Time Management - Reading Material 

This course is about figuring out which tasks are important to you on your job, and then finding time to do them. You will learn how to evaluate the importance of a task by looking at the payoff versus the time invested. Then, you will examine how you currently spend your time, and how to reset your focus on what's important. Focus is not enough, however. Once you've determined which tasks to focus on, you will need to incorporate them into your plans and set up your daily schedule so you do first things first.

Objectives:

Increased awareness on managing not only time but also your own personal life
 Better prioritization
 Increase your awareness on your time robbers
 Facilitate you to eliminate or manage your time robbers


Definition of some related terms of time management:

TIME : Period during which action or process continues.

MANAGEMENT : Achieving objectiveness through self and others.

EFFECTIVENESS : Achieving objectives with maximum results and minimum cost.

TIMEWASTER : Anything preventing achieving objectives most effectively. Time Wasters:

Not realizing how much time they waste. We can’t manage time: we manage self. We can manage what we do with the time we have. Disorganization, unclear goals, too many personal phone calls, disjointed processes, no routines, poor planning, procrastination, lack of focus, lack of training, junk e-mail, surfing, and it goes on.

​These are all time bandits that steal our time and people often don’t make the connection that it’s why they never have enough. Working in this state is an absolute breeding ground for stress.

Big Time Wasters:

 Perfectionist
 Just say “NO”
 Indecision
 Inefficiency
 Unanticipated interruptions

 Procrastination
 Poor organization
 Ineffective meetings 
 Micro-management 
 Poor planning
 Failure to delegate 
 Lack of priorities

Some Major Time Wasters and their solutions:

Distractions: Distractions come in many forms,
but we must learn to avoid distractions if we are to get work done.
​Here are a few ideas:

 Tell people when you are busy and cannot be disturbed.
 Work in areas where you are less likely to be disturbed.
 Do your work at times when you are most alert. It is easier to get

distracted when you are tired.

Disorganisation: People often waste much time because of disorganization. Here are some tips for staying organized:

  Keep things that you need in a specific place.

  Eliminate clutter.

  Before starting on a task, make sure that you have all of the

materials or information that you need.

  Follow your schedule.

Perfectionism: It is a virtue to want to do a good job, but some people become so anxious about getting a job done perfectly that they never complete it.

  Examine whether your efforts to get the job done perfectly are really improving things or preventing you from getting the job done.

  Think about the cost-benefit ratio of the extra effort.

  Remember that nothing is perfect.

Procrastination: It is easy to put off tasks if they are not due right away. The trouble is, tasks pile up and you can run into a time crunch later. Remember to work ahead whenever possible. If you can do it today, do it! Recognize the type of procrastination

• Recognition of trigger
 Fear (of failure / success, judgment, the unknown, change)  Perfectionism
 Wanting to do it all
 Incorrect priorities
 Being overwhelmed

Understand the cause and you can beat it Procrastination Solutions:

  Start Something – Anything
“In creating, the hardest part is to begin.” - Anonymous

  Reward yourself for starting

  Break it up

  Exercise: Make a list of 101 things you’ve been meaning to do and start

doing them

  Learn to say “no” appropriately

  Learn value of delayed gratification

Rigidity:

It is important to develop a habit of following your schedule, but some people become too rigid. Unexpected things come up and activities sometimes take more time than planned.

It is important to have some flexibility in your schedule. Allow extra time and avoid becoming too frustrated if things don’t work out as planned... just re- evaluate the plan and make adjustments.


Pareto Principle & Time Management:

It's one of the most powerful work tools ever discovered - and yet most people know little, if anything, about it. It's called "Pareto's Principle" - sometimes also known as the "80/20 Rule."

Ray Kroc, founder of McDonald's built a huge business on this concept. He pared the menu down so that he only sold what most customers wanted to buy. He was then able to serve food fast and hot. And rake in the dough...

