Time Management for System Administrators: Stop Working Late…

8 reviews for Time Management for System Administrators: Stop Working Late…

1. 

   J. Blair – December 15, 2025

   A great list of ideas for getting organized
   I usually think of self help books as touchy-feely nonsense read by weak-minded individuals who can’t think for themselves. This is still my opinion and that probably won’t change. The great thing about this book is that it doesn’t read like a self help book or some master plan to happiness. There’s no chapter on meditation or talking about your feelings. It’s just a list of cool ideas to get organized and methods to implement them. There’s no touchy-feely nonsense and I respect that a lot.I originally picked up this book on a whim because I was drowning at work. I work in a corporate atmosphere and I’m the only IT person. I was barely getting to see my kid and husband. I was working overtime every week. I was feeling stressed out and ground down to the bone. This book has been a great help to me. I’ve implemented most of the ideas from this book in my work environment. Now it’s rare that I have to stay late to finish projects and then usually only when emergencies pop up. My stress level has noticeably reduced. I’ve also gotten a lot of good feedback from the executive staff and managers.I’d highly suggest this book to IT people. It’s probably a good read even if you’re not drowning. At this point I’m getting ahead of projects and even finding time to work on those “someday” projects that make life easier.Also, there’s some cool comic strips and fun stories. 🙂

2. 

   John S. J. Anderson – December 15, 2025

   Something for everybody
   System administrators have a stereotypical reputation for grumpiness and irritability. Some times this misanthropy is a cultivated pose, designed to deter casual or trivial requests that would take time away from more important activities like playing nethack and reading netnews. More often, however, sysadmins are disgruntled simply because they can’t seem to make any headway on the dozens of items clogging up their todo lists. If you’re an example of the latter case, you may find some help in Time Management for System Administrators, the new book from Thomas Limoncelli (who you may recognize as one of the co-authors of the classic The Practice of System and Network Administration).This slim book (only 226pp) packs a large amount of helpful information about making better use of your time at work, so that you can make some headway on at least some of those tasks that have piled up around you, while still managing to have a life outside of work. One of Limoncelli’s main points is that sysadmins have to develop some way of effectively dealing with the constant stream of interruptions in their life if they’re going to accomplish anything. The other point is that they also need a good tracking system to make sure they don’t lose track of new, incoming requests in the process of dealing with existing ones. The book continually reinforces these two points, and presents several alternative, complementary ways to accomplish them.The first three chapters deal with high-level, generic issues: principles of time management, managing interruptions, and developing checklists and routines to help deal with the chaos of day-to-day system administration. The middle third of the book details how to use “the cycle system”, Limoncelli’s task management plan for sysadmins. Basically, it’s a hybrid between Franklin-Covey A-B-C prioritization and day planning and David Allen GTD-style todo lists, with a few sysadmin-specific tweaks thrown in. The final chapters of the book address a grab-bag of issues: task prioritization, stress management, dealing with the flood of email that all admins seem to get, identifying and eliminating the time sinks in your environment, and documenting and automating your work-flow.In general, I think this is a great book for sysadmins that are looking to begin addressing time management problems. People that have already done some investigation of time management techniques (like the aforementioned Franklin-Covey and GTD systems) may find less value here — but I still think the book will be interesting, especially the chapters detailing the workings of “the cycle system”. Personally, after reading this book, I don’t see any reason to move away from my modified GTD system, but I have gone back to using some daily checklists, which are helping me keep on top of my repeating tasks a lot better. I suspect that any working sysadmin will take away at least two or three productivity-enhancing tips from this book.

3. 

   Aleksey tsalolikhin – December 15, 2025

   This is a life-saving book.
   I tell my colleagues this book is a life-saver. Tom’s time management tips and techniques (the Cycle System) have really increased my productivity and effectiveness. I like this book so much, I’ve started teaching a class based on it, to spread this knowledge. Here is what some of my students have said:”Drilling down from ‘goals’ to ‘What are you doing Monday?’ was an eye opener in terms of showing me how this sort of thing fits together. The goals exercise was the best part of it. It made the rest of the concepts real. I’ve even suggested to my boss that the sysadmin group do something similar at one of our staff meetings.” L.G.”I think that ‘The Cycle’ system is a pretty comprehensive approach to time planning, but very simple concept to implement. And it looks very practical in its approach. I definitely plan to follow up on it and give it a try right away. One thing it really encourages you to be very strategic in your thinking, which also helps with achieving long term goals. Putting some time to think about the important long term goals both personal and professional was a real eye opening for me, since I pretty much discovered that I am spending a lot of time and effort on things that are not important from the long term goal perspective.I liked also the attitude towards the vacation time — you know as a sysadmin you always feel guilty for taking too much vacation time in one lump, now I will feel guilty for not taking vacation time instead 🙂 It also helps to encourage your colleagues to take on more ownership and responsibilities over company’s infrastructure while you are on vacation.” O.B.

4. 

