Sep 20, 2022 3 min read Productivity

How to ship a project on a tight deadline

A practical guide for developers to handle meeting tight deadline

You committed a deadline to your boss, and it's around the corner now. How do you finish those multiple tasks/projects within a tight deadline? Or take any deadline you set for yourself to make you more focused and productive, how do you meet them so that it becomes a joy to deal with deadlines?

This blog post provides a practical and minimalist guide to meet tight deadline.

Table of contents

Work for 2 hours with full focus
Count the focused time
Remove all distractions
Find the most productive time of your day
Try to work at the same time every day
Do it every day

1. Two-hour slots of 100% focus

Now, since you have a very tight deadline to get the project done and assume that it is important to you, it's time that you leave all the other less important tasks and concentrate only on this one task.

You should work in 2-hour slots of 100% deep work. Keep all your distractions away and just get right into it. Don't attend any calls, or emails, scroll Instagram, watch TV, or anything else. Put your entire focus into working on this project.

2. Calculate your productive time

Use Developer Diary to track your progress every day. This way, you will also realize the time for which you were productive. You can track your efficiency, recognize where you got distracted, and plan accordingly.

If you want to finish your project on time, we can't afford distractions.

3. Throw distractions out of the window

Disclaimer: We are not asking you to throw your phone out of the window.

By throwing the distractions out of the window, we want you to keep all your distractions, namely your phone, iPad, TV, your comic books, and your family members away from you throughout the 2 hours of your deep work.

4. Find your most productive time during the day

Track your productivity every day and observe the timings. When you do it frequently, you will realize what time suits you the best and you get the most amount of work done.

For many, it is the first 3-4 hours in the morning that are the most productive ones and you can stay more productive, undistracted, and efficient during the wee hours.

On the contrary, some people find that late night hours suit them the best.

You can leave this to your subjective mind to decide which time is the most productive or you can use more objective data points provided by Developer Diary to decide the best time to work. After you finish this project, you can use these learnings and plan ahead of time in the future.

5. Work at the same time every day

Once you have figured out your most productive time in the day, planning your day becomes easy. You should get started with your work at the same time because you know that you will get more work done.

If you have read "Atomic Habits" by James Clear, you must know that time and place make a huge difference, when building a habit. And since you are running on a tight schedule, it is important to stay disciplined and work consistently at the same time.

6. Work every day

Rome wasn't built in a day.

To achieve your goals it is crucial to work hard efficiently and consistently.

If you work hard this once and then leave it, it won't change anything. To bring about changes, the habit has to be practiced every day. And once you have built better habits, you will grow in your career as well as in person.

Follow all the points mentioned above and ship your projects ON TIME.