We all wish that there was more time in the day, don’t we? When the day is over and we look back at what we have accomplished, often times we wonder where all of those hours went. If you’re like most people, time management is an issue at your job as well as your personal life. We are all just a little bit crunched for time. We say things like “there’s not enough time in the day”, or “I don’t know where I’ll find the time,” and “I never have time for myself.” We think that we never have enough time because we’re so busy responding to life’s curveballs. And, when we seem to free up just a little bit of time for ourselves, we get hit from left-field with something that we simply have to respond to. Furthermore, it seems like even when we’re not getting hit with problems, we can’t seem to find the time to manage our daily tasks to begin with.
Is time management important for everyone? Yes. Whatever profession you are in, at any level in a job, time management is an essential skill. We have limited time and we are expected to fully justify the use of this limited time with productive work. Believe me, time management is not easy to do. If you are stressed at work, because you frequently loose the sight from your targeted tasks; you feel distressed because you couldn’t complete your assigned tasks; you often get distracted or deviated from your tasks and fail to complete those in time; then, you might be a victim of poor time management. Thus, time management is one of the most important areas of improvement for anyone.
Strategies for Time Management
Make a Plan
The first activity of your day should be to determine what you want to achieve that day and what you absolutely must accomplish. Define a clear purpose before you check your email or start responding to queries. Setting a clear focus for your day could require as little as five minutes and can save you several hours of wasted time and effort. Capture the tasks and activities you must do on a list and update it regularly during the day. Revisit this list frequently and add new items as soon as they appear. Make sure your list gives you a quick overview of everything that’s urgent and important, and remember to include strategic and relationship-building activities as well as operational tasks.
Set Deadlines
When you have a task at hand, set a realistic deadline and stick to it. Try to set a deadline few days before the task so that you can complete all those tasks that may get in the way. Challenge yourself and meet the deadline then reward yourself for meeting a difficult challenge.
Avoid Distractions
The more uninterrupted time you get during the day to work on important tasks, the more effective you’ll be. Identify the activities that tend to disrupt your work and find a solution around them. For example, avoid checking emails and answering your phone when you’re in the middle of something important. Once you have broken your flow, it can be difficult to reestablish it. Instead, discipline yourself to work on a task single-mindedly until it’s complete. Moreover, incessant social media app alerts aren’t helping you with your time either. Turn them off. You don’t need alerts every moment or to know everything happening with your friends. What’s most important is to have peace of mind and focus on the important goals of your day.
Stop Procrastinating
If you have a hard time staying focused or tend to procrastinate, you may benefit from creating an external commitment, a deadline, for yourself. For instance, schedule a meeting in two days time with yourself. This meeting is where you’ll be presenting your work and, therefore, when your actions will have to be completed. It’s also very effective to complete the most unpleasant tasks early in the day and to allow yourself small rewards once you’ve completed them.
Focus On One Task
Many of us multi-task and believe we’re effective when we do so. However, evidence suggests that we can’t effectively focus on more than one thing at a time. In order to stop multi-tasking, try these tips: plan your day in blocks and set specific time aside for meetings, returning calls and for doing detailed planning and analysis work at your desk. Whenever you find yourself multi-tasking, stop and sit quietly for a minute.
Take Breaks
When you find a natural stopping point every 10-15 minutes, take a break. Too much stress can take a toll on your body and affect your productivity. Even better, schedule your break times. It helps you to relax and gets back to work with energy again later. Take a walk, listen to some music, or do some quick stretches. The best idea is to take off from work and spend time with your friends and family.
Make To do List Every Night
Every single evening before bed, make a list for the next day. Look at your goals and see what you can do to help move you closer. This habit won’t become second nature overnight. It takes time. But by making to-do lists consistently, you’re effectively setting goals for the day. Daily goals are easier to achieve while helping to move us towards the longer and bigger goals. That happens by creating to-do lists.
Delegate
Depending on what type of work you do, you may be able to delegate some tasks. Knowing what to delegate and when is a skill. Some people resist delegating, either because they want to maintain control or because they want to save money by not hiring assistants. Both approaches ultimately hurt productivity and raise costs. However, if you practice time management diligently and still can’t get everything done, you may be trying to do too much. It is better to succeed at a few tasks than to attempt and then fail at many.
Learn to Say No
Making a lot of time commitments can teach us how to juggle various engagements and manage our time. This can be a great thing. However, you can easily take it too far. At some point, you need to learn to decline opportunities. Your objective should be to take on only those commitments that you know you have time for and that you truly care about.
If you are having trouble figuring out what is important in your day or feel overwhelmed or a sense of anxiety when approaching your daily tasks, counseling can be a helpful tool to have in your belt. Gateway 2 Counseling provides online counseling that is convenient and effective for this very reason. If you find yourself struggling, don’t hesitate to pick of the phone. We can help.
Struggling with time management? Learn how we can help.