You've probably heard the saying "Time is Gold" or "Time is Money," yet most do not really know the importance of time. Often, people get on with their lives not really maximizing what they can do in one day. Here are some tips to improve time management and get more out of your day.
1. Develop a system to manage your time
Have you ever wondered how CEOs and industry leaders are able attend a lot of meetings and social events and still make time for their family? Simple - they use a time management system. You would probably argue that they have secretaries who plan for them and staff to get them where they need to be. That may be true but here's a fact to consider: they are given 24 hours a day just like us. They don't get more hours and they don't get less. Building a system will help you improve time management. And there are many tools that you can utilize. You can start using a calendar, an organizer and even Post-its to list down all your tasks for the day.
2. Prioritize your list
Now that you have listed down all the things you need to do in a day, prioritizing them would be the next step. Try to consider the Time Management Matrix or the A, B, C, D approach when doing this. "A" priorities are the urgent and important tasks. "B" priorities are tasks that are important but not really urgent. "C" priorities are not really important but urgent. "D" priorities are neither important nor urgent. By using this method you would know what you should be concentrating on first and which you should be concentrating on last.
3. Multi-task whenever possible
Say you need to make dinner, but you also need to wash the dishes, instead of doing one task at a time; why not do them at the same time. While waiting for your dish to cook in the oven, why not start washing the dishes? By the time your dinner is ready, your dishes will already be dry or starting to dry. Not only did you accomplish 2 tasks, you also did both in less time.
4. Do not delay
Have you seen those "Do Not Delay" stickers on container trucks? If you have, it's there for a reason. Those trucks are probably carrying food items that would perish if not delivered on time. Just like those goods, time is also perishable. Once you lose time, you can never have it back. To improve time management, you need to avoid procrastination. If curiosity killed the cat, then procrastination killed the task. Do not waste your time on C and D priorities; always concentrate on the more important tasks in a day.
These are four of the many time management techniques that you can use. There's so much information on time management that you can read to further improve this skill. However, these are the 4 basic steps towards improving your time management skills.
