Managementmasala's Eleven Rules of Time Management

Time is precious. Managers who have to handle multiple tasks need to manage time judiciously to be successful. Here are Managementmasala's eleven rules for good time management.

Time Management Tips

Eleven Rules For Time Management

Set clear goals: Decide what you want to achieve. Do a reality check to ensure that (a) your goals are realistic, (b) clearly stated, (c) they are your own goals and not prompted by someone else, (d) they are supported by your ecology, that is, those dearest and closest to you support you in the pursuit of your goal and (e) you have the resources such as qualification, skill, health and time and, of course, money to achieve your goals.
Clarify your values: What is important to you in life; particularly those things which you will value and which even money cannot buy.
Use your ignition key: Get the task at hand. Do not hang on in the state of limbo, where you neither do nor enjoy your leisure.
Your routine should serve you. Don’t be the slave of routine – that certain things have to be done every day in a particular way, at a particular time etc. Routine should help you in saving time in deciding the same matters everyday and not some thing which will keep you on your nerves for failing to stick to it.
A ‘yes’ to one means a ‘no’ to another: Committing to one thing means that some thing else will have to be sacrificed. We generally make the mistake of saying ‘yes’ to too many things and end up overwhelmed by our commitments.
Distant elephants look small: Commitments given far into the future look easy to fulfill – that is till the day of reckoning. When the time comes the task looks too big. If you do commit for some thing in a distant future don’t keep preparations pending till the last moment.
Chunk down: If the task is too big try to chunk it down – that is break it down to its parts. This will help you in executing it the easier way. After all you don’t eat a plateful of lunch in one gulp; you eat it spoon by spoon.
Avoid being the victim of perfection: Perfection as an aim is laudable. But if in the process of looking for perfection you do not complete any task your time gets wasted. In most tasks what is needed is near perfection and not total perfection.
Off the desk or on the desk: Often we have the tendency to put off replying to a mail. It resurfaces and again we put off. The time spent on the mail is several times more than what we would have spent on it replying on the first occasion.
Appointments have a beginning and end: Be clear that the time you give to some one is not indefinite. It is not an appointment at 11 AM; it is an appointment from 11 to 11.30 AM. If it is not, your interlocutor hangs on eating into the time you need for other tasks.
Keep some time to plan: That little time you can set apart for planning the day’s, week’s or month’s tasks will reward you in providing much more time.