One topic that I have discussed many times in 1-1s is time management. Most engineers I have worked with and all of my mentees have raised time management as a discussion point. Its natural, as you move up as an engineer the expectation of work from you increases and increases. Some people spend more time, and while that works in the short term - it is not sustainable longer term. The best way is to establish time management and get really effective at time management. Time management isn’t just for work it also helps with your personal life too. I stumbled upon a great diagram with a handful of different techniques, shared below. Every person is unique and you should find the set of techniques that work best for you.

Let me share the techniques that I commonly use which may help you with a starting point.

• Eisenhower Matrix - This matrix helps frame work for me to use another technique for. I use this matrix to categorize what needs done, and then apply other techniques to balance those. If you are a newer engineer, the box “Delegate” looks tempting - but you will probably struggle with that for awhile. Be careful with the urgent-important box - I see many people abuse that box. Is it actually THAT important? Is it actually THAT urgent? Your Important - Non-urgent box is probably your largest box, so you will want something to help you prioritize and tackle that.
• Pomodoro technique - This is my goto day to day technique when I have something (important-urgent) to do. I block off time to tackle a chunk of it, take a break and repeat. I personally prefer 1hr pomodoros, so I will spend ~50 minutes on a task, and then take a 5-10 minute break. The important thing to do here is to block those email and slack notifications so your thought process does not get interrupted.
• 2 Minute rule - If someone pings me in slack, if I can do it in 2 minutes I answer it. If it will take longer, I save for later and then come back to it.
• Task batching - I find grouping similar tasks together to be beneficial. My tasks normally get sorted into buckets for the 1/3/5 method.
• 1/3/5 - I use this method as a prioritization. If my “small” bucket is getting too large, I do a whole bunch of 5-10 minute tasks (normally Friday afternoon). If my “medium” bucket is getting too large, I will do a bunch of them.

Putting it all together, this is somewhat a flowchart of how I work. Obviously, I go to meetings that are scheduled where I am required. But, generally, during free time my control loop looks something like below. Most of my Pomodoro sessions get blocked off in outlook so that I have dedicated time for that. Hope this helps you establish some time management techniques!