3. What is Time Management?
Time management is the act or process of planning and exercising conscious control
over the amount of time spent on specific activities, especially to increase
effectiveness, efficiency or productivity.
Finding a time management strategy that works best for you depends on your
personality, ability to self-motivate and level of self-discipline.
4. Why Do We Need Time Management Strategies ?
To save time
To reduce stress
To function effectively
To increase our work output
To have more control on our daily work schedule
“The Bad News Is Time Flies.
The Good News Is You Are The Pilot”
7. Prioritized To-Do List
Write down all the tasks you need to complete
Break large tasks into their component elements
Allocate priorities from A (very important, or very urgent) to E
(unimportant, or not at all urgent)
You need to differentiate between urgency and importance
Rewrite the list in priority order
Take action immediately and finish them one by one
This helps you to focus on the important jobs first
8. Urgent versus Important
Important activities have an outcome that leads to the achievement of your goals
Urgent activities demand immediate attention, and are usually associated with the
achievement of someone else’s goals, or with an uncomfortable problem or situation
that needs to be resolved
9. Planning
Write down appointments, classes, and meetings on a chronological log book or
chart
First thing in the morning, check what's ahead for the day
If you fail to plan, you plan to fail and you will waste a lot of precious time while
failing
“Action without planning is the cause of every failure .”
10. Goal Setting
To avoid the pitfalls of confusion and lack of motivation, you have to
clarify what you want to achieve
SMART goal setting guidelines :
Specific - Have you clearly defined your goal?
Measurable - How do you know if you are making progress?
Achievable - Is your goal really achievable? Be ambitious but honest.
Rewarding - Is your goal something you are willing to make sacrifices
for?
Timely - Is your goal achievable in a meaningful timeframe?
Write your goals down and be familiar with them
11. 80:20 Rule
Pareto’s Principle:
80% of results are achieved with only 20% of the effort
Focus your time and energy on the high impact tasks to achieve the
greatest benefit possible
If you have achieved your expected outcome and done what needs
to be done, then you may not need to do 80% of the task
Otherwise break the task down again working out the 20% that will
bring the best results
20%
80%
12. Get organized
Time is saved if you prepare your work environment and equipment beforehand
Tidy your desk, make sure your chair is in the correct position and you have all the
information you need close at hand
Having your appointments, tasks and key notes in one place
Helps you find information faster and also helps prevent stress
13. Procrastination
What is procrastination?
Putting off things that we should be doing
Avoid high priority, challenging tasks
Seek comfort in doing tasks you know you're capable of
completing
Causes of procrastination:
Have doubt on your skills or resources
Do not know where to begin
Waiting for “right time” or “right mood”
Underestimate the difficulty of the task
Perfectionism
14. Recognize that you are procrastinating
Work out why you are procrastinating
Ways to overcome:
Find a small part of the task you can do right now
Identify the emotion associated with doing it
Finish an incomplete
Delete it and move on
Face your fears and the risks head-on
Overcome Procrastination
15. Utilize Time Gaps
Time gaps are intervals of time free of activities
E.g. gaps between classes, between meetings, in a queue, waiting in your car
Discover where you are likely to experience small, wasted gaps of
time
Utilize them to finish tasks that can fit in
Examples of utilizing them effectively:
Make calls while waiting
Read up something
Prepare for the upcoming activities
16. Avoid Multi-tasking
Recent psychological studies have shown that multi-tasking does not actually save
time. In fact, the opposite is often true. You lose time when switching from one
task to another, resulting in a loss of productivity. Routine multi-tasking may lead
to difficulty in concentrating and maintaining focus when needed.
17. Learn to say NO
Do not say yes when you don't have the time, motivation, interest or skills to do the
task
Say “no” to tasks that have little impact on your targets
Prevent stress
Avoid overworking