Two Different Kinds of Schedules

I've known for sometime that an ill-timed meeting or interruption could throw my schedule off for an hour or more. As a programmer, I tend to work in blocks of time. It seemed that short of turning off e-mail and IM and hoping for no phone calls, I didn't have a good solution. Enter a great article about the difference between a "Maker's Schedule" and a "Manager's Schedule". A manager's schedule is broken into 1 hour segments. Meeting with someone is just a matter of finding a free spot. A maker's schedule is broken into tasks that can talk half a day or even a day. The solution? Plan meetings at the end of work day.