Time Management
Time Management for Professionals
Article Source: Time Management Tips For Professionals
There is no undemanding route in perfecting time management. Although the thought of managing time may sound undemanding, many people are still result it trying to follow.
If you are one of those people who learn it hard to follow time management, then here are some tips with the intention of you can follow.
1. See the BIGGER Picture
Time is a constant and abundant resource with the intention of people can’t buy or sell. It is a resource with the intention of can be shared with or can be shared from someone else.
And one effective way of managing it is by visualizing a larger and clearer picture of your goal. Prioritize more the actions with the intention of would place you closer to your objective, and prioritize less those with the intention of won’t. Wisely assess the tasks with the intention of need prioritization in order to accomplish actions with the intention of are closely related to your goal.
Many successful people today practice different time management forms and techniques, but if there’s one thing these business minded people impart in common. It’s the thought of how they want to spend their business time.
2. AUDITING Time Management (For Professionals)
Ideally speaking, all with the intention of a person should list and follow should be actively valuable towards their desired goal.
To make your auditing quicker, the following are sub-breakdowns with the intention of many professionals spend their time on. Personal goals may differ, but the general thought of breaking goals down remains the same.
People and Managing. Managing people can be sub-categorized in to three different areas namely;
1. Managing time across
2. Managing time up
3. Managing time downIf you’re currently effective as a leader or as a manager in a company, know with the intention of the best way to spend most of your time is by directly supervising your team or co-workers below you.
This is also an effective strategy of teaching your employees while effective your personal qualified goal at the same time. Cultivating time-leverage upward not only benefits the team and the company, but it can also benefit you by moving closer to your goal.
3. CHARTS for Time ManagementPresently, there are lots of these tips with the intention of are scattered all over the internet. The approach may vary now and again, but believe with the intention of the basic thought is still there.
One common tip most time management tips impart is in building a chart. Building charts are effective in reminding vital plans ahead. Making charts are also helpful in simplifying time management audits, as well as in pitching the whole picture of your goal.
Building a Chart:
a. Initiation building your chart by writing down the days and weeks in a month. Across its columns on top, write down your major tasks and goals with the intention of needs prioritization.
b. After you complete this activity, record the amount of time you spent below each category. This way you can easily monitor your progress and accomplishments in one day.
c. Try to stick to the preparation as much as possible.
d. Avoid over responsibility it by stuffing to much work in one day.
Time Lost , Author, gothick_matt
7 Effective Time Management Techniques
http://www.PositiveTraining.com.au …..Effective time management skills are essential skills for effective people. People who use these techniques routinely are the highest achievers in all walks of life, from business to sport to public service. If you us…
Time Management Techniques: Tips for Learning Effective Skills
http://www.averagegoddess-freebook.com http://www.thegoddesswithinmovie.com Learn effective time management techniques, skills, and tools for overcoming procrastination. Get free tips that are as useful for employees in the workplace as for students in the classro…
10 Effective Time Management Tips
Save time. Stop wasting your time, use these time and activity management techniques
Strategies for Workable Time Management | Time Management | Time …
Time management іѕ a concept thаt many people naturally hаνе difficulty wіth, bυt wіth thе rіɡht time management strategies, thеrе іѕ nο reason whу уου саnnοt take charge οf уουr time аnԁ change уουr life. Here аrе four time management …
Publish Date: 10/18/2010 8:40
http://time-management-strategies.net/72199/strategies-for-workable-time-management-17/
Students time management.mp4 | Time Management | Time Management …
Children need tο bе taught organizational аnԁ time–management skills. HеƖр уουr child see exactly whеrе hіѕ time goes аnԁ learn hοw tο better manage hіѕ time. Watch ουr helpful video аnԁ download ουr “Weekly Schedule” worksheet аnԁ …
Publish Date: 10/18/2010 2:13
http://time-management-strategies.net/72109/students-time-management-mp4-6/
Crucial Time Management
Article Source: Some Crucial Aspects Of Time Management | Help & Teach Our Children
42-15529728
Businessman Overwhelmed with Paperwork — Image by © Royalty-Free/Corbis
Author:tinitoac
Email Essentials at Work
If you work at a company that offers an email account and most of your business is handled via Internet, then you know that excessive emails are annoying. Customer accounts, contracts, and other important documents we do not want to loose, so to keep your mailbox from piling up, it is smart to only give your email address to clients. We can avoid emails piling up by not providing information to advertisements that ask for our information. If you want to place, an order for a product be sure to use an email account that does not send out information over the Internet. Many companies have a managing program that works to save time. Databases often store valuable information, and should be maintained. If you store information on the database, be sure to delete or store old files in a different area, so you can save time. If your email accounts only stores documents that are important to your business, you can save not only time, but also you can spare yourself from liabilities that may creep up. It depends on the company and what type of email account they require the employee to use, but Microsoft Outlook includes features such as address books, business and other features that help the user stay organized.
Essential Notes
Notes are essential since they too play a role in time management. Learning the techniques to taking good notes is a start in the right direction. When we take good notes, we are able to stay organized and run our life smoothly. If you attend a lot of meetings, it might be wiser to meet with the parties attending the meeting before it starts. This can help manage time by informing the co-workers ahead of the game what the meeting entails, as well as enabling you to take notes before the meeting starts. Essentials in time management also include taking time out for yourself, preparing, keeping your priorities in order, and working toward the goals you set.</fo
Life is full of essentials, and if we have the ingredients to make it work, then you are lucky. Time management is one of the most important foundations in our lives. If you think about it, we have 24 – hours a day and seven or eight of …
Publish Date: 10/10/2010 21:54
http://www.catlakkremleri.com/essentials-in-time-management/
Time Management Essentials: 13 Routines For Improving Your Life
Time Management Essentials: 13 Routines For Improving Your Life. I’m usually against adopting strict, boring routines in my lifestyle, unless they can really improve the quality of my life. But even yet, I don’t like boring things at …
Publish Date: 08/31/2010 12:10
http://freestylemind.com/routines-for-improving-your-life
Time
Author:John-Morgan
Time Lost
Author:gothick_matt
Time managment quotes
I love these time management quotes, check them out below. Which is your favourite?
