Whether a matter of personal productivity or circumstance, which part of the week is best for your most personally productive work.
Please get into details of what makes you productive on those days — whether it is how meetings typically stack up or otherwise.
not monday, nor friday
Acurate
minimalWage === this
I will be the odd one but I will say - Monday ! It is the first office day of the week (we have a hybrid setting) , and you still have energy from the weekend.
Same here! I generally fill my free time with other activities than coding, so on Mondays I am so hyped to finally get it started again 🤩
The day that I have no meetings :D
No meetings? Does that even exist? 😱
Productivity must cluster in the middle of the week. Monday is for gearing up and by Friday I'm exhausted. Used to be I moved mountains on Thursdays, but nowadays it's the meeting day. Should probably change that.
I'll go first: We have "no meeting Fridays" which are pretty great for a certain type of productivity, but it's also a way to ease into the weekend, so I don't try to make those the maximally productive days.
By Wednesday and Thursday, most key communication is behind me — as well as a lot of my "critical tasks" and I can usually get some good stuff done on more creative work those days.
Hmmm never thought about it before but definitely Thursday:
Sunday on a side project I really care about. Saturdays tend to be home chore days.
Friday.
On Monday I feel like I have a mountain of upcoming work.
But on Friday, I have that sense that 90% of the weeks tasks are finished. I can then enter Zen mode and work on things that I didn't expect to get to this week. I am way more productive when I can work in Zen mode.
I did some work for a business which actually had impressive data on not just their own but a few 100 other businesses across industries to measure "output". This may have been simply widgets produced (manual), to cases worked (e.g. request for pension payouts), to lines of code written (based on end of day commits through a period) through to sales ads approved etc. Super broad...
Regardless the data always showed Tuesday as the most "productive" followed by a Wednesday, approx 10-15% loss of output. Then Thursday and Monday was quite interchangeable dependent on the industry. Friday categorically dire.
There were lots of ideas as to the reasons and some are actually quite simple. If you map over the top the resources available, you generally see Mondays are a good long weekend or an easy sick day. Fridays are typically the half day, half pay and long weekend candidates also. The workforce that is available on a Monday typically talk about their weekends, get up to speed with their tasks for the week and when they hit Tuesday they've got themselves set up.
By Wednesday you're now losing productivity typically due to the output of a Tuesday surfacing issues / problems / meetings etc. Most businesses tend to schedule "events" on a Wednesday e.g. training, awareness (h&s) etc so you lose hours. "Mid week check in" as well as weekly reporting up through the business also becomes a drag.
For me, it's usually Wednesdays or Thursdays. Mondays are packed with meetings and management stuff, and on Fridays, I'm usually quite exhausted and we do sprint reviews each 2 weeks, so not the most productive for me.
Wednesday and Thursday I can get work done most of the day if I don't have too many PRs to review. On a good Thursday, I can get a straight 4h block of coding time at most (usually less)
It's been a while since I've had one of those coding days where you spend all day coding... I kinda miss those 😔
Regarding Tuesdays, I don't believe they exist xD
It's Thursday for me. I block off the entire day for coding. Still end up with meetings sometimes anyway though. It's not really preference, just Thursday was the day I have the fewest recurring obligations, so I chose it.
I don't like the first four days of the week, I'm quite productive on Friday because I know that I can work on some stuff on the week-end.
But mainly, I'm more of a night owl so: productive late a night. 👌🏻
All the same. I try to treat every day the same Mo - Sun including when waking up or going to bed. Is much easier for the body. I love every day and I am so happy and blessed to work as a developer. Thanks
As long as the coding is goin smoothly i only stop for a coffee :) But i'd say the middle of the week is the best for me.
same here !
Tuesday - Thursday are the best days for me.
We do big house chores on weekends, so I usually take Monday and Friday a bit slow, like do some blog writing and watch/read tutorials with a little house chores in between 😁
Monday - "we (you) really need to do this by friday"
Tuesday - "we (you) really really need to do this by friday"
Wednesday - "we (you) desperately need to do this by friday"
Wednesday - Maybe they let me work
Thursday - "we're doing it by tomorrow right? How about by the end of today? Is it done?"
Friday, every 10 minutes - "are you done? are you done?" (Yes twice)
That's daunting to say the least.
Thursday. For no reason, except that it's almost the end of the week, it motivates me to work harder to finish the two three codes before the weekend. 🚀
Any day that isn't packed with pointless meetings
I'm a 6 AM on Monday morning kind of guy. 5 or so hours of good work before new stuff gets put on my plate.
Weekend. On other day of week, doing technical writing for myself and other clients. On weekends, work on projects.
Hey Ben.
Usually on Wednesdays!
When you hate your office job and love programming it has to be Saturday. Had fun programming whole day then chill in Monday. 😌
sunday(after two days of on fri and sat so productive in sunday) and wednesday(it's wednesday my dudes!)
Thursday. I usually have zero meetings and tend to WFH on Thursdays. These are my most code-filled days.
Thursday is my best coding day.
I do not like when a picture tells me what I should do. Would like to block you in order not to see that nonsense in the future!
Thursday as I want to finish as much as I can, so I have a pretty much free Friday ^_^
The first half of Monday before we're closing the sprint 🏃
Friday !
may because of the enthu that I'm going to get a two day off 😉
On Friday. Because in the next two days I will get a leave😅
The day with less meetings 😂😅
Monday and Friday
monday because it's the first day of the week
Friday because I have to close those tickets I've left between tuesday, wednesday and thursday 😆
Sunday night, when I was totally tired being with my kids whole 2 days and after they left sleep, finally I can write code in the silence and darkness.
1~2hr session of Sunday morning before preparing a breakfast.
Inspiration just came when you're in the kitchen 😆
I don't know it's completely random and there are infinite variables to take into account. I will say that I had a really good work day yesterday and today. So thats a win for Mondays and Tuesdays!
my BEST coding is probably on weekends, when I have time and freedom to work on my own stuff... work has some ~problems~ that sometimes keep me from doing my best
Wednesday. Why? The house is empty for once 😅
Monday, Wednesday, sometimes Friday
The earlier in the week, the better!
Friday :)
The day with the less meeting usually friday for me
Everyday 🥰
Every day is a good day. It does not matter the day but the spirit which we face it
I am still attending school. That is why probably saturday. Although I do some programming every day. I get the most and best work on my projects in the saturday morning hours done.
Monday 😉
I produce the most between Tuesday and Thursday, Monday and Friday I am in a lower pace