If you’ve attended any time-management seminars, you’ve heard the old saw “everyone has the same twenty-four hours,” and been made to feel guilty that Thomas Edison spent his inventing 70 bazillion things, while you can’t get one stupid presentation done. You start work every morning positive you’ll accomplish great things–only to find, when five o’clock arrives, you’re no closer to finishing anything than you were at eight. That means another late night, either at your desk or on the couch at home, struggling to stay afloat while other priorities (family, friends, housework) dangle, neglected. This isn’t how you thought your life would turn out.
The thing is, everyone starts the day with twenty-four hours but (sorry, Ms. Inspirational Speaker), we don’t have the same twenty-four hours. Our ability to apportion our time is affected by our circumstances and our work styles. Some of these are changeable, while some aren’t. The trick is to find a time management system that works for you. So, rather than a one-size-fits-all program, here are some hints you can use to take control of your own twenty-four.
1. Find Your Prime Time(s)
You’ve no doubt heard of circadian rhythms–the rhythms that govern all natural functions, including our own. You’re probably aware of your own “body clock”–whether you’re a morning person or a night owl, or in-between. But did you realize you can make those rhythms work for you?
Over the next week, pay attention to when you’re most attentive, in the best mood, get the most done. Chances are, those periods will remain fairly consistent. Make a note of them, and then plan your work day to take full advantage. If you’re most alert in the mornings, set aside that time to work on projects which require your full concentration. Leave less-demanding tasks, such as filing, phone calls, and administrative work for the afternoon, when your energy falls off. If there are jobs you dread–if you have “phone phobia,” for instance–schedule them for your high-energy periods, when you’ll be less likely to put them off. If you experience several peak times throughout the day, use them to your advantage; take work home, or tackle household chores you often avoid.
By capitalizing on your personal rhythms, you’ll not only increase your productivity, you may just end up enjoying your work a little more!
2. Quit Multi-Tasking
Yes, yes, that may sound sacrilegious, particularly in a culture which worships super-human levels of achievement. But whenever you try to accomplish several attention-intensive tasks at once, you are actually accomplishing less. Recent studies have shown that the continual interruptions multi-taskers often accommodate actually hurt their ability to return to the project at hand. Other researchers have demonstrated that, even when we think we’re juggling simultaneous tasks successfully, we’re not performing as well as we think. Even switching back and forth between jobs takes more time than we think. At the end of the day, we can go home, exhausted from being “busy” all day–without having accomplished much at all. We were our own interruptions.
So next week, stop multi-tasking. Do one thing at a time. Start something and then, instead of switching over to answer the phone, text, or e-mail, finish that job first. It may feel odd. You may find yourself stopping automatically every five or ten minutes to do…something…. If this happens, take a deep breath, don’t click on anything, and go back to what you were doing. You’ll end up with a completed task, and a sense of satisfaction. Answer calls, e-mails, and other communications in a block; believe it or not, they’ll wait. Multi-tasking can be a difficult habit to break, but the payoff will be less stress and, almost perversely, higher productivity. What’s not to like?
3. Manage Distractions
Notice we didn’t say “eliminate.” That’s impossible. But you probably have a little more control over your environment than you think, and exerting this control is crucial to increasing your productivity and decreasing your time at work, without compromising your earning ability.
First, make a list of your most frequent distractions. Some are probably unavoidable; still they can be managed. For example, if your job requires you to answer the phone and handle correspondence, you may wish to arrange “phone-free” hours with a colleague, so that each of you can handle detailed work without interruptions. Other ways to control distractions include:
- If you’re fortunate enough to have an office door, close it, a least for a few hours a day. Teach your team members (nicely) to respect your need for uninterrupted concentration. Few problems or questions are so urgent that they must be handled instantly; and if your staff follows your example, you may end up with a happier, more productive team.
