How Can You “Find” Time Each Day?
Be honest. How many times have you said that? Do you say it weekly, daily or several times a day? That’s a red flag indicating that you are either not using any time management strategies or the ones you are using are not working for you.
Either way, time is ticking away, and you are running to catch up. At some point, you just can’t run any faster, work any longer, or stay up any later. You have to take control of how you use your time each day.
Are You Wasting Time?
You may challenge the idea that you waste a lot of time each day. Take a serious look at how you use your time. Do you stretch your lunch an extra half hour or stop and talk to co-workers several times a day?
Add it all up and each day there is a quick opportunity to put an hour or more to more productive use.
What about personal phone calls or personal emails? There goes another half hour. Do you “take a few minutes” to surf the net during work time? Chalk up another half hour to an hour or more.
You may be present at work, but you are not using work time efficiently. Is it possible that you’re wasting anywhere from a half hour to three hours of work time?
How much of your work is on schedule? Are you behind on any high-priority initiatives? Do you get frustrated, take extra work home, and sacrifice personal time to get it done?
As you look around the office or think about other members of your team, I bet you know a teammate who gets a lot done and seems to have a lot more time to pursue other interests. Maybe she’s taking online university classes and gradually working toward her graduate degree. Plus she plays tennis twice weekly for exercise and volunteers one weekend a month with Habitat for Humanity.
She leaves work on time most every day and her in-box is clear. She does it by consistently applying time management strategies. Yet she never appears rushed, and you never hear her complain about not having enough time.
Chances are that your active, productive co-worker prefers to live a life aligned to her goals rather than reacting to others. When you fail to plan your time, then you let other people fill your time and set your priorities.
How Others Set Your Daily Agenda
“Hey, can you take me to the mall?”
“Come on over and watch my new video.”
“I’ll pick you up and we’ll just hang out for the day. You can do your work later; you have plenty of time.”
Those are the ways that you allow other people to use your time because you have failed to plan your time. If you ask the co-worker I mentioned before to hang out after work, she is more likely to say, “I have a paper to write for my class, so let’s pick another evening that works for both of us.” She isn’t ignoring you, but she isn’t willing to let your lack of planning change what she needs to do according to her time management plan.
Start Planning Your Day Today
If you are still saying, “I wish I had more time” at home, then look around for ways that you waste time. Let’s start with the morning.
Do you spend half an hour in the morning searching for a particular shirt, finding it in the dirty clothes basket then looking for something else to wear?
Plan your morning the night before:
- Decide what you’ll wear tomorrow and out all the pieces from shoes to shirt so you can dress quickly.
- Place everything you need in one place near the door you exit each morning. No more searching for keys or your work bag.
- Review your calendar for the next few days. Anything you need to prepare tonight? Write it down in your planner or journal.
- Plan quick personal tasks immediately before work, at lunch, or immediately after work.
Taking these four steps will take that frantic feeling from your morning and give you focus for your work hours.
When you get your job done within eight hours, then you have the evening for yourself and don’t need to stay late at the office. Who knows – you might decide to join your colleagues’ tennis group.
Leave a comment to share any tips or ideas you have for improving productivity.
Make it a great day!
