Timeboxing: The goal-oriented time management technique

We’ve all had that 30-minute task that spirals out of control and takes up a whole day’s work. When you don’t set constraints or boundaries on your time, it’s easy for work to get dragged out over the course of the day. There’s even a name for this: Parkinson’s Law, which states that “work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.”

Timeboxing is one of several time management strategies to help you take back control of your schedule. Instead of losing hours to easy tasks, timeboxing can help you fight procrastination, reclaim lost productivity, and focus on the work that matters. With timeboxing, you’ll practice assigning each task a specific amount of time, so you can spend less time planning work and more time in flow.

What is timeboxing?

Timeboxing is a simple time management strategy that helps you increase productivity and avoid procrastination. When you set a timebox, you commit to finishing a task within a specific time frame. This approach keeps you focused and reduces unnecessary planning or distractions. Instead of spending time tracking down approvals or searching for files, you can jump straight into the task with everything prepared.

Timeboxing can be used to schedule individual tasks, help your team stay organized, and manage meetings more effectively. No matter the purpose, the first step is deciding whether to set a hard or soft timebox.

Hard timeboxing

A hard timebox means stopping work when the allocated time is up, even if the task isn't finished. Hard timeboxing helps manage perfectionism and keeps you from spending too much time on tasks that are already good to go. In team settings, it keeps the backlog moving and helps meetings stay on track.

Hard timeboxing benefits:

• Helps overcome perfectionism by enforcing a strict end point.

• Ensures team tasks and meeting agendas stay on track.

• Encourages focus and prioritization within a set time period.

Soft timeboxing

A soft timebox, on the other hand, is more flexible. When the timer goes off, it serves as a suggestion to wrap up the task rather than an absolute stopping point. Soft timeboxing is useful for complex tasks where setting a strict deadline might hinder progress.

Soft timeboxing benefits:

• Provides flexibility for tasks that need more time.

• Helps teams stay aligned on timelines without rigid constraints.

• Prevents disruption in meetings by allowing important discussions to continue organically.

How to timebox

Timeboxing is a time management method that involves organizing your tasks by assigning an allocated time for each. Here’s a step-by-step guide with examples to help you integrate timeboxing into your team’s workflow.

Step 1: Identify tasks

Choose tasks that benefit from a focused time limit. For example, if you find yourself spending too much time perfecting deliverables, timebox 30 minutes for this task. By placing a strict limit on the time you spend polishing your deliverables, you can curb overly time-consuming perfectionist tendencies.

Another example could be social media management. If managing your team's social media accounts tends to consume your entire day, apply the timeboxing technique by allocating a specific block of time to it, such as an hour in the morning and another in the afternoon. This simple time hack helps contain tasks that could otherwise sprawl throughout the day.

Step 2: Set specific goals

Define what you want to achieve within the timebox. For example, if you find yourself spending more time in your inbox than on higher-priority tasks, set a goal of drafting three email responses in 30 minutes. By doing so, you're spending time tending to your inbox and completing necessary tasks.

Another common example of timeboxing is in agile software development. Agile teams frequently use a structured approach to scheduling meetings, with each meeting having a set time limit and strict deadline. 

This agile timeboxing practice includes:

• Daily scrum (15 minutes): During their daily scrum, team members dedicate a strict 15 minutes to synchronization, which ensures focused team collaboration within the allotted time.

• Sprint planning (2 hours): With a sprint planning meeting, teams spend these two hours planning tasks for the next sprint, which often spans seven days. This strict deadline helps in prioritizing and organizing work efficiently.

• Sprint review (1 hour): An agile team uses this hour-long block of time to review their previous work. They may use a time tracker tool while taking stock of their Kanban board's completed tasks and milestones.

• Sprint retrospective (1 hour): A sprint retrospective is held at the end of each sprint and is dedicated to reflecting on what went well and what could be improved, all within an allotted time frame to encourage concise and effective discussion.

These pre-scheduled meetings have rigorously enforced timelines that help structure the workflow to ensure efficient time management.

Step 3: Allocate time

Determine a specific time duration for each task. For the email example, set a timer for 30 minutes. The use of a time tracker here can be beneficial, especially when managing multiple tasks throughout the entire day. Think of it as setting a strict limit, much like the allocated time in a sprint retrospective.

We offer some timeboxing tips below that help you determine how much allotted time is needed for different types of tasks.

Step 4: Work without interruptions

Focus solely on the task during this period. In our email example, this means no checking social media or other distractions. Here are some tips to help you stay focused while timeboxing:

• Prioritize comfort. Arrange your workspace for comfort; a good chair, proper lighting, and a clutter-free desk can significantly enhance focus.