Article Source: Blog For Self Improvement: Best Time Management Quotes
Time is the school in which we learn, time is the fire in which we burn. ~ Delmore Schwartz
Time = life; therefore, waste your time and waste of your life, or master your time and master your life. ~ Alan Lakein
A man who dares to waste one hour of life has not discovered the value of life. ~ Charles Darwin
Take care of the minutes and the hours will take care of themselves. ~ Lord Chesterfield
Whether it’s the best of times or the worst of times, it’s the only time we’ve got. ~ Art Buchwald
Money, I can only gain or lose. But time I can only lose. So, I must spend it carefully. ~ Author Unknown
Time is the most valuable thing a man can spend. ~ Laertius Diogenes
One worthwhile task carried to a successful conclusion is worth half-a-hundred half-finished tasks. ~ Malcolm S. Forbes
You will never “find” time for anything. If you want time, you must make it. ~ Charles Bruxton
Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Pasteur, Michelangelo, Mother Teresa, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein. ~ H. Jackson Brown
The great dividing line between success and failure can be expressed in five words: “I did not have time.” ~ Franklin Field
Want To Accomplish More EVERY Day? Time Management!
Want to be more successful? Visit http://www.prescriptionwealth.com for personal development, goals, time management, sales, marketing, leadership and how to be wealthy? Similar to Tony Robbins, Brian Tracy, Napoleon Hill, Zig Ziglar,Robert Kiyosaki, Wayne D…
Time Management for Kids
Ever feel you’ve all the time in the world to do the things that you want to as well as all the things that you NEED to? How could manage your time better? Many of the strategies we use are great for kids too? But should our kids be learning about time management?
Kids should be mindful of the rewards in handling their time. As parents we can integrate this pattern to our kids day to day activites. Our kids will copy what they see their parents, teachers, mentors and peers doing. When they see how well we manage our time they will look to see how they can copy useful strategies into their own lives. Good practices include creating good habits for ourselves, whether it is putting toys away, clearing the dinner table or some other regular acitivity.
A calander is a good resourse we all use, we can use it not just as a reminder for appointments but to record other information like regular activities which need to be completed. As our kids grow older they can plan their own time to fit in their out of school activities, homework and revision sessions, time for relaxation, exercise and socialising should be set aside too.
The key to successful time management for adults and kids alike is to break down tasks into manageable sizes and to set time aside for each task or sub task to be completed. Study planners are great so kids can see they are getting the balance of study and play right and to keep focus on what needs to be achieved.
Just as we go to work for financial rewards dont expect your kids to stick go without rewards themselves, it does not have to be anything huge but a simple treat and words of recognition for those small acheivements and successes is very motivating to kids.
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](https://i0.wp.com/img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png)
Time Management for Managing Stress
Time Management is Important for Stress Management
Time Management is Important for Stress Management
by Stop Panic
Effective resource allocation can help you lead a more healthy life and render you more productive, with adequate work and relaxation time. Alternatively,poor time management can not only lead to poor productivity but also undue amounts of stress.
Activity records are one of the most important tools in resource management. They help you utilise your time better, so that you can reduce time consumption on certain activities and eliminate time-wasting ones. In this way,you get more time for work and your general efficiency increases.
It might be shocking for you to see the amount of time wasted once you start making an activity record. One might spend a hell bunch of time in reading worthless mails, perusing the internet,talking to associates,making coffee, and travelling or waiting in meeting rooms.
Time
Author:John-Morgan
When you start tracking your activities for a few weeks, you will analyze the time you waste, in a better manner. Start changing habits that are mere time wastage. If you believe you are wasting time reading mails, then sort out your mails, categorize your mails in sections such as ‘read later’and ‘read now’.
If you have many tasks to do in an exceedingly short duration, then work through the list and see if there are any jobs that may be delegated to someone that isn’t as overloaded as you may be, and who can help you with it.
Alternatively, barter with the people you are dealing with to see it they are prepared to offer you more time. As you consider your time function and your ability to deliver tasks, remember to leave emergency time for unexpected activities and for appropriate teamwork.
Prioritize well. This is another golden rule of time allocation.Ask as to which task demands more of your attention. You should also be ready to figure out if you should be doing a given task at a given point of time. Prioritize your jobs and you’ll manage your time better.
resource allocation takes practice. Ask whether the task at hand is what you need or have to be doing at this actual moment. If the answer is yes, by all means, go ahead and do it.
Allot a correct place for all your stuff and develop a habit to keep your things in the right location.This way you’ll never need to search for any of your belongings and you may so save a lot of time. It will help you keep away from stress.
Time Management Without Really Trying | Engage Today
Do you ever feel pressure as project deadlines come and pass? The best advice I ever heard was to take a deep breath, exhale, relax, and cut.
Publish Date: 05/05/2010 14:11
http://engagetoday.org/time-management-without-really-trying/
Effective time management skills, Effective time management and …
Get more information about effective time management, effective time management skills, effective time management and planning, effective time management strategies, effective time management techniques at Business Mantra.
Publish Date: 05/05/2010 6:05
http://www.businessmantra.net/effective-time-management-skills.html
Randy Pausch Lecture: Time Management
Carnegie Mellon Professor Randy Pausch gave a lecture on Time Management at the University of Virginia in November 2007. Randy Pausch — http://www.randypausch.com — is a virtual reality pioneer, human-computer interaction researcher, co-founder of Carnegi…
Time Management and the 80-20 Rule
How can you finally achieve buying your perfect house? The average person has about 300 projects to take care of right now. The fact is, you will never get caught up – but you WILL start getting your life under control when you STOP doing things. Wha…
Time Management Tips
Time Management Tips to Complete your Goals
Reaching a goal is easy to say, and in real life can be harder to do. That’s why staying motivated during the times that you just don’t feel like it, or when you don’t even want to try is so important. There are keys as to why you might not feel you’re at full potential. It could be you – a not very self confident you.
If you think you can just fake it and you’ll be successful, then think again. It won’t work. So what can you do?
Start by looking your self confidence issue square in the face and then change it! No one else can, and to be honest no one else cares as much as you should. Write down why you feel the way you do and make a list of the areas you would like to improve or change totally about yourself. Be honest and know what is really important to improve on, and what can be changed. Develop a plan for your spiritual life too. If you don’t have grounding in a spiritual or religious life, take the time to find one. It will change how you handle life, and any curve balls it throws at you. You only have one life to live, so live it to your fullest, and to the best of your capabilities. Without addressing your self confidence issue – no time management skills matter, but don’t be to hard on yourself change takes time, but begin today changing your future.
Here are 5 tips that you can use to stay motivated, and to achieve whatever goals that you’ve set out for yourself in your life.
Make a plan to stay motivated. Write it down. Look at the different ways that keep you motivated and write those down too. There are endless possibilities for motivation that you can use, and there will be new ones that you might discover along the way. Take some time to read some books from inspirational power leaders such as Tony Robbins, or use spirituality to inspire you and give you hope.
