8 time management skills you can practice
Improving time management is a goal for most of us. Considering the fast-paced world that we’re now living in, it’s for good reasons. Developing effective time management skills can bring with it many benefits, which include greater levels of productivity and an increase in self-satisfaction.
This is, of course, very important in the office environment but structuring our time outside of work can also lead to a better organised and generally more fulfilled life.
Check out the eight time management skills below which you can start to practice right away to help you use your precious hours and minutes to their very best advantage.
Start prioritising
Prioritising your time begins with the elimination of all non- essential tasks. This will free up your valuable time for what is truly essential and important which will, in turn, lead to a greater feeling of accomplishment for you at the end of each day.
Set goals
Setting goals in our lives give us something to aim for and work towards. Furthermore, the milestones we set in our efforts to reach those goals can become excellent markers of time well spent. Breaking down goals into smaller mini-segments has the added benefit of making achieving them seem much less overwhelming.
Unless we set strict goals we are unable to differienate between the outcomes and the decision making process. If we start judging our decisions based on the outcomes, it can be harder to recognise the postive decision making and steps we took to get there, this can be attributed as the Outcome Bias.
Learn to handle stress
With deadlines comes pressure which can actually be a good influence on a person’s motivation. The sustained burden of unbearable demands can, however, lead to the onset of stress, which can impact negatively on both the body and mind. Knowing your personal pressure limits will enable you to reduce your stress levels and getting to know the symptoms of stress will help you to notice a red flag when you see one.
Don’t procrastinate
Avoiding a particularly difficult or tricky task can cloud your day and the sense of dread can impact negatively on the rest of your work. Instead of putting off that one job you have been dreading, do it first and allow the rest of your time to be used to its full potential.
Try to delegate
An excellent time management skill is being aware of the right time to delegate. If someone else is willing and able to complete a particular task for you why not let them do it, and use that valuable time wisely in another way?
Be patient
When you have a busy schedule, there may be a temptation to rush through your to-do list so you can get everything done. However, hurried tasks can often yield sloppy work and, in some cases, even a necessity to redo the work; a real disaster when it comes to time management. It may sound like a contradiction, but taking your time will, in fact, save your precious time in the long run.
Write a list
A to-do list not only allows you to plan the time you allocate to each job effectively but, more importantly, it enables you to recognise and reward your progress as you make your way through it.
Become self-aware
Everyone works in different ways and becoming aware of our own preferences, methods and quirks will help us learn to work not against them but with them to reach our very best potential.
By implementing a few of these tips, you will find that you are able to manage your time much better, both in and out of the office. This will allow you to make better decisions, while increasing your productivity and self-satisfaction.