- Cut off communications. Turn your phones off. All of them. Let calls go to voice mail, and make a deal with yourself not to check texts for at least an hour. Turn off the sound on your computer, so you can’t hear that little “ping” as a new e-mail arrives. Follow that oft-repeated advice to set aside one or two times per day to return messages.
- Forget the ‘Net. Unless you need it for work-related research, do not go near the internet. Many companies, aware of its unparalleled ability to suck otherwise competent, devoted workers into its maw, have implemented internet restrictions. If yours has not, block sites you find impossible to resist. Remind yourself that IT can find out if you’ve been looking at wedding dresses or loafing on message boards when you were supposed to be finding sales numbers. If your access is restricted, that’s great–just don’t surf on your phone; lock it in a drawer, if necessary, and route calls to your work number.
- Remember, your cubicle is your castle. A long time ago, people worked in offices. With doors. And they could, to some degree, control who had access to them. But no more. You’ll have to be creative to minimize the distractions inherent to working in ‘cubicleville’. Try…
- The Stop/Go sign. It seems self-explanatory, but be prepared to explain it for a week or so.
- The Curtain. If your workplace allows it, hang a light-weight fabric or beaded curtain to demonstrate your need for quiet work time. You can also find commercially made cubicle barriers.
- Headphones. Try noise-canceling models, or create a “wall of sound” by playing music (while wearing headphones). If the latter, however, make sure that the sound isn’t loud enough to disturb your cube-mates.
No matter which method you choose, be prepared to explain your need for quiet, concentrated work time to some co-workers. Some may end up feeling miffed, but as long as you are polite, this is their problem. Don’t feel guilty for making your work a priority.
4. Make Deadlines Work for You
Finally, use deadlines to help you prioritize your work. Sometimes, we feel overwhelmed because everything seems important. This isn’t so. One or two projects always hold the trump card. At the beginning of every week (or every day), plan out what absolutely must be accomplished, and when. Calculate how much time you think it will take to complete those projects, and then add time to account for interruptions, unforeseen emergencies, and other hindrances. Then, move your personal deadline up.
For example, let’s say your presentation is due Friday. You estimate it will take eight hours of uninterrupted work, possibly twelve under normal circumstances. You then make your personal deadline Wednesday, to ensure that any long meeting, sick child, or other situation can’t derail you completely. If you get done early, great! If something comes up, however, you still have the safety cushion of another day to handle the problem and get back on track.
Time management is a learned skill, similar to learning to control procrastination. For most of us, it requires practice, trial, and error. Remember, however, your ultimate goal: to maintain optimum productivity and the ability to earn a great income while reducing stress and keeping your life simple. The more you get done in those eight hours, the more time you’ll have to do what really matters.
Great and absolutely essential tips. I recently found out about the ‘pomodoro technique’ for time-management – def worth looking into
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I have not tried the pomodoro technique. Looks interesting. I will give it shot.
As the online market and in-house blogger for AAMCO, I find that the best supported time management technique is the Pomodoro one. Not only do you break down your hours into 40-50 minutes of work and 10-20 minutes of play, but there is a really handy iphone app that is a cinch to use and really helpful.
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Two comments about using the pomodoro technique in one day? Now I really need to give it a shot!
I think managing distractions is the hardest part for me. I find that I get distracted easily, even in the office environment. It does help to close the door, or sometimes bring in headphones and play some music. That way I don’t get distracted by things going on outside.
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Richard, Yes, managing distractions is a big issue for me too. I will do a quick post on this topic soon… I think putting the article together will be very helpful for me to learn to manage my distractions as well! Thanks for stopping by.
My primary time management tip is to focus on the most important thing and get it done. Like you pointed out multitasking can be a big waste of time if it is not going to help you with your primary objective.
Regards
Mark
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You are right, Mark! Prioritizing the TO DO list and knocking the most important item off is such a stress reliever and a great time management tip!
Thanks for stopping by!