Take the time to write down every morning, or even the night before, short term lists for goals that you want to achieve that day or the next. By focusing on a few short term goals your long term ones will become closer and well defined. Take your long term goals and shorten them into easier to accomplish steps.
Walk from room to room and post some brightly colored post-it notes listing all of the positive things that will happen in your life by achieving your goals. Taking a look at the goals you will accomplish will inspire you to reach for the goal and not to give up.
Use time wisely by taking care of your body. Regular exercise and a healthy diet in conjunction with a steady sleep routine will keep you alert and focused on the goals ahead.
Reward yourself when you reach a milestone toward your goal. Do this by taking some time for you, in other words take the time to smell the roses. Soak a little longer in the tub, buy a new outfit, and take a day off to spend with a loved one, or just nap the afternoon away. Do whatever it takes to make you feel good about what reaching out for your goal.
As you go along with your plans always recognize that when the bad days hit, there will always be a tomorrow. However, if you notice that you just can’t get out of the unmotivated mood you’re in, then it could be signs of a physical problem that could be causing you experience depression. Imbalances in the body can really play havoc on your goals, and delay the time for you reaching your goals.
By reaching for the stars and succeeding you’ll find things out about yourself that you never knew. The most important thing to remember is that you should never quit, even when the chips are down. Why? Because you understood and put into practice your own version of the 5 time management tips and beat the odds! The best thing is if you did it once you can do it all over again.
Time
Have we forgotton how to concentrate?
This article is one which I found really interesting and thought I would share with readers of my blog.
Source: Have we forgotten how to concentrate? – Times Online
I must be quite a sight at work. A large paper fish is wedged into my monitor to conceal new email alerts. I wear a Madonna-taking-an-aerobics-class headset, not for hands-free calls, but to block out noise (invariably, there’s someone close by, shouting my name because I can’t hear them). And I read out loud to stop myself just going through the motions. You see, I’m trying to concentrate. And there’s a lot stacked up against it.
In a new book, The Art of Concentration, the health writer Harriet Griffey argues that we are experiencing an attention crisis. Office workers are interrupted every three minutes, so at best we have a three-minute attention span, and 62% of us are addicted to email. Meanwhile, a recent study at the University of California calculated that we are bombarded with 34 gigabytes of information a day, including roughly 100,000 words (a figure that has more than doubled in the past 30 years). What’s more, the trend-spotting agency The Future Laboratory talks of “filter failure”, “information anxiety” (fretting about awaited emails) and “stuffocation” (the state of being overwhelmed by years of consumption). No wonder we self-diagnose attention-deficit disorder.
“In Britain, we work the longest hours and get the least done,” says The Future Laboratory’s Chris Sanderson. “It’s a big problem.” An “attention economy” has emerged, where the scarce commodity is human attention.
“The ability to concentrate is the X factor,” says Griffey, whose book, promisingly subtitled Enhance Focus, Reduce Stress and Achieve More, unpacks all the latest science (plus Buddhist thinking) on focus. She points out that we are experts at “sabotaging, daydreaming and distraction”. Thirty per cent of the time, we don’t think about what we’re doing. Even the brainiac Alain de Botton struggles. “The constant thrill the internet can deliver is hard to challenge,” he admits. “I don’t manage much work while ostensibly at work.”
Related Links* Do you have adult ADHD?
* Is it ADHD that’s eating the boss?
* Call to bring ‘smart drugs’ out of the closet
We are our own worst enemies, says Griffey. We develop avoidance strategies, instinctively seeking the path of least resistance to binge on virtual comfort food. Yet it takes, on average, 15 minutes to refocus after an interruption. Email is addictive because it brings reward: an invitation, a joke, some attention — simple lab-rat science. If I ate food, say, like I checked my digital portals, I’d think I had a serious problem.
I do, and it has a name, coined by a former Apple employee, Linda Stone. Continuous partial attention (CPA) describes this behaviour. “We are always on high alert, scanning the periphery for other opportunities,” she says. CPA, and the concomitant state of the do-it-now mentality, make us multitask, and speedily, so concentration is poor and mistakes are made. We all know that reading emails while on the phone to a client or when out with friends doesn’t work.
Griffey says we can all concentrate well and do the job once. Concentration leads to success. We’d leave work earlier. We’d also get more out of food, music, people, flat-pack furniture, everything. But avoidance, negative thinking and digital dependence are formed habits, so stopping them takes discipline.
There could be longer-term implications. De Botton argues that a lack of concentration is affecting our ability to be alone and unstimulated, and it could make us stupid. While scientists know our behaviour is changing, they don’t know how that affects our neural structure. We must relearn how to concentrate, says De Botton, who has all but banned his children from computers.
Naturally, Griffey, an erstwhile “flutter-brain”, is “very good now” at concentrating, but arguably the biggest driver was having children. “With babies, you have 90 minutes to yourself, tops, to focus,” she says. “Eight hours now seems an infinite time.”
From the man who thought five hours’ work a week was too much — Timothy Ferriss, the author of The 4-Hour Workweek — comes the “low-information diet”, where you focus on output (work), not input (news, emails, surfing). Ferriss talks of “attention management” — which, he argues, we need like time management. “Information consumes attention,” he says. “ The only option is selective ignorance — one of the few common traits among top performers.” De Botton supports this notion: “My real work happens in bed or in the bath — away from the infernal machine.”
Information dieters report feeling as refreshed as after a two-week holiday. But as we already know, dieting runs counter to our natural impulses — no wonder we are seeing the rise of internet-addiction clinics. That’s just the start of the attention economy. The Future Laboratory predicts attention managers, deletion parties and time coaches. IBM, Intel and Deloitte are implementing “technology quarantines” — no-email days, no-computer days even — and with positive results: improved relations and greater productivity.
If we want results, we need to “single-task”, says Ferriss, finishing one task before starting another, and resisting instant gratification. “Lots of people say they’d love to write a book,” says Griffey. “I say, you can. You just need to concentrate for long enough.” It’s time to start paying attention to paying attention.
PAY ATTENTION NOW
Practice the five-more rule Force yourself to read for five more minutes, write for five more minutes or learn five more things before getting distracted.
Exercise Mental activities such as sudoku and memory games promote agility. Try meditation, t’ai chi and yoga.
Rest Relax constructively: sports, games and hobbies are good; television is not. Twenty-minute naps refresh the brain.
Be cyber-savvy Only check your emails once an hour and turn off any alerts.
Go rustic Urban settings put you on high alert. If you can’t take a country walk, take lunch in the park.