This powerful "natural law" - which has been statistically confirmed in countless wide-ranging studies over the last 100 years - states simply that, in any given situation, there are usually a "vital few" factors whose overall influence far surpasses the importance of the rest of the factors, which are referred to as the "trivial many." This imbalance often plays out in such a way that as much as 80 percent of the results of a given system or process can be attributed to a mere 20 percent of all the possible causes. Pareto's principle is named after Italian economist and sociologist Vilfredo Pareto (1848-1923).

In his studies, Pareto applied mathematics to economics and sociologic theory. In the process he determined that 80% of a nation's wealth is typically controlled by 20% of its population. In turn the financial decisions of that niche 20% of the population impact 80% of that nation's economic success. Pareto's Principle was consequently applied by economists and sociologists to many other situations. But it has also become a popular equation for both personal and professional success.

So how does all this statistical theory stuff apply to you? Simple: what is the biggest complaint that you would typically have? That's right 'I don't have time'. But by now, of course, you have probably learnt the usefulness of making 'to do' lists. Afterall, putting tasks down in black and white expresses an intention. And the use of Pareto's Principle enables intentions to be transformed into actions. The first step is to priortize your list. Though all tasks may seem equally important and urgent you will soon find that they can be ordered into degrees of importance, regardless of their size or time requirements.

It is a general rule of thumb that about 20% of your workload comprises high payoff, high priority items. So the next step is to identify the top 20% of tasks from the list. Then you organize give 80% of your time to the top 20% of the tasks and spend the remaining 20% of your time on the left over 80% of tasks. This way you immediately zoom in on a manageable set of tasks of high value while still attacking 'the trivial many' tasks.

So there you have it by spending 80% of your time on the top 20% of your tasks you boost your productivity and improve your efficiency. And by spending 20% of your time on the less important 80% of tasks you are still able to significantly tackle your overall workload.

Summary of Pareto Principle 80 – 20 Rule:

 Spend more time on 20% of your work- related activities that generate 80% of the total returns

 Spend less time on the remaining 80% of your activities because they will produce only 20% of the returns

 Focus on the results you want to achieve

 List all the activities that will contribute to your wanted results Focus on key critical activities that will bring you 80% of results.

Prioritization & Time Management: Stephen Covey

In his book “Seven Habits for Highly Effective People”, Stephen Covey talks about the third habit that is - Put First Thing First. Consider the simple 2 x 2 matrix shown below. It plots the concepts of urgency and importance against each other; and represents where you are spending your time. To really understand and apply this habit, you need to have first done habit 2 - that is, you should already have defined what is important to you. Without first doing this, habit 3 has no power because you simply cannot separate what is important from what is not important.

This representation shows four categories of demand which may be made on your time. Quadrant 1 consists of activities which are both urgent and important - in other words, things to which you absolutely must attend. Why must you do these things? Because they are important - meaning that they contribute to your mission; and they are urgent - meaning that they have some sort of deadline associated with them.

Choices about where to invest your time really are made in the other categories; and most people - driven by the concept of urgency - get drawn into Quadrant 3; doing things that consume their time but do not contribute to their goals. Highly Effective People (yes they all fit together you see) understand that the high leverage activities are all Quadrant 2 - important but not urgent. Planning, preparation, prevention, relationship-building, reading, improving your professional knowledge and exercise are all examples of Quadrant 2 activity - not an exhaustive list, by any means.

We all intuitively know that Quadrant 2 activities are the key to getting results; but you need to have internalized the first two habits before you can benefit from the high leverage this habit brings. In other words, you first need to have developed the strength of character (proactivity) which allows you to be able to say no to demands on your time that fall into Quadrants 2 and 3; and you also need to have defined what importance means for you - otherwise the Quadrants do not exist.

Steps in Time Management:

Establish Goals/Roles/Priorities/Objectives

Log Time

Eliminate Time Wasters

Gain Time through Delegation

Eliminate Time Consuming Activities/Systems

Planning and Scheduling Use of Time

Changing Habits

How Planning helps to use your time effectively?

The next stage in concentrating on results is to learn how to plan. Planning can be considered to be an investment in efficiency and success. Planning is the process by which you work out what you want to achieve, and then think through the who, what, when, where, why and how of achieving that goal in the most effective way possible.

