
- Improved Professional Relationships – Leadership that recognizes when it needs to allow someone to have some personal time is leadership that earns respect from every employee.
The holidays are always a busy time of year, both professionally and personally. It is the perfect time to set clear work-life boundaries.
5) Track Time to Stay on Track
Many employers use time tracking tools to identify productivity gaps and make corrections as needed. These tools are great at identifying where time is wasted by unnecessary distractions. They can also help determine how employees can be used most effectively in their various roles. In fact, many employers are surprised by the data these tools produce.
It is only by using such tools that employers can obtain hard data on how time is used throughout the company. Once that information is in hand, employers can make the most well-informed choices about which tasks to assign to which employees.
6) Break Big Tasks into Smaller Wins
Big tasks can feel overwhelming or even impossible. When trying to tackle them as one singular big task, that might be the case. However, when large tasks are broken into smaller chunks, they can be handled more easily. Some benefits of breaking big tasks into smaller wins include:
- Reduces Procrastination – One of the biggest productivity threats is procrastination. Pushing work off until another time means that one does not have to deal with it in the moment. However, it also means that certain things simply never get done. Breaking big tasks into smaller pieces reduces procrastination because it is easier for employees to see themselves accomplishing a smaller task.
- Builds Momentum – Accomplishing even a few small things helps individuals build momentum towards their larger goals. There is a psychological component that takes over, making it more likely that a large task will be completed once momentum has been established.
- Enhances Clarity and Focus – It is also true that it is easier to be more focused and clearer about what must be accomplished when those tasks are broken into smaller chunks. There is literally less to focus on, which means one can put more focus into each task.
Create a smaller list of tasks from the larger, overarching list of things to do to achieve the best possible results.
7) Simplify Meetings (or Skip Them)
Believe it or not, you don’t have to hold a meeting for everything. As it turns out, most meetings ultimately reduce employee productivity. Harvard Business Review reveals the following:
New research shows that about 70% of all meetings keep employees from working and completing all their tasks. While the average meeting length decreased by 20% during the pandemic, the number of meetings attended by a worker rose by 13.5%.
This is plenty of evidence for why one should reduce the number of meetings that one holds altogether. Although some meetings are still necessary, look for ways to eliminate them, at least for the holiday season.
8) Automate and Streamline Where Possible
Repetitive tasks don’t need to be handled by employees in all cases. There are plenty of tasks that can be handled by modern technologies, and employers should look to shift many of those responsibilities to the technologies designed to handle them. Those technologies can handle these tasks more effectively and more rapidly than any human employee ever could.
Take some of the holiday workload off employees’ plates and leverage the technologies available today. Tasks such as payroll management, data entry, and certain customer support functions are all candidates for automation.
9) Build in Buffer Time
Don’t expect everything to go off perfectly all the time during the holidays, just don’t. You need to include some buffer time in your schedule to allow for the likelihood that holiday schedules will get a little mixed up at times.
Common reasons for needing extra buffer time include:
- Last-Minute Schedule Changes – Many employees submit last-minute PTO requests during the holiday season, as their personal schedules often change during this time. Expect this to happen and add extra buffer time to your schedule.
- Delivery Delays – One factor largely out of your control is how other companies handle their schedules and operations. It may be that you are unable to receive the materials you need on a schedule you are accustomed to.
- Holiday Distractions – No matter how you slice it, there will almost certainly be some holiday distractions as people begin to think ahead to the celebrations that they will enjoy.
Given these factors, you should always factor in additional buffer time when thinking about how you will get anything done. Allow yourself that extra time allowance and don’t get overly frustrated if things get slightly behind.
10) Communicate Early and Often
Speak with clients, employees, and customers about your expectations and holiday-season timetables. It is always better to keep them in the loop rather than risk any surprise that could undermine their trust in you. Most would much rather hear your expectations for the holiday season in advance.
Review how you handled things last holiday season and use that as your measuring stick for how things will go this year. It is a starting point, and you can always make tweaks to that schedule as necessary.
11) Review Your Time Data Before Year-End
While you are reviewing data, make sure to spend some time reviewing how you and your employees spent time throughout the last year. You can use this information to determine what went right and what went wrong in the previous year. An honest assessment of your situation and the data that you have at your fingertips can help you determine what steps you need to take in the year ahead.
12) Prepare for a Strong Start in January
Create realistic expectations for yourself and your team in the new year. Base this on what you accomplished in the previous year and what you would like to improve upon.
Remember, the success or failure of your ideas is not determined in January alone. If things don’t go exactly to plan when you open your books in January, don’t be discouraged. Instead, recognize there is a learning curve to all of this, and allow yourself time to adjust your plans as they unfold.
Small changes to how you run your business can add up to massive productivity gains. Even if you can only adopt a few of the suggestions from the list above, that is exactly what you ought to do. Take the small wins and use that momentum to build up to something even bigger. Among the best ways to do so is to accurately track your time and maintain a full accounting of your employees’ time as well. Start your 14-day free trial of Time Tracker trial today as time management starts with knowing where your time is going.
FAQs
1. Why does productivity typically drop during the holiday season?
Productivity often declines due to shorter workweeks, increased PTO usage, holiday distractions, and reduced staffing, especially from mid-December through early January.
2. Can productivity realistically be maintained during the holidays?
Yes. While output may slow, planning ahead, prioritizing critical tasks, setting clear boundaries, and building buffer time can help prevent productivity from completely dropping off.
3. What is the most effective time management strategy during the holidays?
Focusing on high-impact tasks using the 80/20 rule, breaking large projects into smaller steps, and eliminating unnecessary meetings are some of the most effective strategies.
4. How does time tracking help during the holiday season?
Time tracking provides clear data on how time is spent, helping managers identify inefficiencies, allocate resources more effectively, and keep projects on schedule despite holiday disruptions.
5. How can businesses prepare for a strong start in January?
By reviewing time data from the past year, setting realistic goals, and adjusting workflows based on lessons learned, teams can begin the new year with clarity and momentum.