Know yourself Find your chronotype (are you an owl or a lark?), so you can work when you’re most alert.
Prepare Envisage your desired outcome (as golfers do); keep a notepad to hand to record other thoughts and focus on the task.
Don’t try harder, try differently To beat a mental block, pique your interest — tweak your imagination, find your hook.
Recommended reading
The
Art of Concentration: Enhance focus, reduce stress and achieve more by Harriet GriffeyThe
4-hour Work Week: Escape the 9-5, Live Anywhere and Join the New Rich
by Timothy Ferriss The
80/20 Principle: The Secret of Achieving More with Less by Richard Koch
Simple Time Management: Curing Procrastination the Simple Way
Source: Simple Time Management: Curing Procrastination the Simple Way
Procrastination is a subject that is very much linked to time management discussions and debated in many of the time management forums across the Internet. These discussions always intrigue me as I do not think of procrastination as a time management problem for most people. Let’s review the definitions of procrastination and what it means to procrastinate. See if this stays together as the article unfolds time management systems versus project management systems.
Procrastination according to Merriam-Webster is: to put off intentionally and habitually : to put off intentionally the doing of something that should be done. This is a pretty clear and simple definition of the problem.
Time management systems are quite simply organization systems. You need a list of what you must accomplish over a certain time horizon, so you get it done. You organize your files so information is readily available when you need it saving you the time of hunting around for things. So by definition time management systems help those who are in motion. The procrastinator is not yet in motion. They have put off doing what they need to do. So logically, time management systems do not help procrastinators. In other words you don’t need a map if the trip has not started.
Causes of Procrastination
I think there are some simple categories into which most procrastination falls.
Pleasure/Pain Impact is Not Currently Felt Nor Imminent
In simple terms people are motivated to act by either pleasure or pain. If the task is very pleasurable to them the motivation is there and it will be accomplished. Clean your room and I will take you to the toy store is an example. If the task will avoid a lump of pain, again the motivation will be there. File your taxes on time to avoid a large penalty is an example here. If the procrastinator does not have the awareness to and mindfulness to project the pleasure to be enjoyed or the pain to be felt from their delayed action, they will continue to delay taking action until opportunities are lost and situation are uncorrectable. So in our examples, Dad lost his patience waiting for the room to be cleaned and left without you. In the pain example, you waited so long, that all the accountants in town are booked up and have no time to see you and there is no way you can get your taxes done on time now.
Overwhelm
The feeling of overwhelm is one that can impact many people. Simply put, the task is so daunting that you simple defer it because you don’t know how or where to start. The thought of writing a 20 page research paper overwhelms you so you go out for a beer with your friends.
Cures for Procrastination
I find it funny that there are many cure procrastination programs advertised on-line with most of them asking people to take fill out lengthy questionnaires or read long books. Just what someone who has a procrastination problem needs is more on their plate. They probably have a bunch of reading and tasks to they have not gotten to, why do they need more. What procrastinators need are simple ideas that will get them focuses on the tasks they must get done.
Awareness
The first tip is awareness. You must use awareness to bring the future into the present. You can only act now. By being aware now of the pain or pleasure completing a task will provide, you will be more apt to take the required action now to avoid the pain, or experience the pleasure. Think about the outcome and consequences of delaying action and what the future looks like with the actions undone. Play that as a movie in your mind like it was now. This simple technique will provide you the motivation needed to begin the actions needed to get started and to reduce the anxiety you are feeling knowing the task has not started. To quote DK Reynolds, “Nothing diminishes anxiety faster than action.”
Small Steps
As the old saying by Lao-Tzu goes, the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Use this advice to break bigger projects down into smaller easier to accomplish tasks. A 20 page research paper is daunting, but a 10 minute on-line search for books on the paper’s topic is not. Take the whole task and break it down into smaller mini-projects in sizes that do not overwhelm you. Then schedule the tasks into your calendar leaving plenty of extra time for slippage of the schedule. This method ensures the project is done on time and in a manner that relieves anxiety instead of creating it.
Like everything else in life the cure to procrastination can be simple and effective.
Recommended reading
Time Management Tips
I found this great article on Time Management Tips which I thought I would share with you.
Source: 15 Time Management Tips
For some of us playa’s, there never seems to be enough time in the day to do what we do best…which is not a lot. By the time Happy Hour rolls around, we start to wonder where the day went. But fear not. A few tweaks to your day-to-day activities can start putting some time back into your life, so you’ll have more time for watching reruns of “Wings” and warming up your TV dinners. All it takes is a few adjustments.
Recognize Where the Waste IsIn order to begin a time management program, you need to pinpoint exactly where you are wasting the most time. Likely, there will be many areas where you need better time management. Look at those areas and start working on them every day. Slacking off here or there won’t help you. Be rigid.
Get Some ToolsGetting your life organized will help your time management because you won’t have to think about what is coming up next on your schedule. You can also look up directions if you have a meeting, what restaurants are nearby, and a million other handy things to save yourself some time. Some people use their iPhone for these functions and some still use the Palm Pilot system. Whatever you use, make sure you can surf the net and plug in your daily schedule at ease.
Multi-Task While EatingEating while just staring at the wall is a great time waster. Which is not a good thing. At least check your e-mail or read over a project you have to work on in the afternoon while you are munching your way through that tuna sandwich. If you read (dork!) in your free time, do it during lunch to give you some extra time later when you are usually reading.
Make Calls in the CarNo, we didn’t say hold the phone or dial while you are driving. That’s illegal in a lot of places these days and kinda’ not safe. Use a hands-free device to make your calls and check your voice mail. We all have people we need to chat with every day, so make good use of your time in the car and get the talking out of the way while you make your way through traffic.
Brush Teeth in the ShowerGetting your teeth cleaned up may seem like a quick enough task, but if you do it while standing under the shower head, you can save yourself a couple of extra minutes in the morning. Do it for a week and say hello to ten extra minutes of time for you. This is time you can spend putting your fake eyelashes on or something.
Run HomeThis is for those of you that work out. Provided you have a cardio program, think about getting the workout finished before you even get home. If you have a wife, girlfriend, or even a dude you carpool with, have them drop you off a few miles from home and start your run. Throw your clothes in a backpack and do it up Army Ranger style. Saves you having to go in the house, change, then leave again. Shaves several minutes off of your day.
Workout TheaterPiggybacking on the running time saver, for your weigh-lifting workouts, try adapting it to a home workout. Press some iron in the living room while watching a TV show you have on DVR or a flick you have way-overdue from Blockbuster. You will finish your workout while getting your entertainment on and now have some extra TV time for the evening.