By planning well you can ensure that you concentrate only on those tasks that will move you towards your goal in the most effective way possible, without being distracted by unimportant but urgent tasks.

Planning breaks down into two main strands: personal planning, which is best done by setting goals, and project planning, which is best achieved by a formalised application of the planning process.

Goal Setting - Planning for personal achievement:

Goal setting is a formal process of setting personal targets in a number of areas. The process of setting goals on a routine basis helps you to decide what you want to achieve with your time, and then set the precise personal targets that will lead you to achieving this.

Setting goals has the additional benefit of raising your self-confidence by forcing you to recognise your ability and competence in achieving the goals that you have set on an ongoing basis.

It is a very powerful technique that can yield strong returns in all areas of your life.

At its simplest level the process of setting goals and targets allows you to choose where you want to go in life. By knowing precisely what you want to achieve, you know what you have to concentrate on and improve, and what is merely a distraction. Goal setting gives you long-term vision and short-term motivation. It focusses your acquisition of knowledge and helps you to organise your resources.

By setting sharp, clearly defined goals, you can measure and take pride in the achievement of those goals. You can see forward progress in what might previously have seemed a long pointless grind.

By setting goals you can:

Achieve more
Improve performance
Increase your motivation to achieve
Increase your pride and satisfaction in your achievements
Improve your self-confidence
Plan to eliminate attitudes that hold you back and cause unhappiness

Research (Damon Burton, 1983) has shown that people who use goal-setting effectively:

suffer less from stress and anxiety concentrate better
show more self-confidence perform better are happier and more satisfied.

Goal Setting Helps Self-Confidence

By setting goals, and measuring their achievement, you are able to see what you have done and what you are capable of. The process of achieving goals and seeing their achievement gives you the confidence and self-belief that you need that you will be able to achieve higher and more difficult goals.

Providing that you have the self-discipline to carry it through, goal setting is also relatively easy. The following section on goal setting will give you effective guidelines to help you to use this technique effectively.

Informal Planning

Some simple tasks may not suit either the personal goal-setting approach, or the formalised planning procedure. These may benefit from use of Prioritized To Do lists, used mainly to schedule a number of daily activities, or Action Plans, which list the tasks necessary to achieve a particular goal.

Prioritized To Do Lists:

What are To Do Lists?
'To Do Lists' are lists of tasks to be carried out to achieve goals. These goals might be specific targets, or may simply be the efficient administration of your day. By ordering these tasks in order of importance, you have prioritized your To Do List.

Whilst To Do Lists are very simple, they are also extremely powerful, both as a method of organising yourself and as a method of reducing stress. Often problems may seem intimidating & large or you may have a seemingly huge number of demands on your time. This may leave you with a feeling of loss of control, or of being overburdened with work, or of facing hopelessly huge obstacles.

Getting Back Control
The solution is often simple: write down the tasks that face you, and if they are large, break them down into their component elements. If these still seem large, break them down again. Do this until everything that you have to do is listed. Once you have done this, run through these jobs allocating priorities from A (very important) to C (unimportant). If too many tasks have a high priority, run through the list again and demote the less important high priority items. Once you have done this, rewrite the list in priority order. You will then have a precise, sharp plan that you can use to eliminate the problems you face in the order that they need to be eliminated. This allows you to separate important jobs from the many time-consuming trivial ones, and gives you control of the problems facing you, reducing stress hugely.

Even if the things you want to achieve do not seem overwhelming, To Do Lists are extremely useful ways or organising yourself efficiently, and of motivating yourself to achieve what needs to be achieved efficiently.

Preparing To Do Lists
It is a good idea to prepare To Do Lists whenever suits you: some people recommend doing them at the end of each day for the next day, others at the beginning of a day, others whenever you feel that things are getting out of control - the important thing is that you use them in the way that suits you.

Action Plan
An action plan is a brief list of tasks that you have to carry out to achieve an objective. It differs from a To Do list in that it focuses on the achievement of a goal, rather than focusing on goals to be achieved in a period of time.

