Time Management

“What can I do to improve my time management?”

Time management is very much an individual thing. Some people seem to have time to do everything they need to do, others are always trying to catch up and leaving important things to the last minute. Most people are somewhere in between, but just about everyone agrees that they would benefit from managing their time better. We could give you a vast array of ideas, but that’s the subject of a full workshop!

In the meantime, here are three things to think about.

a. Are you doing too much? In which case, prioritise tasks by importance and urgency, and push all the unimportant tasks – especially those apparently urgent ones - to the bottom of the pile. If they don’t get done, so what?

b. Are you working inefficiently, for example by doing a lot of routine tasks frequently, that could easily be grouped together? If not, re-organise them so they can be done in one larger block of time.

c. Are you prone to distraction? If so, organise your tasks and your day to suit your working style. This lets you concentrate for the time spans that suit you, and establish a working discipline that either removes sources of distraction altogether, or allows you to ignore them until you are ready to deal with them (phone calls, email, etc)

Prioritise

List all the routine tasks you do, and allocate them into four categories; as new tasks descend on you, allocate them immediately into one of these four categories:

• Important and Urgent

• Important but not Urgent

• Unimportant and Urgent

• Unimportant and not urgent

It’s immediately clear what you should be focusing on! If it’s hard to decide on importance, ask yourself:  ‘what’s the worst that can happen if I don’t do this?’ You will also notice that second category; it is really critical to carve out time in the day or week to do these things, otherwise the clamour of everyday life crowds them out. Many of these are continuous tasks, such as following up sales calls; if necessary, enter a regular block of time in your diary as if it were an appointment, so other things don’t encroach on that time.

Work Efficiently

Now that your tasks are prioritised, you can focus on the important tasks and see if you’re doing them in the most efficient way. For regular routine tasks especially, separate them into whether you are currently doing them daily, weekly and monthly.

Take the daily list, and for each task, ask yourself : ‘if I did this once a week, would it matter to the business?’  If the answer is NO, then ask yourself the follow up question:  ‘if I did this once a week, how much time would it save?’

An example we met on one occasion was invoicing: -

The business invoiced as soon as possible, after the task was done.  The result was that three or four times a week, they opened up the computer program to create the invoice, print off the copy and mail it to the client; they then pulled out the ring binder and filed the copy invoice. Each time it took 20 minutes, which meant that they were spending at least one hour a week on invoicing.  We got them to do the invoicing once a week and Hey Presto doing all three together only took 30 minutes!

So have a look at you lists and see what you can condense to weekly from daily (or adhoc). Once you have done the daily list try the weekly list see what can be done monthly.

Avoid distraction

This is the number one enemy of time management! You can prioritise your tasks and arrange to do them in the most efficient way, but if you can’t concentrate on getting them done, you’re doomed!

To tackle this, you must recognise your working style, and be honest with yourself about your ability to concentrate. Do you work best in short bursts with frequent short breaks, or can you work for hours on the same topic with no interruptions? Do you have to answer every phone call and email as it happens, or can you return calls later, when you’re ready? Once doing something, can you concentrate on it until it’s finished, or do you find your mind wandering?

Once you recognise these things, there are techniques you can employ to deal with them. However, perhaps the biggest problem for all of us, and a real killer for owner-managers is this: do you find yourself putting off those tasks you don’t enjoy doing?!

If so, it eats away at you, ruining your day until you finally buckle down and do it, when you probably find it wasn’t that bad after all! So make it the first thing you do, and get it out of the way. A good friend of ours calls it : Eating the Frog for Breakfast !

If you need help with time management, or any other issues that would make your business more profitable, call us on 01384 355 444 and select option 1, or email us at doug@exec-tc.com