Day Theming for PMs
Day Theming is a time management method where you group similar tasks into categories and then process one category in a single day without interference from other categories.
A well known example is Elon Musk, who runs both SpaceX and Tesla. He allocates his weekly time by day between the two companies. You do not need to run multiple companies for Day Theming to be useful. It also works well for PMs who handle many categories at once, such as communication, writing product specs, benchmarking research, user feedback, and meetings with many stakeholders.
Why Time Blocking and Day Theming work better together
Time Blocking assigns work to blocks of time. That alone can be productive, but if you alternate very different kinds of work, you lose momentum each time you switch. According to research from the University of California, Irvine, it takes about 23 minutes and 15 seconds to fully resume after an interruption. When you are immersed in a type of work, batching related tasks by combining Time Blocking with Day Theming gives you the most productive experience.
How to find a Day Theming style that fits you
In an ideal world you would dedicate a whole day to a single category. In reality, constant issues and many meetings you did not choose make that hard. You will not always control your entire day.
So make Day Theming flexible and adapt it to your situation. I personally use a 4-hours Theming method.
1. Identify the hours you can truly control
I spend my first work block from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. After a break I work again from 8 p.m. to midnight. About 90 percent of my meetings happen between 1 p.m. and 6 p.m.
During 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. I have little control. The hours I can drive are 8 a.m. to noon, 8 p.m. to midnight, and weekends.
2. Set themes inside the hours you control
From Monday to Friday I control two four hour windows, morning and evening. For me, 4-hours Theming works better than full Day Theming.
For example, our team has a development meeting every Wednesday at 9 p.m. To keep that momentum, I dedicate the entire Wednesday evening window to product work. Outside the meeting time I check product bugs and create Jira tickets, review what changed during the last week, align on features with the team, and focus only on product so I can maximize immersion.
If you group work by project when you Time Block, you can minimize switching costs between projects. For instance, if tasks for a website launch are scattered across the 22nd to the 24th, move them to the 23rd and handle them together. You will go deeper and finish faster.
3. Use Theming on weekends too
Weekdays fill up with urgent items and meetings, so important but not urgent work keeps getting pushed back. I write one blog post on Saturday morning for four hours. A blog post is not urgent, but over the long term it becomes a company asset. Since weekday work keeps pushing it aside, I use a Saturday morning window where nothing else interferes.
4) Leave healthy gaps even when you theme
Using 4-hours Theming does not mean every controllable hour must have a theme. As I explained in the post Time Blocking for PMs, plans change and variables appear. Do not theme every minute. A slightly loose approach raises productivity by giving you room to absorb change.