This salad themed technique is a tool that I use pretty much daily as a way of staying on track – and it’s ridiculously easy to put into practice.
Developed by Francesco Cirillo in the 1980’s the Pomodoro technique (so named after the tomato shaped timer he used) suggests that working in timed sprints encourages greater focus.
Take a moment to consider how often you start working on something only to find that you:
a) Get distracted by emails, phone-calls or other tasks
b) Lose track of what you’re doing and spend far more time than you intended on a particular task
c) Forget what it was that you were actually trying to achieve in the first place
d) All of the above
Cirillo argued that before starting a task you should first identify whether it’s your highest priority, clarify what exactly needs to be completed and estimate approximately how long it will take.
At that point you should start working on it in timed sprints.
Cirillo chose twenty-five-minute blocks however, the exact time is up to you.
Just make sure it’s not too long and when the timer is finished take a short break of three to five minutes before resetting the timer (and your focus) and completing another sprint.
Who knew tomatoes held such depths!