• Break down tasks. If a task feels overwhelming, break it down into smaller, manageable subtasks to tackle within each timebox.

• Visual reminders. Place a visual cue, like a sticky note, on your desk to remind you of your current task and keep you anchored.

• Create a distraction-free environment. Turn off notifications on your phone and computer. Consider using noise-canceling headphones if you're in a noisy environment.

• Set mini-goals. Within each block of time, set mini-goals or checkpoints to maintain a sense of progress and motivation.

Step 5: Review, adjust, and take a break

After the timebox ends, review your progress. Did you draft all three emails? If not, adjust your approach or time allocation for the next time. 

Reward yourself with a short break after a timebox, especially for longer or more intense tasks. Rest is important. In fact, a popular project management method known as the Pomodoro Technique emphasizes the significance of short, rejuvenating breaks between focused work sessions.

How long should the timebox be?

The ideal length of a timebox depends on the task and focus required. Most individuals and teams benefit from 30 to 90-minute timeboxes, which allow for deep work while maintaining productivity.

However, timeboxing isn't limited to short periods. In Agile software development, teams often use longer timeboxes spanning weeks or months for structured processes like sprints, sprint planning, and retrospectives. These longer iterations help teams stay on track and flexible with key deliverables.

General guidelines for timebox lengths:

• 30-60 minutes: Ideal for emails, brainstorming, or social media tasks.

• 60-120 minutes: Best for in-depth tasks like writing, coding, or design work.

• 2+ hours: Break into smaller chunks to prevent burnout and stay productive.

For example, if you're working on an ebook, break it into timeboxes for research, outlining, and revisions. This approach makes large tasks more manageable and helps avoid procrastination.

The goal of timeboxing isn’t to rush work but to allocate the right amount of time for focused, sustainable effort—because when done right, timeboxing works.

7 tips to use timeboxing

If you want to use timeboxing to help improve your focus or reduce procrastination, try these seven tips for effective time management.

1. Prioritize timeboxed time

If you have a busy day, it can be tempting to rearrange, reschedule, or cancel your timeboxes. Try to avoid this as much as possible. Once they’re set, think of timeboxes as meetings you’ve scheduled with yourself. You aren’t loosely planning to do something. Rather, you’re making a commitment to yourself that you will work on this task during the time you’ve set aside. Just as you wouldn't abruptly cancel a meeting with a team member, you also shouldn't cancel a timebox unless absolutely necessary.

2. Visualize your time to better understand it

Timeboxing is most effective when you make it visual. It helps to actually schedule focus time on your calendar, so you can see what time limit you have for any particular task. This also helps you stick to your schedule—and lets team members know when you’re unavailable. Without scheduling focus time on your calendar, team members might think that's an open time and schedule a meeting or ping you with a question.

3. Set a timer

Whether you’re using a hard or soft timebox, set a timer so you know when your time is up. Remember: When you create a timebox, you’re setting a goal to complete a particular task in a certain amount of time. A time tracker can help you hold yourself accountable to that expectation and alert you when that time is up.

Setting a timer also frees you from thinking about the time while you’re working. Instead of constantly checking the clock or making sure you aren’t late to your next meeting, you have dedicated time to dive into your work and get into flow.

In the case of a hard timebox, plan to move on to the next task once the timer is up. If you haven’t finished what you’re working on, you can come back to it in a later timebox. For soft timeboxes, use the timer as an indicator that you should wrap up what you’re doing in the next five or ten minutes and move on to the next task.

4. Turn off notifications or use “Do Not Disturb”

Timeboxes are effective because they help you focus on the task at hand and find flow. Too often, we allow our fractured attention to set our intention, which not only leads to reduced productivity but also hampers effective, high-impact work. In the same vein, you also don’t want to be unnecessarily distracted while you’re in your timebox.

By snoozing notifications or using a “Do Not Disturb” feature, you can ensure you aren’t disrupted while also letting team members know that you’ll get back to them as soon as possible. Most tools allow team members to “override” these settings if they need to get in contact, so you won’t be completely out of contact—just protected from unnecessary notifications while you’re in your timebox.

5. Take breaks between timeboxes

When we talk about productivity at Asana, we don’t mean “doing as much as you possibly can”—and that isn’t the goal with timeboxing, either. Rather, we think of time management strategies as a way to maximize your effectiveness and make the biggest impact with your work.

Similarly, timeboxing your work isn’t a way to eke out the absolute max productivity, but instead a way to help you be more intentional and effective with your time. Like all focused work, make sure you’re taking short breaks between timeboxes—even if you’re just standing to stretch or grabbing a drink of water.