Wherever you want to achieve something, drawing up an action plan allows you to concentrate on the stages of that achievement, and monitor your progress towards that achievement.

Planning for important projects

Where you are planning a project that involves the interaction of several people, access to resources and preparation for contingencies, then a formal approach to planning may be useful.

Using Time more effectively

As stated earlier, the key to managing time effectively is to concentrate on results, not on being busy.

Improving the quality of your time

It is important for you to understand that you function at different levels of effectiveness at different times of the day.

If you have kept an activity log for a number of days, you may see that a pattern emerges of times when you think clearly and effectively and shift a lot of work. There may be other times of the day when you feel flat and tired. You may find that the quality of your work suffers during the less energetic part of the day.

You can use this information to schedule work. Important work or activities that need creativity and intelligence should be scheduled for the time when you are most alert. Routine or mundane tasks should be carried out during the periods of low energy.

Creating More Time
In the previous section we examined at ways of using your time more effectively. In this section we will look at ways of creating more time.

Specific Time Management Tools:

Planners
A good planner addresses five basic questions:-

1. What are my work goals?
2. What did I need to meet them? 3. What is the order of importance? 4. How much time is required?
5. How should I distribute my time?

Master List
  A master list is a type of to-do-list. It can be used to inventory activities that need to be done in a short period of time such as a week or a day.
  It has the to do lists What do with the to do list?
 Prioritize the activities on the list
 Assign each activity an estimated time
 Reassign priorities at the end of each day  Renew the list when it becomes too long  Expand the list to include notes

Scheduling Grid
  Block out times on the schedule for each of your major activities.
  Start with recurring activities that occur at a fixed time (examples: classes or work).
  Then block out time for activities that you want to do on a regular basis (examples: exercising or studying).
  Allot ample time for each activity, especially high priority activities.
  Take into account when you are most effective. Morning people might schedule more activities early in the day. Night owls might schedule things later.

Scheduling
 Schedule large activity blocks first
 Schedule the most important work when you are most alert
 Leave plenty of unscheduled time
 Always set aside time for preparation, organisation & planning

Action Plan
An action plan is a brief list of tasks that you have to carry out to achieve an objective. It differs from a To Do list in that it focuses on the achievement of a goal, rather than focusing on goals to be achieved in a period of time.

Wherever you want to achieve something, drawing up an action plan allows you to concentrate on the stages of that achievement, and monitor your progress towards that achievement.

The Activity Log
An activity log is a highly effective way of monitoring the way in which you spend your time. If you work purely from memory it easy to believe that you spent all your day working, and consider that you use of time is good. If you keep an Activity Log for a few days you may be surprised to see precisely how much of your day is wasted.

Without modifying your behaviour, note down the things you do as you do them, from the moment you come into the office. Every time you change activities, whether opening mail, working, making coffee, dealing with colleagues, gossiping, going to collect paper from a printer, etc., note down the time of the change.

As well as noting activities, it is worth noting how you feel, whether alert, flat, tired, energetic, etc. This should be done periodically throughout the day.

Once you have logged your time for several days, analyse the log. You may be alarmed to see the length of time you spend opening mail, talking to colleagues, dealing with disruptions, or doing low value jobs!

How to estimate time taken to achieve a project

It is always difficult to estimate the length of time that a task will take, particularly if it is not a task that has been carried out before. It is quite normal for the time taken for completion of a project to be seriously underestimated as the influence of the unexpected or unscheduled high priority work is forgotten.

Time Estimates

Taking unpredictable events into account

When you have to guess time, and particularly when you are likely to be held to a time estimate, ensure that you allow time for:

Other high urgency tasks to be carried out which have priority over this one.
Accidents and emergencies
Meetings

Holidays and sickness in essential staff
Contact with other customers, perhaps to arrange the next job Break downs in equipment
Let downs from suppliers
Interruptions
Quality control rejections etc.

If the accuracy of time estimates is critical, you may find it effective to develop a systematic approach to including these factors. Typically this would be based on past experience.

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