We have only 24 hours in a day, and we cannot change it, no matter what desperate things you are ready to do to finish your daily tasks. You might be stressed by having to deal with too much workload without having enough time to accomplish them.
Whether you are a student with lots of home tasks, a worker with set deadlines to follow, a manager with goals to obtain, or a housewife trying to finish all chores, you need to improve your time management skills.
There are many ways to help to shape up the way you spend your time, from different applications, like daily organizers to changing your sleeping habits or even entire lifestyle. But first, you need to understand how critical time management skills can be not only in professional life but in life in general, and personal life as well.
What are time management skills?
Time management is the method of planning and using conscious control of time spent on specific activities to increase effectiveness, efficiency, and productivity, says wikipedia.org. It includes a variety of skills that might help you manage your time in the best way. Each one is based on essential factors you should always take into account while managing your activities.
The best time management includes the following factors
Organization. Being well organized might help you to maintain an exact picture of what you need to accomplish and when. It might mean maintaining an up-to-date calendar, being able to locate specific documents quickly, having a tidy environment, and taking detailed notes.
Prioritization. Giving priority to each of your responsibilities is the critical factor in becoming an excellent time manager. There are many ways to prioritize what you need to complete. You might decide to accomplish simple tasks faster than longer and harder ones, or vice versa. Logically, you might prioritize your tasks, starting with those that are more important and have to be done faster most, or it can be a combination of both.
Goal-setting. Being able to set goals, short-term or long-term, is the first step to becoming a good time manager. It will help you to clearly understand your final goal and what exactly you need to prioritize to accomplish it. Setting short and long-term goals can lead to success not only in your career but in personal life as well.
Communication. Having strong communication skills and developing them can help you to make your plans and goals clear to people you work with. It also lets you focus on accomplishing the most important, relevant tasks that align with set goals.
Planning. Being efficient in planning out your daily activities, meetings will definitely help you stick to your schedule.
Delegation. Managers mostly practice this skill, but you can also try delegating tasks if you are managing, for example, a project. Sometimes, it is necessary to be able to say “no” and to transfer the responsibility! You need to practice having boundaries to manage your time well and ultimately achieve your goals.
Stress management. A bits of everyday stress can help you stay motivated and perform well when going through your schedule.
Developing each of these skills will help you to organize yourself in all ways.
Why is time management important?
Time management skills are essential because only a few of us ever have enough time to do everything that is needed or that we want to do.
Time management is defined as using our time productively and efficiently. But what about when you are working as productively as you can, and you still cannot get everything done? Time management is the only tool to solve this problem.
Those who are good at time management are good at getting on and doing things. They are also, however, better at prioritizing, and working out what needs doing—and then discarding the other stuff. Such people can easily define the difference between urgent and important, and it also helps to manage your time.
1) Urgent tasks demand your immediate attention, but the final result, whether you give them that notice may or may not matter.
2) Important tasks matter, and ignoring them may have severe consequences for you or those who surround you.
Skillsyouneed.com demonstrates very excellent examples of urgent and essential tasks and also shows the vital difference between them. It also provides the priority matrix that might help you to organize your tasks into their right categories.
How to develop time management skills?
To understand what time management activities and skills to look at first, read the article from sas.upenn.edu as it will help you to realize what points are essential.
There are lots of sites that give detailed instructions on how to improve your management abilities. For example, site indeed.com suggests twenty best time management tips, while coachingpositiveperformance.com demonstrates only seventeen. We are going to show six that are vital.
Six easy tips to boost your time management skills
Make plans. Lists of daily activities are one of the best ways to stay organized and on top of your time. It will help you to learn how much time things take and what is achievable in specific time frames.
Set goals. Think of what you need to achieve and when, and set goals. The goals should be not only long-term but short-term as well. Set the accurate dates to achieve each goal by, and then do your best to stick to those targets. When a goal is long-term, share it up into smaller pieces, more manageable steps.
Prioritize work. At the start of every day, make a list of tasks that need your immediate attention. Share your activities into essential and urgent using the information listed ahead.
Avoid procrastination. Avoid procrastination at all costs. Do not spend valuable time on it. If you need more information about what procrastination is and how to manage with it, read a beneficial article about it at lifehack.org.
Take breaks. Do not mix it up with procrastination! When you are working and feeling stressed or overwhelmed, it’s essential to take a quick 5-10 minute break away from everything. Take a walk or listen to music. When you are ready to work again, your productivity will be increasingly more. If you are still stressful after a break, read the article “How to turn your stress into productivity”.
Stop multi-tasking. Most experts think that doing more than one thing at the same time is not productive or efficient. Do not concentrate on many tasks, choose just one, but essential, and you will the best result much faster. For more pieces of advice, visit such sites as weforum.org and knowhow.ncvo.org.uk.
Good time management requires daily development and practice of focusing on activities and holding them in a way that can minimize the time for achieving more. Use all the information listed above, and we hope it might help you!
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