Time Management
Thursday, July 30th, 20091. Set your goals
Start by setting your goals. When you know where you’re going, you can then figure out what exactly needs to be done, in what order. Without proper goal setting, you’ll avoid confusing priorities. People tend not to spend time in goal setting because it requires effort. However, the little time and effort put in goal setting now will saves an enormous amount of time, effort and frustration in the future. Make a 4 by 4 matrix: Urgency (high/low) Importance (high/low).
2. Prioritize
Everyone has a “to-do” list of some sort. The problem is that they are just a collection of things that need to get done. To work efficiently you need to work on the most important, highest value tasks first. Without prioritizing, you may work very hard without achieving the results you desire; probably because what you are working on is not of strategic importance.
- Separate routine tasks from one-off tasks;
- Create a structure for the routine tasks, including everything (breaks, lunch, etc);
- Prioritize your one-off task as a to do list;
- Use your natural rhythms during the day (e.g. during the day you have more energy during the mornings, etc);
- Group similar tasks together in order to focus on one thing at a time.
3. Manage Interruptions
Know what to do to minimize the interruptions you face during your day; there are phone calls, information requests, questions, emails, chat, and a whole lot of other things that come-up unexpectedly. Some might need to be dealt immediately, but others must be managed.
4. Postponing
Deal with things that are important but you just postpone them (some people postpone things because they are afraid of success). First, recognize you postpone things, then reward yourself each time you get them right and also remind yourself the consequences of not getting those things done in time.
5. Scheduling
In essence, time management is about effectively scheduling your time. When you know what your goals and priorities are, then you have to create a schedule that keeps you on track and protects you from stress. You must understand the factors that affect your time available. You not only have to schedule priority tasks, but also leave room for interruptions and contingency for unexpected events. One all these steps are done, you will control your time and keep your life in balance. As an exercise, keep a time-log to actually understand in what you’re using your time; you will certainly see that there are a lot of things that you really don’t need to do (e.g. chat, txt, check emails every minute, etc). A good way to measure your time management skills is to use that time-log as a standard to understand how your ideal week should look like and try to improve your ratios every week and definitely see what activities take you to succeed-> time management involves a lot of FOCUS!
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There are 2 types of people:
- Through-time people: they are always aware of what time it is, they always realize how long things are going to take them and adjust accordingly and do everything (good in quantity).
- In-time people: are not aware about time, are more detailed and do quality work, not quantity.
However, both are stressed by time. 1. because time worries them, 2. because they’re always late.
-> a lot of time management depends on your motivation, if you’re demotivated you’ll avoid certain tasks and you’ll don’t do them; try to do things that you dislike first and get them over with. A lot of demotivation comes from things that you cannot control: thus: FOCUS ON THINGS THAT YOU DO CAN CONTROL. “Displacement Activity“= when you do other thing to avoid what you really have to be doing!