Watch the DistractionsDudes get distracted easily, we know this. If you have some work to get done on the computer, but can’t resist TNT’s afternoon lineup, keep the TV off while working. This goes for the radio, hanging out at Starbucks or working while sitting on the beach. Actually, that one would be pretty sweet.
Give Work to Someone ElseWe don’t take on too much work ourselves because we’re just lazy. But we know a lot of you out there keep piling work on yourself. Learn how to delegate and give work to other people at work, or to roommates at home. Little things, like washing dishes can suck 10 minutes out of your day. Look for areas to pass the task baton to others.
SleepMany of us feel that afternoon lull where our head starts to bob at our desk. We’re bored with work and we just had to stay up last night to see Angelina Jolie on Letterman. We then spend the next hour trying to fight off sleep and getting refocused. To avoid this, make sure to get enough sleep every night…except the nights when Angelina is on.
Plan AheadEach night, there needs to be a moment where you review what will be happening the next day. If you have somewhere to be at 8:30am, plan accordingly. Set your alarm to wake up earlier. Plan your route to avoid as much of the morning traffic rush as possible. It will only take a couple of minutes to refer to your schedule, but will save you tons of time the next day.
PrioritiesMaking sure you are attacking a task in the order it should be conquered is also key to managing your time. Alphabetizing your record collection instead of doing your taxes is probably not a smart move. Make a list of things you need to do — no matter how small — and put them in order. You can then attack projects and tasks as they move up the list instead of trying to do pieces of projects at the same time. That just keeps you unfocused and wasting time.
Keep on the CleaningFor you dudes not fortunate enough to have someone living with them that loves to do all the cleaning, you need to stay one up on the cleaning, laundry, and general house stuff. Don’t let the laundry pile up for two weeks then blow half your Saturday doing laundry and folding clothes. Likewise, don’t wait until your place is so messy even the vermin are moving out before you clean it. Do a little at a time as you are going about your day. It’ll never pile up and you’ll always be caught up.
Make Some Extra FoodIf you cook — or even if you are just ordering out — make sure to get a little extra. You can reheat the stuff for your next dinner and save yourself having to cook again. Or you can brown bag it the next day at work and save yourself a trip out to Burger King. Try doing this 2-3 times per week and see how much extra time it’ll save you.
Monster Shopping DayThis is the antithesis of the cleaning tip. Grabbing some groceries and other household items can suck up your time if you go a few times per week. There’s the traffic, parking, standing in line…all that fun stuff. Plan your shopping for a couple hours once every two weeks. Stock up so you won’t have to keep running out for more stuff. Yes, this will require thought and making a list. But you’ll save yourself hours.
How to Have better time management
- Image by vpickering via Flickr
It’s the enemy of us all and we are at its mercy. Time, as the saying goes, waits for no one. However, there is help at hand! In fact, a lot of time has been devoted to the benefits of time management and how to achieve it. Today’s stressful lifestyle means a constant juggling of work, family life and social life. It’s easy to take your eye off the ball and let one of those departments suffer. Being organized can’t be left to chance. It really does require some effort and it pays off in the end.
There are numerous books written on the subject and courses and workshops are conducted to teach us the methods and benefits of time management. The Filofax, so popular with go-getters in the 1980s, brought the first stirrings of laying down a format for dividing up time. Some people prefer software applications that follow the same principles. A lot of people have things to do lists but it needs to be more refined than that.
Prioritizing is the key; otherwise there are too many paths to wander down in a forest full of waiting tasks. It’s a good idea to have an end goal in sight; otherwise specific tasks lose their sense of identity. Ask yourself, where would you like to be in five year’s time or ten or fifteen? Also, the benefits of time management will be lost if the set targets are not in sympathy with work colleagues or family members. Are you all singing from the same hymn sheet?
Once a clear goal is formalized, there are targets to decide and placed in order of chronology and importance. It’s the most satisfying feeling in the world to tick off those boxes. Daily, weekly and monthly tasks should be set out in detail. Not everything always goes to plan of course and a bit of flexibility needs to be built in. The benefits of time management will only work if the targets are realistic. Neither underestimate nor overestimate what can be achieved.
Everyone likes to be in control but you will never leave the office on time if you don’t delegate. It will soon become apparent, who can be trusted and who can’t. Another important aspect of the benefits of time management is self discipline. Procrastination won’t get the job done. This is especially significant if you are working from home, an increasing activity these days. It may be a sunny day and the golf course is calling but that monthly report won’t write itself. When the weekly targets have been met, that’s the time to reward yourself with a little rest and recreation. After all, all work and no play makes Jack or Jill a dull boy or girl.
Related articles by Zemanta
- Time Management Shouldn’t Take a Lot of Time (geordiecoach.wordpress.com)
- Efficient Time Management Part One (geordiecoach.wordpress.com)
- The Productivity Dilemma: To Do or Not to Do? (geordiecoach.wordpress.com)
- Getting Things Done: Tips on Using Your Time Productively (geordiecoach.wordpress.com)
- Could your time management skills get you laid-off this year? (briantracybusinessguru.wordpress.com)
Further Reading
Time Management for Dummies (UK Edition) by Clare Evans
Do it Tomorrow and Other Secrets of Time Management by Mark Forster
The 25 Best Time Management Tools and Techniques: How to Get More Done without Driving Yourself Crazy by Pamela Dodd and Doug Sundheim
Eat That Frog. 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time by Brian Tracy (Paperback – 1 Jan 2008)
Who Moved My Cheese?: An Amazing Way to Deal with Change in Your Work and in Your Life by Spencer Johnson
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](https://i0.wp.com/img.zemanta.com/reblog_b.png)
The Productivity Dilemma: To Do or Not to Do?
Article Source
The Productivity Dilemma: To Do or Not to Do? | SUCCESS Magazine | What Achievers Read
The Productivity Dilemma: To Do or Not to Do?
“Do-not-do” lists might be the answer to improving your time management.
Chelsea Greenwood
Hi, my name is Chelsea, and I’m a listaholic. At any given time, I have multiple lists outlining chores to do, people to call, things to buy, etc. Even the fun stuff somehow makes its way into list form, from movies to watch and books to read to places to visit.
