Timeboxing is restricting a meeting, a task or activity to a specific timeframe – a specific start and end time. The advantage of doing this is to focus for a specific period of time, document the outcome, and then move on. This puts pressure on the team to focus and produce an outcome, a decision or a plan that is the best given the time constraints, and avoids the possibility of ‘analysis paralysis’, procrastination or deferring decisions.
Timeboxing is a way of addressing Parkinson’s law, which says that “work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion”, so if you can restrict the time available for the task to a reasonable amount, less time is wasted on unfocussed time wasting.
Timeboxing vs To-do Lists
One ‘productivity back’ is to replace your to-do list with timeboxes in your calendar – dividing your day into timeboxes – one timebox for each task you need to do. The timebox is sized according to the time you think you need to complete the task. You then focus completely on that task and produce the best outcome possible in the time you have.
Why timeboxing will boost your productivity
If we refer to Parkinson’s Law again, and use only a to-do list, even if it is prioritised, tasks can often take longer to complete just because we do them until we think they are done – perfectionism and procrastination can get in the way and the task takes longer than it actually needs to be completed. If you apply to a time box to it, you focus on that time with the goal of completing it in the timebox, and if you’re disciplined and ruthless about it you’ll complete it and move on when the timebox is finished.
What is Timeboxing in Agile?
Timeboxing is used extensively in Scrum in the following ways:
- Sprints or iterations are timeboxed to ensure that planning is restricted to a shorter period of time, and the team can focus on the sprint goal ensure that for that timebox (the sprint).
- Sprint planning: The sprint planning meeting is time boxed to put pressure on the team to produce a plan that is ‘good enough’ for the sprint given the time constraints. Wasting time on produce a perfect plan, when it is possible the plan can change, is not a good use of the team’s time.
- Sprint review, retrospective and daily scrum: Like the other meetings, keeping the time spent on these meetings ensures an acceptable outcome is reached, and that the team has enough time in the sprint to focus on producing value.
What is a time boxed iteration?
A timeboxed iteration is a time-limited period where the team focus on a single goal and produce an increment of the software. In Scrum, this is a sprint, where the team work towards the sprint goal defined in sprint planning.
Timeboxing Best Practices
- Preparation: Set an approach length for the timebox. Too short and it will be difficult to achieve the desired outcome of the timebox, too long and time will be wasted – remember Parkinson’s Law!
- When starting the timebox – e.g. the meeting, the sprint, your own task, etc. be clear on what the goal is for the timebox. This is why sprint planning is important in scrum, why agenda’s are important for meetings. If everyone understand what the goal is, it is more likely that it will be achieved.
- Periodically throughout the timebox, check the progress towards the goal. In Scrum, this is one of the benefits of the daily scrum (note though it is not the goal of the daily scrum, but by understanding the challenges of the team, you can get an idea of their progress).
- At the end of the timebox, summarise the outcome and assess what could have been done better. In Scrum, this is the Sprint Review and Retrospective. For meetings, this is entirely appropriate as well – summarise the main points discussed, actions items, and them ask for a show of hands on how valuable everyone thought the meeting was.
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