Working full time - starting a side-hustle, looking for advice around scheduling

No "correct" answer here, depends on what works for you (how you like to work) and your situation, with family etc.

Some people like to wake up early before the full time and do work on the side project. They find they have more energy then. Waiting till after the full time job, they feel drained and don't have the motivation to work on thing.

Other people prefer to work late at night when everyone else is sleeping (this is me). They are most productive late at night and don't need lots of sleep 😀

If you're ok with context switching, I would "skip" lunch and work on side projects instead.

A simple hack if you're still "stuck at home" due to the pandemic. Pretend you still have a 1h commute to the office every day. Use that time to work on your side project.

I've been artificially limiting myself to one hour per day and building a saas, and sharing my progress: one hour saas, which might be of interest to you.

I second scheduling being the key here. This is what made it possible for me when I had a full time job and was building on the side. I have a family and at the time my kids where very young. Everyone's situation is different but this is how I managed it.

• I had a very long commute for years while I built on the side. I spent at least 45 minutes on a train each way to work. Some days I would use 30-60 minutes to work.
• When I came home from work, I would spend time with my family and kids. When the kids went to bed, usually around 8pm, I would work. I would typically work from 8pm until 10pm or 11pm.
• I would try and find 4 hours each weekend day to do work. This way I could balance time with my family and my projects.
• I would schedule vacation days and spend the day as a "work day" for my side project.
• When I had a job (I worked on side projects for 10 years before getting lucky enough to go full time on one) I would try and spend time at lunch when needed.

I always made sure I got enough sleep and exercise. These are still staples for me. I would also caution about burnout. You know yourself and behavior best so take breaks as you need them. I still struggle with taking breaks but it's so important.

Do what's best for you, over the years I would do a mix of these working styles. Lots of times I'd read on the train instead of working or not work during a lunch break but I always worked after the kids went to bed. For me, that was the time I could focus best. It took me years to figure this out.

Lastly, I would recommend you figure out a system that works for you. I love Trello and use it to manage what I'm working on. This was key to my success while working a full time job. I would spend the last 10 minutes of every night figuring out what I was doing the next day and where to start. I didn't want to waste any time trying to figure out what to do. Since my time was so limited, I wanted to be as efficient as possible. I still do this today and I find it helps me be as productive as I can.

It depends what your goal is for the side hustle. Personally I find value in doing the work on the side project, e.g. I force myself to build in an unfamiliar framework so I don't mind not making sales. For my side project https://houndreminders.com/ I spent around 60 hours building it over 3 weeks, so that was fairly intense. Since launching it I've only spent 2-3 hours per week on it and I'm very happy just getting a few users now and then. So I think it all comes down to what you want to get out of it.

During the initial 3 weeks I admit I ignored some of my full time job duties, but I made up for that by putting in more time afterward. For the 2-3 hours of upkeep work I just do it whenever I feel like it, evenings and weekends.

One thing for me personally that really helps is to always wait a week or two before working on a feature or adding something to the website. I write it down in Trello and only work on anything when I'm 100% certain I want to do it. That helps me feel like I've never wasted the 2-3 hours that I spend on the project.

I get to work right after my day job and will work on the weekends. You don't need a ton of time. Typically what I will do is during small breaks in the day, I will fill out Vivify Scrum (agile board) or write down notes of what I want to accomplish. The intermittent pre-planning allows me to not fumble when I get heads down on my side project (https://qmux.io) and I can get the work done early and not spin my wheels too much.

I try to work at night between 9 and 1:30. Usually get 2 to 4 hours in. Have family. Only way this works is when everyone else is sleeping. Luckily I'm a night owl and only need 6h sleep and wife is early sleeper/riser.

Scheduling is really the key to this thing. You need to pull your weight at your day job, but also stay consistent enough to sit down again after work and do something on your sideproject, whether you are motivated or not.

Here's my process for it:

• Every night, I schedule tasks using Todoist for the next day
• My tasks are medium long (usually taking anywhere from 20min to 1h) and I know I can distribute about 12 tasks in one day without getting overwhelmed
• I mix my day job & sideproject tasks, but I assume you could also do it after work. I don't have block/office times, which helps.
• I stay consistent with this every day. I think working on something 1-2h/week will not yield amazing results
• I adjust these goals if I feel stressed or overwhelmed. The goal is that I can do this forever, not burn out in a year