Sound familiar? If you, too, live by the list, consider this: How many of those list items ever get done—and how many of them really need to get done? Sure, it would be great to finally send in that $15 rebate or reorganize your file cabinet. But, by constantly nagging yourself about accomplishing these not-so-consequential tasks, they wind up hanging like millstones around your neck. Who needs that added anxiety?“In the rush of our intense workdays, our instinct is to focus on ever-expanding to-do lists,” says Matthew Cornell, a personal-productivity specialist and a consultant at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. “This is natural—being busy feels like being effective. But fixating on doing takes us away from two important things: doing what has the biggest impact on the bottom line (ours or our organization’s) and reexamining at a higher level what we’re doing in the first place.”
Many productivity and time-management experts say the most helpful list you may ever create is one outlining what not to do. By taking a realistic look at how you spend your time, you can determine which activities don’t yield valuable results in return for the time and effort they require. Then, you can cut those time-wasters out of your life. That is the question. “Do-not-do” lists might be the answer. by Chelsea Greenwood
In his best-seller Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap… and Others Don’t, Jim Collins lauds the value of a “stop-doing” list: “Those who built the good-to-great companies… made as much use of stop-doing lists as to-do lists. They displayed a remarkable discipline to unplug all sorts of extraneous junk.”
The first step in deciding what not to do in your life is zeroing in on what you ultimately want to achieve.
“If you really get clear about your real goals, visions and values, it will be easier to cull the extraneous things off your lists that aren’t that purposeful for you,” says David Allen, an author, lecturer and founder and chairman of the David Allen Company, a management consulting, coaching and training fi rm.
Sit down with your co-workers, spouse or family members, and take some time to outline your priorities in as specific terms as possible. For example: “We want to sell X amount by the end of the year,” or “We want to save X amount for retirement by 2015.” Having this endpoint in mind will help you streamline the road to getting there and remove any speed bumps along the way.
Next, the most important step is to assess how you currently spend your time. “The biggest time-management mistake people make is not realizing how much time they waste,” says Peggy Duncan, personal-productivity expert and author of The Time Management Memory Jogger. “To get a visual of how you spend your time, keep a time log for a few days.”
Dedicate a new notebook and choose at least three days to log from an average week (not during the holidays, a vacation, a period of transition, etc.). If you’re looking at your in-office habits, choose weekdays; if you’re looking at your time spent at home or with loved ones, choose a couple of weekdays and a weekend. Duncan suggests creating columns with the following headers:
1. Time: Record the start and end times, not just the total amount.
2. Activity: Describe exactly what you were doing.
3. Planned: Was the activity planned or last-minute?
4. Interruption: Did you encounter an interruption while trying to accomplish your task? What was it—an e-mail, an instant message, a co-worker dropping in?
5. People: Who else was involved in this activity?
6. Priority A to D: Give the activity a priority grade (A being the highest) based on your goals and how you’ve prioritized your work.
Next, take some time to objectively analyze your log. Look for patterns that you may not have noticed before. The time column may reveal that you take frequent coffee breaks in the afternoon.
Or you may notice that you’re prone to spontaneous activities that deter you from your planned goals for the day. Maybe meetings take longer whenever a certain co-worker is around.
Now it’s time to budget. Collins writes: “In a good-to-great transformation, budgeting is a discipline to decide which arenas should be fully funded and which should not be funded at all. In other words, the budget process is not about figuring out how much each activity gets, but about determining which activities best support [your goal] and should be fully strengthened and which should be eliminated entirely.”
Decide which activities support your aforementioned goal, and consider that, after assessing your log, some of these can be improved or streamlined. Those activities that distract or detract from your goal go on your “do-not-do” list.
Cornell adds that it may be helpful to make a third list of “projects or efforts that, while interesting and potentially valuable, simply aren’t worth doing at this time. Rather than simply dropping them, it’s essential to keep a list of these. Otherwise, your mind will try to track them for you, degrading your intellectual performance. This is hard, though. Because we want it all, it is difficult to give up. For this reason, it helps to treat this ‘idea file’ of projects you’re not doing as a dynamic thing. You should review it periodically to evaluate whether it’s time to reactivate some of them.”
Depending on how drastic your findings are, implementing your do-not-do list may require persistence and teamwork. Post the list in one or more visible areas to remind yourself what you should not be doing, and enlist the support of co-workers, friends or loved ones to keep you on track.
Allen recommends using the power of positive thinking. “Focus on ways to identify yourself with the new, more supportive habit,” he says. “Instead of telling yourself you should stop watching TV on the couch, start imagining how good you’ll feel on a walk in the fresh air. That new identification will naturally get you off the couch.”
Collins writes that seeing through on your do-not-do list ultimately may take sheer force of will. “The real question is… do you have the discipline to do the right thing and, equally important, to stop doing the wrong things?”
Effective Time Management – Separating Entrepreneurs from All the Rest
Source: How to Manage Time: for Effective Entrepreneurs
Effective Time Management – Separating Entrepreneurs from All the RestThe end of the year is a great time for personal assessment. Many great entrepreneurs use this time of year to not only plan next year’s journey but to make an honest appraisal of the last 12 months of our lives. As I look forward to 2010 I see a calendar that is almost overflowing as it is. I’ll be putting on a major marketing conference for lawyers in the middle of January and likely leaving the next week for 2 1/2 weeks in China as Sandi and I travel on another adoption journey. For those of you who don’t know me well, David and Leah (12 and 11 years old) will be our eighth and ninth children (and our third and fourth a adoptive children.)
My list of things “to do” in 2010 is enormous. We’ve already blocked out two separate vacations; I’ve got trials to try; one high school graduation; a major book to finish; and several other books that will promote my law practice to complete. In addition to running my personal injury and medical malpractice law practice, Great Legal Marketing will celebrate its fourth birthday in February and that’s one month after we celebrate the one-year anniversary of taking over the local Glazer Kennedy Insider’s Circle chapter. Each month I produce three newsletters to mail, two coaching calls, two mastermind telephone meetings, a host of weekly faxes and e-mails and I manage and write for five blogs. I run twelve day long mastermind meetings during the year for my attorneys and local small business entrepreneurs. I will run at least one marathon in 2010 and yes, I do get to 95% of all of the sporting event and extracurricular activities my kids are involved in.I tell you all of this not to brag or to suggest that your life is any less busy than mine but simply to say that “if I can do this then anyone can.” I do not have any more time than you do. One thing that I think I’m pretty good at is valuing and guarding my time. In fact, I understand that the number one thing that others ask about me is “how does he get it all done?”
In his book, No BS Time Management for Entrepreneurs, Dan Kennedy starts by defining entrepreneurship as “the conversion of your knowledge, talent, guts, etc.- through investment of your time-into money. As you might imagine, Dan Kennedy looks at the “management of time” a lot differently than all of the other time management authors. If you have never read this book then you must put it on your list to be read before January 1. If you have read it before, pick it up and read it again. Every lawyer who joins my coaching program gets a copy of this book. It is one of the most important books I’ve ever read.