6. Capture all of your work in a work management tool

In order to create a timebox, you need to know what you have to work on. If you haven’t already, set up a to-do list in a project or work management tool, like Asana. These tools help you identify what important tasks are coming up and what you need to do during each workday.

How to use timeboxing with your team

In addition to being an effective personal productivity tool, timeboxing can help you lead and manage a team. Keep in mind that timeboxes shouldn’t be a punitive action, but rather a way for your team to better organize and prioritize work. Here’s how:

1. Decide why you’re using timeboxing

Timeboxing can be a great management tool—but make sure everyone on your team is aligned on why you’re using it and for which tasks. Are you trying timeboxing out as a team to see if you like it? Is this a new strategy you want to implement to better understand how long work takes? Have there been issues with productivity that you want to address?

Take the time to sit down with your team to have this conversation. Make sure you allow space for questions and feedback to ensure your timeboxing strategy feels productive.

2. Capture team tasks in a work management tool

In order to timebox effectively as a team, you need insight into what everyone is working on, and when that work is due. With a work management tool, you can share a central source of truth with your entire team to increase visibility and team collaboration. When you know who’s doing what by when, you can better understand their workload and more efficiently prioritize work.

3. Decide how long—on average—tasks should take to complete

If you’re using timeboxing with your team members, take some time to align on average task lengths during your next 1:1. For example, if you’re on an engineering team, align on how long the average bug fix should take. If you’re on a design team, establish agreed-upon expectations for different types of creative work.

By deciding on these times together, you aren’t saying that everything needs to be completed in this exact amount of time—sometimes tasks are more complicated and their respective timeboxes should be longer. But having a baseline can help you and your team move forward with timeboxing as effectively as possible. Once you’ve set expectations, you can always revisit them during future 1:1s and adjust as needed.

4. Try timeboxing team breaks

Just like timeboxing for individuals, make sure you’re encouraging and making time for breaks on your team. In addition to using timeboxes for work, consider setting timeboxes for downtime to ensure your team members take breaks. Plus, by clarifying that break time is as important as time dedicated to work or tasks, you can proactively prevent burnout or workload stress.

Using timeboxing for meetings

When they’re effective, team meetings can be great avenues to get a ton of work done. But too often, meetings suffer from lack of focus and unclear goals—so team members spend less time actioning on work and more time talking in circles.

To make meetings more effective, it helps to always have a meeting purpose and agenda. But timeboxing can take meetings to the next level by helping you and your team stay on track and cover everything you want to discuss. Here’s how:

1. Share meeting agendas with meeting topics and time limits

The simplest way to timebox a meeting is something you’re probably already doing—creating an agenda. When you send out a meeting agenda, you’re making sure everyone is clear on the meeting’s purpose. With an agenda, you can ensure meetings are effective uses of your team’s time, where decisions are made and work moves forward.

To timebox a meeting agenda, add a line for how long each agenda item will take. It’s also helpful to clarify if these are hard or soft timeboxes. Finally, make sure to share the meeting agenda—along with any pre-reading materials—with your team beforehand. That way, everyone can come to the meeting as prepared as possible. Then once the meeting starts, share the agenda again, or keep it on screen to help guide the discussion.

2. Decide if you’re using hard or soft timeboxes

Make sure to clarify if you’re using hard or soft timeboxes in the meeting agenda, and then again at the start of the meeting. Letting meeting attendees know the limits up front will reduce confusion during the meeting.

Examples of when to use soft timeboxes in a meeting

Unless your meeting agenda is tightly packed, aim to create soft timeboxes during a meeting. That way, you can let team members know they should be wrapping up, without feeling like you’re “kicking them off the air.” Example meetings include:

• Team all hands

• Daily standup meetings

• Project kickoff meetings

• Webinars

• New hire training

• User testing

Examples of when to use hard timeboxes in a meeting

Plan to use hard timeboxes if your meeting agenda is tight and you need to cover all of your content before the meeting is over. These meetings can include:

• Design workshop or review

• Discovery meeting

• Meetings with action-packed agendas

• Project plan

If you’re facilitating the meeting, setting hard timeboxes can feel awkward. No one likes interrupting presenters or team members mid-conversation. Making sure your team understands that you’re using a hard timebox before you get started can help ease this awkwardness. It might also help to remind them why you’re using hard timeboxes—for example, to ensure you cover every topic on the meeting agenda.

