Go away I’m in the middle of a Tomato!

Christmas is often a time for reflection, particulary the lull just after new
year, those few days before you have to launch yourself back into work. During this
time I was pondering my pesonal working methodology when I came across the pomodoro technique  http://www.pomodorotechnique.com/, which I have now started using.

I have to say that my that I find it to be a simple and highly effective time management
technique requiring only the following (taken from the pomodoro technique site):

A Kitchen timer - a tomato (or Pomodoro in Spanish) shaped one is where the technique
gets its name
A pencil
A to do sheet
An active inventory sheet
A records sheet

To use the technique, put all the activities you have to accomplish on an active inventory sheet. At the beginning of each day select the tasks you need to complete and copy them on to the to do sheet

Start working:
Choose the topmost task from the list
Set the Pomodoro to 25 minutes
Work until the Pomodoro rings
Mark the task with an x on the To Do sheet
Take a short break (3–5 minutes)
Keep on working, Pomodoro after Pomodoro, until the task at hand is finished, then cross it out on the To Do Sheet
Every 4 Pomodoros take a longer break, (15–30 minutes).

Thats it…The aim is to avoid all interruptions once a pomodoro has begun. Which is not always practical
especially if your a socialble type of chap that likes helping people (as am I…)

My observations on using the technique are:

It’s surprising just how many interruptions you get - again this follows the old adage that you have to measure something in order to change it - just being concious of interruptions and the time it takes to rebuild your mental stack after even a short one is surprising.

The technique is like running a personal micro-iteration

My personal productivity has certainly increased.

I’m interested to roll this out to a full team of developers - perhaps by running shared pomodoros in the development office and measuring the effect on produtivity.

This post was, of course, written using a single tomato…

Peter.