Here are principles drawn from that book which I have found most viable:
1
Assess the true value of your time. Kennedy has a formula which goes basically like this: look at your base earnings number. As Dan puts it, how many dollars do you want to make next year? Next, look at how many hours you are genuinely productive. Warning: the best way to do this is to run a time log on yourself for a week. Every 15 minutes right down what you just did. After two days you will probably want to rip your hair out. Using a very generous number, most entrepreneurs and executives are productive no more than one third of their working hours. Many-far less. By honestly evaluating your number of productive hours and dividing your base earnings goal by the number of productive hours you will really see what every wasted minute costs you.2
Surround yourself with people who understand and respect the value of your time. Here’s a giftgiving idea: give those with whom you interact frequently a copy of Dan’s book. (They will understand you better.) A corollary to this principle is to get rid of those people who don’t value your time appropriately. Here is what is really important here: your key staff needs to know that they do have access to you; it just won’t be whatever they feel like walking down the hall and knocking on your door. Pre-plan the appropriate number of meetings, and the length of those meetings, each week. This will seem hard at first. I guarantee you that you and they will be more productive. It forces them to “bundle” all of those things that they believe need your attention and then to prioritize them for your meeting.
3Teach your email correspondents how to communicate with you. This began for me by eliminating staff e-mails to me. Whatever it was they were going to e-mail they now “batch” and we talk about during our short meetings. Read and then give everyone else a copy of the book “the.Hamster Revolution, How to Manage Your E-Mail before It Manages You.”
4
Eliminate the need for doing or delegate those tasks and activities that cannot and do not match up to the value of your time. The hardest thing for most entrepreneurs to start do is to “give up control.” I will tell you from experience however that letting others do things that are not an appropriate use of your time will be like starting each morning with a can of Red Bull after your coffee. It will be addictive and productive. Today I employ “virtual assistants” as contract workers across the United States and around the world. The key is finding the best people for specific jobs. For example, one of my virtual assistants tracks down each of the failed credit card transactions each month in Great Legal Marketing. We have a 100% collection rate. Another assistant designs might print ads and “landing pages” for Web advertising. Another transcribes audio recordings and changes them into blogs.5
Learn the power of saying “no.” Again, this is really hard for entrepreneurs. People who are seen in the community as successful and being able to get a lot of things accomplished get asked by others to accomplish more things. It can be an ego thing to say “yes” to every committee assignment, local leadership position and other “this will really be good for you” invitation. I am giving you permission to say “no.” Remember, if you are reading this you likely have sole responsibility for your own and your family’s financial stability. You likely have “responsibility” for employing other people and competing in the marketplace with others who are trying to steal your customers/clients. You have the responsibility for maintaining the emotional stability of your family as well. Everything else is extra. Everything else comes after you maximize your own physical health, financial health, emotional health, spiritual health and “fun health.” Please do not feel guilty about this. You cannot help other people to your maximum ability unless you first maximize your own health in all of the above areas.Copyright © 2009 Benjamin Glass – About the Author: BEN GLASS is a Fairfax small business owner and marketing and small business consultant. He runs monthly marketing meetings for Northern Virginia business owners and entrepreneurs. To come to our next meeting for free, and get one of Ben’s books, for free, visit http://www.Glazer-Kennedy-Virginia.com or call 877-IBA-GKIC (877-422-4542)
Getting Things Done: Tips on Using Your Time Productively
Source: David Allen: Tips on Time Management| SUCCESS Magazine | What Achievers Read
Getting Things Done
Tips on Using Your Time Productively
David Allen is an international author, productivity expert and founder of the David Allen Company, a management consulting firm. For 20 years, he has developed and implemented productivity-improvement programs for more than a million people at Fortune 500 corporations and U.S. government agencies. He is the author of three books, including the best-seller Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity.
SUCCESS: Why do you think the work-life balance concept is misleading?
David Allen: A lot of people I know sit at work worried about stuff at home, and when they’re at home, they are worried about stuff at work. Then you’re in neither place. Your brain needs to engage on some consistent basis with all of your commitments and activities. You must be assured that you are doing what you need to be doing, and that it’s OK to be not doing what you’re not doing. If it’s on your mind, then your mind isn’t clear. Anything you consider unfinished in any way must be captured in a trusted system outside your mind, or what I call a collection bucket, that you know you will come back to regularly and review. To be able to handle your commitments and agreements with yourself, you have to have a clear distinction between what you’re doing and everything else. That’s the boundary I have. You have to be fully present with what you are doing and ask yourself, “How do I get that other thing that’s distracting me on cruise control?”
People often seem overwhelmed with the amount of choices they have for their lives, so what are some of the best management techniques so people don’t wind up with regrets?
DA: The best time-management technique is to ensure you have captured every single thing that has your attention, or should have your attention, by writing it down. The goal is to get projects and situations off your mind but not to lose any potentially useful ideas. Then you can step back and look at your list from an observer standpoint, and not let yourself be driven by what’s the latest and loudest in your head. The worst practice is to let yourself be driven by your desire to relieve the pressure of what’s pulling on you, instead of using your system for capturing, clarifying, organizing and reviewing. While you do want to be making intuitive choices, no system is really going to tell you what to do. You still have to trust your heart and your spirit—your intuition. But a good systematic approach will let you feel a lot more comfortable and you won’t miss all of your possible choices. Letting the latest and loudest thing steer your life is not the way to live your life or make decisions.
How can people make progress once they have captured and reviewed their to-do lists?
DA: I have a personal mission to make [the question] What’s the next action? part of the global thought process. Ask yourself, “What’s my next action?” It clarifies things quickly. There’s a great difference, however, between making that decision when things show up versus when things blow up. So many people glance at a project and think, “I don’t quite have all the pieces between here and there.” We know something is missing, but we’re not sure what it is exactly, so we quit. Without a next action, there remains a potentially infinite gap between current reality and what you need to do. Constantly ask yourself, “What’s my next action?”
Some people say they’re waiting to catch up with the minor to-do items to focus on their major goals, but that day never seems to come. How can people more effectively use their time to get the majors finished, instead of the minors?
DA: It’s a good question. I think it comes back to focus. The truth is, if you really look at where you want to be going, there are things you can do that can get you there faster and sooner than other things. It’s the old priority decision. Which one of the things on my list—either a project or an action—if it were finished, would actually give me the highest payoff? If you’re making that kind of distinction, it doesn’t get any better than that. That’s how I would make the distinction between minors and majors.