Examples of meetings that shouldn’t be timeboxed

Not every meeting should be timeboxed. Some meetings benefit most from a free-form style of conversation. While you should always send a meeting agenda—even if it’s just a loose outline of what you expect to discuss—avoid setting timeboxes for meetings like:

• Working sessions

• 1:1 meetings

• Team building

• Brainstorming sessions

3. Inform presenters that the timebox is almost up

Whether you’re using a hard or soft timebox, make sure to let team members know when their time is almost up. It’s up to you to decide how much notice you give, and whether you’ll give multiple cues. Obviously, you want to avoid interrupting the conversation too many times, so play around with warning signs to see what works for you. For example, you could use a chime when there’s a minute left, or raise your left hand to indicate there are 30 seconds left. If your team is using video conferencing to meet, consider leaving a comment in the chat.

The benefits of timeboxing

There are a variety of ways to use timeboxing for your own productivity, to help your team align on work, or to facilitate meetings. The ultimate question is: should you use timeboxing?

While this time management technique isn’t perfect for every scenario, timeboxing can help you:

• Be more intentional about your work. To create a timebox, you first need to prioritize which tasks to work on and decide how long each task should take. Thinking through these details for every task helps you be more mindful about where you’re spending your time.

• Work with increased focus. By setting aside time to work, you’re also telling your brain that this is valuable focus time. This can help you improve focus and, by extension, productivity.

• Reduce multitasking. The truth is, the human brain can’t multitask. Whenever we switch tasks, our brain needs to “re-upload” the information for that task—and that takes precious time and energy, even if you don’t realize it. By timeboxing, you’re focusing on one task (or a related group of tasks) at a time. That way, you aren’t jumping around from project to project.

• Increase motivation with goal-oriented time management. When you create a timebox, you’re setting a goal for yourself: to complete a particular task within these pre-set time constraints. Even if you don’t always succeed, giving yourself something to work towards can be motivating—especially if you aren’t excited about the work.

• Establish a predictable work schedule. Timeboxing can help you gain a clearer sense of what your day will look like. By scheduling your timeboxes in your calendar, you can clearly see when you’ll accomplish which tasks. This can reduce the “guessing game” element of scheduling work and help you tackle each day with confidence and clarity.

• Reduce perfectionism. If you frequently agonize over already-finished tasks, timeboxing can unblock you and help you increase productivity. Timeboxing operates off of the principle of progress over perfection. Once your timebox is up, you need to move on—even if the task you’re working on isn’t perfect.

The drawbacks of timeboxing

Though there are a lot of benefits to timeboxing, this productivity hack isn’t for everyone. Here are the most common drawbacks of timeboxing, and how you can combat them.

Struggling to finish tasks before the end of the timebox

• Problem: If you often find yourself running out of time before completing an important task, you may not have allocated enough time.

• Solution: Start with soft timeboxes to give yourself flexibility while you develop your estimation skills. Over time, you'll improve your ability to set realistic time frames so that each task has an appropriate amount of time to be completed effectively.

Feeling that timeboxes are too short

• Problem: You might feel that the allocated period of time is too short to make real progress.

• Solution: In reality, shorter time limits help you break work into manageable pieces, track progress better, and align with Agile methodologies like scrum or Kanban. Use a work management tool like Asana or Microsoft Planner to see the big picture while focusing on individual deliverables.

Interruptions disrupting workflow

• Problem: When the timer rings, it can break your concentration and disrupt your workflow.

• Solution: To stay in the zone, schedule similar tasks back-to-back and include a short break—such as a five-minute break. This approach mimics the Pomodoro technique and helps you maintain focus while still respecting the time constraints of your workday.

Feeling rushed, leading to low-quality work

• Problem: If the pressure of a strict deadline leads to rushing and compromises quality, you may be overestimating what you can achieve in a set time frame.

• Solution: Be realistic when setting a timebox, and allow room for adjustments. The goal of this time management technique isn't to push productivity to the max but to avoid burnout and deliver high-quality results. If you’re using timeboxing in Agile software development, consider discussing workload distribution during a daily scrum or sprint retrospective.

Feeling overwhelmed by too many scheduled timeboxes

• Problem: Filling your calendar with numerous minute timeboxes can become overwhelming.

• Solution: If managing individual timeboxes feels daunting, try switching to time blocking. Instead of assigning a strict limit to each task, group similar tasks into broader categories—for example, handling all your emails or social media work within a designated block. If this approach seems more manageable, check out our guide on how to get started with time blocking.

It's time to timebox

Like most time management techniques, timeboxing is only valuable if it feels valuable for you. Try it out, or check out other time management techniques that incorporate timeboxes, like the Pomodoro technique.

No matter what time management technique you’re using, make sure to track work in a shared work management system like Asana. With a shared central source of truth, you can increase visibility, help you break work down into smaller chunks, and enable cross-team collaboration.