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Getting Writing Done in 15-Minute Increments

In her book on academic writing, Wendy Belcher reminds us how much progress you can make in just 15 minutes. Sitting down for 15 minutes to accomplish something—even a small part of the process—can add up over time.

I completely agree, especially for editing in smaller sections. While I do struggle with the setup costs of these shorter sessions, it’s something I’m working on, and I’ll keep you updated on how my progress goes.

What I can definitely recommend, though, is to actively work on your writing and reflect on it. Thinking about your writing really does help. Over the last two years, I feel like I’ve improved massively by deliberately focusing on my workflows and approaching writing as a craft. This is an investment well worth your time, especially if you’re in academia, where academic writing is often the main criterion for evaluation. If you want to up your academic writing game, putting effort into improving your processes is key.

So anyway, this is an invitation for you to take a close look at your project. That’s something all the authors I’ve been reading emphasize.

Belcher, for instance, recommends making notes on what you spend your time on to get a clear sense of how long things actually take. Cathy Mazak also stresses this—understanding how long tasks really take can help you avoid unrealistic plans and the frustration that follows when those plans don’t work out.

Knowing how long things actually take is helpful not just for scheduling tasks to ensure they get done on time, but also for managing your expectations. For example, you might realize you don’t need to edit an entire article in one day (which probably isn’t feasible anyway), but instead focus on editing one section at a time. Maybe this was already obvious to you. But to be honest, I have been lying to myself about this for a long time. I was totally convinced I just needed an hour or two to edit a whole article. So, sometimes things take longer than you thought.

That doesn’t mean you should discard small pockets of time. They can add up and you can get significant work done if you use the 15-min time pockets that you do have.

That’s all I have for today. Just some food for thought!


OpenEdition suggests that you cite this post as follows:
Sarah Lang (May 17, 2025). Getting Writing Done in 15-Minute Increments. Epigrammetry. Retrieved June 13, 2025 from https://doi.org/10.58079/13y27


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