Time is hard to find these days, and many people don’t realize it’s the root of most stresses.

Poor time management increases job stress, decreases your level of job satisfaction strains your relationships and even takes away your sleep!

Now, if you are suffering from poor time management, here are some tips to help you improve your time management skills right now.

1. Make a to-do list.

A to-do list will organize your jumbled thoughts by allowing you to write it all out and decide on what requires more priority due to a close deadline, for example.

So start by listing yours, breaking down the bigger ones. Then, label each according to their priority, paying close attention to deadlines and making sure to think over which are really the most urgent and important.

Now you can get started on your things to do!

2. Take notes

You can do this in addition to your to-do list if you prefer. But by taking notes, you are pretty much reminding yourself of all sorts of ideas you might have throughout the day.

How many times do you come up with a great idea for your next project only to forget it?

Jot ideas down right away and don’t rely on yourself to remember it tomorrow. This will save you tons of time spent in trying to rethink something you’ve already thought about!

So get started with this habit by carrying around a small notepad or tape recorder, nothing big. Start noting down your valuable thoughts.

3. Learn to focus.

Figure out what needs to be done now and focus! Don’t stress over your boyfriend’s upcoming birthday, dinner with your mom or your child’s baseball game – just focus on the task at hand!

Avoid being open to interruptions. Once you focus completely on what you need to do NOW, you’ll be able to get it done quicker than if you were distracted by things that are less important.

Doing this alone will increase your productivity and save you tons of time spent in switching tasks or in asking “Uh, where was I…”

Provided by Janet Schlarbaum

Now, it is more obvious that the time is not that free and unlimited. Furthermore, you cannot turn time back or buy more, even if you are rich. Once the time has passed, there is no more. So, it is obvious that we need to manage our time given to perform a specific task, in a most time-efficient way.

Why we need the effective Time management? The answers are obvious. To achieve better results. To achieve quality of work To reduce stress To reduce errors To improve satisfaction with job To improve quality of private life.

In order to manage our time in a best possible way, we need to learn and utilize Time Management tools:

Prioritization

In every segment of our life activity, in our profession or in the recreation club, there are certain lists of activities that need to be accomplished. Since there are always more activities than we can handle at same time, we need to prioritize. In order to prioritize we use our judgment, common sense, experience or other people’s advices. However, there are more structured tools that can help us in prioritization.

Urgent/Important matrix

This tool helps us to filter tasks as per their urgency and importance. Urgent is something that needs attention – Now. Important is something that is related to results, goals and value. When we pair these two scales of importance and urgency, we get a matrix with four quadrants.

Pareto

Pareto principle is prioritization tool which states that 20% of our results comes from 20% of our effort. 80% of our revenue comes from 20% of our customers. 80% of our success comes from 20% of our effort.

This principle does not have to be in exactly 80:20 ratio, but essentially shows that there are certain activities that create most of our success, therefore we should give priority to them.

Fight Procrastination

Many people procrastinate (delay) accomplishment of tasks. In fact, everybody is procrastinating to some degree. To the most extreme situation, procrastination can totally block some process or destroy someone’s career.

In order to fight procrastination first we need to understand the degree of our habit of procrastinating. Second is to understand why is this happening. Third step is to take action to suppress habit of delaying or procrastinating task accomplishment.

Time Planning

While Prioritization is vertical dimension of Time Management, Time Planning is it’s horizontal dimension. Simply, by time planning, we position our activity in time. I order to track implementation of task planning through time, we conduct tracking in several time scales:

- Milestones are related to annual planning, project planning and seasonal events.

- Scheduling of Tasks is related to Monthly, Weekly and Daily scale, by recording incoming tasks and events in desired time format ( notebook, scheduler software, etc. )

- To Do List is a simple form of daily planning. It enables us to work better, serves as a reminder and helps us with task tracking. It also motivates us to do what we need to do and helps us to focus on priorities.

To Do List Tips:

1. At the end of a day spend 5 minutes to plan a next day.

2. Unfinished tasks from today schedule for tomorrow.

3. Include both, daily tasks and long term tasks in daily To Do list.

Reputation Management

By Constance Knieper

How many times have you looked at your schedule and wondered how you were going to fit everything in? How many times have you made the comment “this should have been scheduled here”? Do you have days where you’re empty at noon but the schedule dictates that you keep going until 5:00 pm? Do you dream of days that consistently flow smoothly AND you have accomplished everything intended – on time? Creating a scheduling template can solve these problems and change your life.

A scheduling template is a blueprint of your ideal day prepared in advance. It coincides with a prepared appointment guideline based upon individual desires and appointment history. The concept is similar to “painting by number”. Every possible or desired appointment is reserved in advance for up to one year at a time. Appointments are scheduled by referencing the guideline then locating the next available appointment of that kind.

Regain control of your time. The greatest benefit realized is the return of control over how your day is scheduled. Everybody seems to want everything yesterday or last week. Unfortunately, it is not always possible to respond that quickly, yet we are often forced to try. This is especially true if others are scheduling your appointments without a clear and specific set of instructions. A natural byproduct of the scheduling template is the development of a very clear set of scheduling instructions.

The formation of a plan for scheduling is a huge benefit. As stated, this is a natural byproduct of the template. Once created, it is easily learned and followed allowing anybody to schedule an appointment simply by referencing the guideline. People can be taught quickly, it is easily understood so they can begin scheduling immediately.

Incorporating personal desires with professional desires is often challenging. In fact, it is common for personal desires to be overlooked or skipped due to lack of time. A scheduling blueprint is a reflection of personal and professional desires. When creating the template, both are coordinated so that the ideal day includes time allocated to accomplish both.

Eliminate stress and fatigue. The scheduling guideline identifies all possible appointments including a list of all activities that can be completed within each one. Reviewing each appointment to ensure the time allocated is adequate for the activity aids in removing problems experienced routinely in the past. The ideal day is constructed using the guideline to reserve each predetermined appointment eliminating conflicts through the day. Since they conflicts are resolved in advance, stress and anxiety are reduced or eliminated.

Once the initial template and guideline are created they are easily updated. This is important since technology is improving at an astounding rate giving the ability to complete more in less time. Modifications to the template are easily incorporated and can be applied immediately or to subsequent years.

Generally, creating the ideal day carries forward to the ideal week, month, and year. Since the template is arranged to plan up to one year (can be longer if desired) it practically eliminates haphazardly scheduled days. The advance planning and development of a scheduling template has simplified the process of scheduling and resulted in more productive days.

Reputation Management