Are you constantly double—or triple-booked with days that involve so many back-to-back meetings that you don’t have time to breathe?
That’s no way to run a business. And it will negatively impact your productivity and sustainability over time.
At Elevate, we step in and partner with CEOs and business owners to help give them control of their calendars back so they can use their time more efficiently and effectively.
Today, our experienced EAs are sharing their top tips that you can take and use to improve your own calendar management in your business!
Executive calendar management mistakes
We have truly seen it all when it comes to calendar and time management disasters.
Most of our clients tend to struggle with:
- Double booking
- Not enough breathing room or breaks between meetings
- Not paying attention or following what’s on their calendar
- Using more than one email account
- Confusing personal and business calendars and appointments
- Losing control over meetings just put on their calendars
- Not being prepared for meetings
- Not respecting time blocks
Can you relate to any of those struggles? You’re not alone! Keep reading to see what we suggest doing instead.
How to manage your calendar like a pro
A well-managed calendar helps you feel more productive, increases your efficiency, and sets a solid standard for the rest of your team to follow.
When you are in control of your time, you feel more peaceful, less chaotic, and less rushed. Calendar management is truly a game-changer!
Here are the inside secrets our EAs shared about how to manage your calendar:
- Merge all calendars so double-bookings don’t happen
- Share access and visibility to all calendars across your team
- Set meeting buffers and limits within your scheduling apps
- Use color coding to indicate different calendar entries: green for networking, your company’s main color for meetings, blue or pink for personal appointments, etc.
- Separate business and personal calendars and email accounts
- Add focus time/free space into your day
- Set meetings for 25 mins and 50 mins to automatically give yourself a break
- Practice annual and quarterly calendar planning
- Give your EA control of your calendar and allow them to be the gatekeeper of your time (we’ll protect your time better than you will!)
- Create a templated agenda and ensure every meeting has a stated purpose, touchpoints, and loose or structured agenda as needed
- Manually confirm calendar invites when using scheduling links
- Use naming conventions for calendar invites
- Mark personal appointments as private on your work calendar
Need help with your executive calendar management?
Implementing these best practices will help you take back control of your calendar and your time!
But if you know maintaining these best practices is hard – or you know yourself well enough to know things will start to slip at some point – one of the best things you can do for yourself and your business is to bring on an EA.
We are ruthlessly efficient and passionate about helping you manage your time and protect your priorities. Check out our Executive Assistant services to see how one of our talented EAs can level up your business and give you the gift of time!