If there’s really anything I’ve picked up over the year of working nonstop it’s that there really is a “prime time” for my work habits. It’s weird but I generally get most of the work done around 2 – 3 hours before sleeping – I think it’s because I’m somewhat tired and relaxed so what I did was start to stay up longer and sleep less hours – result? A lot more done.
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There are times that stress can eat up much of your time so managing your activities is very important part of time management. I also like your point about multi-tasking. Some actually consider this technique useful to them, but sometimes this can actually lengthen the time of work. All because they need to shift their mind from one task to the other.
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Hey Sam,
Finding a qualitative same time informative article, is so hard to find. And it took me 2 days for searching it. And this is the article that I had been searching for. I gained a lot of tips and I am so eager to utilize this time management of yours. Thanks.
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I know it’s bad to multitask, but it’s not like we enjoy it. Once we’re pushed into a corner with our schedule, we need to multitask. In an ideal world we have time for everything, in our world we compromise.
Though it would be an interesting experiment to try this for a few days and see where it takes me.
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I agree, its always wiser to do one thing at a time but we’re all used to multitasking. This turn us into workaholics and its becoming more a habit. We want to do so many things at one time, we work until we drop but just as tomorrow never comes even working never comes to en end. I multitask all of the time but I try to outsource some of my works sometimes, it really feels blissful!!
My idea of time management is finishing the work as fast as i can and as best as i can. When i enter that mode, nothing can distract me. Everything’s on pause and i don’t look at the watch. I’ve noticed that checking the time is just placing more pressure on the task at hand. So i don’t have time limits, but i do make estimations in my mind, which i often surpass by finishing the task a lot faster. The key is total focus.
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Great article, very important topic. Time management is one of the hardest things when talking about work and jobs. It’s important to focus, manage the distractions as you said, and be motivated because motivation is what keeps you doing all this effort for working and doing your job right. If you are motivated, then you will sure do anything to get your job done right, fast and professional. Also, a schedule is highly recommended, if you have a schedule and try following it, it would be much easier to do everything good. Thanks for sharing!
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very interesting
time is something we never have enough of…its about priorities
slowly i phased out TV and Gaming
and beliave me, i have so much time, and not just that, i think much more clearly
thanks heaps
james
You’re absolutely right, Sam. For me, becoming disciplined was difficult. Weeding out my distractions and increasing my willpower worked wonders, though I had to work at it quite a bit.
Good tips. After all, it’s common sense: don’t be late, you don’t like waiting either. If you want some spare time for fun, organize your tasks to be efficient… so on and so forth
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Distractions – Number one enemy when you face deadlines. Noise cancelling headphones is a pretty nice trick which I will try
I am very thankful to read this post about time management I am easily hooked when I saw the topic is about this one because I know that I can learn a lot of things. Even though I am a fan of reading blogs regarding this topic I know that there are still other and effective way on how you are going to to manage your time. If you learn how to manage your time even though there are heaps of works everyday welcoming you in your desk you can do it in just one day.
Time management is an important habit to be implemented and only this makes us a successful business man/women not only in business it is an essential task to be followed in our daily life …because this is one thing which cannot be called again and your article is really refreshing ..thanks for sharing
Fortunately, when 5 o’clock arrives I’ve got everything done. I hate leaving things behind
I think it’s about self-respect too: If you want people to appreciate you, do things right!
Marian recently posted..How To Control Home Mold
Organisation of tasks and a project timer keep me on the time management straight and narrow.
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Time management is maybe the most important fact of working. If you can’t manage your time, you have a serious problem, if you can’t manage your time you probably can’t make the best. These tips are from far very useful, but also it’s important not only to read them and then carry on, it’s important to follow them.
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I know that I can really manage my time wisely, but when it comes with working with distractions. I doubt if I can still continue working on something if there are lots of distractions around me. These tips can truly help me managing my time wisely.
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Some people believe that they do more things by multi-tasking but the truth is it lessens their ability to focus on a particular tasks which affects their productivity.