BPL-03 Properly managing your timetable

About this guide

Tutors often run into serious issues due to poor timetable managing. This guide will spell out typical issues tutors face and help to make sure you never run into the same issues. Once you have set up your timetable (see BPL-02), it's important to make sure you continue to run your timetable effectively. Simple solutions and suggestions are provided for you.

Why it’s important to properly manage your timetable

It doesn’t matter if you have three or thirty students, you need to have a timetable you can control. The difference between a professional tutor and an unprofessional tutor can be as little as how they manage their timetables.

Take this scenario as an example: imagine you’re a student starting with a new tutor. You both agree on a lesson time and you show up for the first lesson on time. The tutor seems surprised to see you when you ring the doorbell. He rushes to get some materials ready and proceeds with the lesson. Next week you show up and after three rings of the doorbell he runs out to tell you to wait five minutes as his earlier student’s lesson is running late. You show up next week and when your tutor answers the door, he flat out tells you that he forgot you had a lesson today.

While the above scenario seems extreme, the reality is that there are many students experiencing the same situations. While nobody may be as bad as the tutor described, it gives you an idea of what would be going through the student’s head. Do you think a tutor who treats their students like this would develop a good reputation and attract more students? Its more likely current students will quit in frustration and tell everybody not to go to him. By properly managing and organizing your timetable, you avoid these issues.

Let's look at some simple strategies you can put in place to avoid issues like the one above.