Now, the highest payoff may mean it’s going to give me the most relaxation; it’ll take the most pressure off my brain; or it’s going to move me toward something that’s really meaningful to me. So I don’t think you ever get away from that responsibility to be making mature choices about which one of the things you need to do is more important. Ultimately, you have to have conversations with yourself about all the areas of responsibility you have, including your health, state of mind, things you might want to be accomplishing, and your values for your lifestyle and work—where you want to be.
I think we do resist doing the things that are the most meaningful to us because it’s going to get us closer to unlocking some wonderful, grand, glorious part of us that we really aren’t ready to engage with yet. I think it’s our own self-image and esteem. It’s probably the biggest angel at the gate—if I don’t think I’m really worthy of that, then I’m going to find all kinds of reasons to avoid getting involved with it. It’s a fear of success. But when you start to make things happen, you really begin to believe that you can make things happen. And that makes things happen.
Freemind, mind mapping, time management and life
Freemind, mind mapping, time management and life | Virtually Speaking | ZDNet.com
Freemind, mind mapping, time management and lifePosted by Dan Kusnetzky (see above link for original article & website)
As I was organizing my daily plan, it struck me that some of you would be interested in some of the tools and techniques I use. Mind mapping is a powerful tool that helps me organize my chaotic thinking into something that looks, from the outside anyway, to have been sequential and logical. Freemind is an open source mind mapping tool.
The tools* Mind mapping — the wikipedia has a nice description of mind mapping. Here’s a snippet of their definition.
“A mind map is a diagram used to represent words, ideas, tasks, or other items linked to and arranged around a central key word or idea. Mind maps are used to generate, visualize, structure, and classify ideas, and as an aid in study, organization, problem solving, decision making, and writing.”
* Freemind — an open source project that makes mind mapping software available on a number of platforms. There are quite a number of open source and commercial offerings in this area. The wikipedia offers a nice chart. I’ve personally used Inspiration, Mind Manager, Tony Bizon’s iMindMap and Freemind. I selected Mind Manager when I needed something that tightly integrated with Microsoft’s Office. Freemind works well enough, however, for my purposes, runs on all of the operating systems I use on a daily basis and will create PDF files, JPEG files and files that are usable by OpenOffice.Org or Microsoft Office.
How are they used?
Mind mapping is used in a number of ways in my environment. Time/self management, document organization and project organization are some of the most important.
Time/self management: I have a set of hierarchical maps that allow me to keep track of projects I have underway, calls I need to make, events I need to attend, and things that I need to deliver. Freemind, as well as most of the other mind mapping software, makes it possible for one map to link to another. This allows me to have a high level view of my committments and responsibilities and then go to a map devoted to a single project, program or committment. These maps are synchronized between my desktop systems and my smartphone. I can update them on any system and know that all of the other systems will be updated the next time I synchronize files.
Content Creation: I collect thoughts about a report or a presentation by creating a map. This process is somewhat like getting out the ingredients of a meal and placing them on the counter. Then it is easily possible for me to link these thoughts together into a hierarchal view of topics, subtopics and thoughts about what should be presented. These topics and subtopics can be moved about until the flow of one to another makes sense. The maps can then be exported into a number of different formats and used as input to a word processor or presentation software. On more than on ocassion, I’ve presented using the map as if it were a presentation deck.
Program or project planning: As with content creation, I can grab thoughts and just place them in a map. This might be done with the aid of a project or program team. These ideas can then be linked together into categories and the categories then sorted out by time and priority.
Although my train of thought is easily derailed, using these tools has helped me keep folks around me fooled. They think that I’m focused and on top of things. The truth is that I have well organized notes, in the form of mind maps, and refer to them each time I am interrupted or am finished with some task. Oh, one more thing, every time I make a commitment to do something, agree to be somewhere, or am given a task by the CEO, I update the maps.
My system isn’t perfect, but it works well enough for me.
What are you using to get and keep organized and on track?
Dan KusnetzkyDaniel Kusnetzky is a member of the senior management team of The 451 Group. He is responsible for research and publications on a broad array of technology topics. He examines emerging technology trends, vendor strategies, research and development issues, and end-user integration requirements. You can follow Dan on Twitter. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
[Caption]
Time Management Shouldn’t Take a Lot of Time
Time Management Shouldn’t Take a Lot of Time | Email Marketing News and Tips
Time Management Shouldn’t Take a Lot of Time
If you spend all day reacting to your business rather than proactively tackling your to-do list, maybe your time management plan could use a tune up. A little planning can save you valuable time throughout your day. Your plan should be simple so you don’t spend all day planning your day. I’ve put a few points down that can give you back some of the time that has been slipping away that you may not have even noticed.
“Got a minute meetings” Do you get a lot of co-workers stopping by your desk asking, “Do you have a minute?” Every time you say yes, you can bet that the meeting will last more than just a minute. Couple that with the fact that you just lost your momentum and focus on the project you were just working on. Get in the habit of saying ‘No’. Unless the matter is urgent, most questions can be saved for a weekly meeting where you can have an organized forum to answer all of the questions your co-workers have of you. Also consider setting aside time twice a day where your door is open to answer questions that can’t wait until the weekly meeting. You will find that you can concentrate better and your weekly meetings will be more productive and organized when people bring specific issues to the table.
“Touch it Once” This may sound simple but when put into practice it can make your day much more productive. Don’t open that letter or email until you have time to read it and deal with it. If you open a letter and then put it down to make a call that you just remembered and have to go back to review that email again you could easily waste 15 minutes just reviewing the task you didn’t finish. If you spend 15 minutes per day reviewing or re-reading you will waste 97 hours a year where you are taking no action. If you touch it, take action.
“Make Lists” Making a list the day before of what you want to accomplish will help you clarify your goals and put perspective on your priorities. Don’t make your list so long that you will not finish it by the end of the day. Focus on the 6 most productive tasks that you need to get done and finish your list. Determine how long each task should take you and plan your day around finishing that list. You will find a tremendous psychological boost by completing the last item on your list.
These three simple techniques can be implemented in just one day and you don’t need to spend a lot of time getting organized to try them out. With all that extra time at the end of the day you can take a second to give yourself a pat on the back before you start your list for the next day.
Source http://blogs.boomerang.com/blog/2010/01/06/time-management-shouldnt-take-a-lot-of-time/
[Image courtesy of Flicker]
Newcastle Performance Coaching Limited 