Time is the most valuable resource for any employee. For employees who have been working from home for the past year, managing time to ensure work gets done and personal life doesn’t take a hit can be sometimes difficult. The goal of Microsoft 365 apps like Outlook and Microsoft Teams is to help manage time and ensure communication is efficient. Specifically in Outlook, the calendar can be used to effectively manage meetings and work life balance in a user-friendly way. Here are some new features in Outlook employees can use to ensure they are taking time for themselves while still getting the job done.

Organize professional and personal time with the Outlook calendar board

According to Microsoft, workers use six tools to track everything they need to get done on average. The time it takes to switch back and forth between applications can be tedious and cause unnecessary time sink. Microsoft has launched a new calendar view in Outlook for web called the Outlook calendar board to keep task and appointment management in one place. In board view, the calendar expands into a free-form space that users can customize to fit they way they work. Options on the board include additional calendars, files, task lists, sticky notes, and individual goals. These board items can be dragged onto the calendar to reserve time for a specific task or other board item. Seeing all tasks, appointments, and other items in a single view will give employees a holistic view of their job without going back and forth between apps.

Plan tasks out ahead of time

One way to ensure a task will be completed on time is to remove distractions and unwanted interruptions. The task list example used in the calendar board view above can be used independently of the board for employees to track tasks throughout their day and add them to the calendar as necessary. The My Day button in Outlook for web opens a To Do pane where employees can enter, modify, and remove tasks as necessary. These tasks can then be dragged onto the calendar so employees can block off time for specific tasks.

Make meetings shorter by default

Many times multiple meetings can get stacked back-to-back in a single day. This can cause unnecessary breaks in productivity and limit the time available for breaks throughout the day. In Outlook Calendar settings, users can enable the ability to automatically end meetings early on their calendar. Doing so should give users a quick breather in between long meetings or a day full of short meetings. To enable this setting, navigate to Outlook Options within the File tab of Outlook. Next click on the Calendar tab in the options window and scroll down to Calendar Options. Users can select how many minutes they want meetings to end early by depending on the length of the meeting.

Set custom meeting availability

Many workers find a specific time of day in which they are most productive or like to reserve to just put their head down and work. Meeting availability settings allow users to provide preferred meeting hours that are shown to coworkers when scheduling meetings. To update these custom settings, navigate to the Outlook Options in the File tab of Outlook and select the calendar tab. From there, employees can update work hours by time and day and meeting availability by time.