   Camilo Matajira – December 15, 2025

   # IntroductionIn **Time management for System Administrators** **Thomas Limoncelly** provides specific advice for System Administrators concerning Time Management.Why do System Administrators need a specific book on time management? Because System Administrators have an unusually high number of interruptions that prevent them from getting projects done (p.25). The good thing that System Administrators posses, and that also makes them unique concerning time management, is that they are tech-savvy. Which puts at their disposal several tools that the average non-technical person will find complicated to use (p.25).Perhaps what makes the System Administrators more unique concerning the time management, is the very nature of their work. On the one hand, System Administrators work for the projects they were hired for, but on the other, they also have to available to provide help and support in case of technical incidents; users’ requests; and quick fixes, etc.These two parts of the job description are in odds one against the other. Especially because, according to Limoncelly, managers judge System Administrator’s performance based on finished long term projects. But if time is not managed correctly, incidents and user’s requests take priority and long-term projects get undone. It is like the Eisenhower matrix: the important things are rarely urgent, and the urgent are rarely important.# Thesis of the bookIn my opinion, the most important idea in the book is this: Don’t trust your brain. First, don’t trust your brain memorize important technical procedures, todo lists, calendar meetings, because you will forget. Hence the need to be organized and rely on systems. Second, don’t trust your brain to produce great output when you are dividing your brainpower to do several tasks at the same time, to get the most out of your brain you need to be able to focus.To preserver our brainpower, Limoncelly provides his framework, which he calls the six principles of SA time management:1. One “database”: for time management information (use one organizer). This means, put all your information in a single place so you don’t have to jump between systems.2. Conserve your brainpower for what’s important (conserve RAM). Don’t use your brain for tasks that a calendar or todo list can do better. Use external storage for anything you aren’t focused on right now.3. Develop routines and stick with them. Routines are our best friends.4. Develop habits and mantras (replace runtime calculations with a precomputed decision).5. Maintain focus during “project time” (be like a kernel semaphore).6. Manage your social life with the same tools you use for your work-life (social life isn’t an optional feature)# The system the author propose “The Cycle”He also proposes a simple system he called “The Cycle” to help us handle our daily activities. It is composed of a calendar, a life-goals list, and a day by day to-do list and schedule. One should write all the meetings in the calendar as well as future to do’s. Every day you create a new schedule for the day, you start including the meetings that you already have in your calendar, then you start adding tasks to do in each of the timeslots in order of importance. The tasks that you are not able to finish are carried to the next day. I am oversimplifying the system, but the idea is to have a way in which you will not forget any of your commitments.I also found interesting that he motivates the reader to write down his goals. “The truth is that you will achiever more if you set goals. Studies have found that successful people set goals and work toward them. (…) I’m intrigued by evidence that setting a goal without working toward it is better than not setting goals at all.”# Handling emailOne of the chapters for which I profited the most, was when he explained how he does email. I adopted his method. The idea is to keep your inbox clean.To keep it clean you need to have a plan for what you’re going to do with every email message you receive, this is what he suggests:1. Filter:Filter emails according to content. Groups by mailing list for example.Less important mailing lists, deleted by FridayEvery month check if you should unsubscribe.He recommends using procmail to do serverside filtering.2. Delete unread.Maintenance announcement, spam, “blast” email.3. Read and:The goal is to touch email only once (I mean to deal with it and send it to its final resting place)”If you aren’t using proc mail you’re working too hard”3.1 DeleteEmails that require no action from us. CCs.3.2 File:He does not usually file.In case he did he has two folders: Save and Receipts3.3 Reply, then deleteEmails that require a reply should get a reply right away.If the reply needs a lot of work. Put the mail in the Todo list.3.4 Delegate or forward, then delete.cc the person so he knows who it was delegated to. Sometimes create a follow-up.3.5 Do now then delete.# Other interesting thoughts and suggestionHere is the list of interesting thoughts that I get from the book:Why do I need to focus: because those things that are worrying you or that have you distracted are taking away brain CPU power from the tasks that you are doing. It is better to stop, grab a piece of paper and write it down.In System Administration multitasking is the norm. Only very special tasks should be multitasked, those that you start and take a lot of time. You should not multitask anything else. Do one task at a time well rather than many things at once poorly.Don’t trust your brain, I write down every request, every time.Tip: You and your coworker can agree to establish a mutual interruption shield. Before lunch, you field all the interruptions so that your coworker can work on projects. After lunch your coworker fields all the interruptions and lets you work on projects. You’ll see an immediate improvement in the amount of project work you get done. This method works particularly well when there are a lot of SAs. We were able to add time slots of interruption catching that let the entire rest of the team focus on project work for all but one hour a day.Organize your windows with a virtual window manager. Rather than have 40 Organize your windows the same way every time.A good routine saves you work and reduces the amount of time you spend making decisions. Routines give you a way to think once, do many. The more routines we develop, the less brainpower we have to put into small matters and the more brainpower we have to focus on the fun and creative parts of being a system administrator.# ConclusionI would recommend this book to all System Administrators. Limoncelly has plenty of experience in the topic, and the stories and examples he uses in the book will make you identify with him easily if you are in the Sys Admin Camp.

5. 

   Saggingpeach – December 15, 2025

   Fantastic book, after my first read through it has already affected how I manage my work and time during the day. Thomas Limoncelli is a genius.

6. 

   Óscar Casal Sánchez – December 15, 2025

   Excellent book, if you are a SA you think that the world is crazy and you don’t have hours to do everything, really you need time management and don’t forget to enjoy your social life

7. 

   Simon – December 15, 2025

   Still great even it is quite a while ago it was written. Funny, relaxed and eye-opening book!

8. 

   Carlsberger – December 15, 2025

   It might be helpful for people who worked extremely hard in the past and had so much to do that could not focus on any organizing at all. In my opinion, if you have accomplished to get a school-degree, have accomplished to finalize projects like moving to a new flat or planning your vacation, you have done more in time-management topics than will be presented within the book.It is more a guide like a “simplify your life”, that means: you, of course, know all of those things which are presented, but haven’t actually tried to live like that. If you know what needs to be done, but you have never tried, or probably failed, this might be a good motivator to try again.The book is definitely not a useful guide to learn about the specific difficulties you need to deal with as an administrator and how to build a more “abstract” framework to improve the status quo.the name of the book should be more something like “think before you do” and can be summarized like: “you need to understand what is urgent and what is important”. Not more then that, but absolutely a good introduction when you have never dealt with managing your time.