TIME MANAGEMENT TOOLS YOU NEED

as any process it is best managed when there you adequate tools. There are many tools you could use to perfect time management but the four described below are perhaps the most powerful and effective in increasing productivity.

Goal Setting 

Where you want to be 5 years from today? What about 15 years from today? What about postretirement? Have you thought about it? Have you visualized yourself in different stages in the future? 

Without a clearcut life goal you would not have a direction. Even more important, you would not know whether you are successful or not. You would have nothing to measure your achievements against; neither would you know where your efforts ultimately lead. 

You need to have goals to ensure that you have direction in life. This direction would define your purpose in life, make your life most interesting and have you motivated in your work. Some examples of life goals:

I want to be an excellent homemaker, to provide a nurturing, healthy and loving ambiance that makes a house, home

I want to become the CEO of a leading fashion house

I want to have my own XYZ business

I want to have $1 million in my  bank in 10 years

I want to have a PhD degree before I complete my 30th birthday

I want to be debtfree in 5 years’ time

I want to retire and travel the work by the time I am 50

I want to have my own house on my favorite beach before my 45th birthday

I want to put both my children through college

I want to start my own photography studio

I want to live in Europe after I retire

As you can see, goals give you an      

overall sense of purpose. You have before you a set destination, and hence it becomes easier for you to plan your life. With a set goal, you will be able to decide better what job is best for you, what type of relationship you are looking for, what leisure habits you could pursue, and so on. Life is much better when you have a set goal, because then you have something to set your compass for; you have a destination and through it, you gain a direction. 

This is one of the most important tools of time management; one that you need to set correctly. To have a goal put in place consider going through the 5 steps briefly described below. 

5 Golden Rules for Goal Setting

Rule No. 1 – The Goal Should Be Motivating

A life goal should be something that you want to achieve with all your heart. It should be important, it should give you intense pleasure, and it should be motivating to you. Remember a goal will bring focus into your life. It will have to be something that makes you proud, gives you happiness and makes you feel good about yourself.

Do not shy away from writing down more than one goal if you feel the need for it. For example, your goals could be:

I want to retire at 55

I want to put my 5 children  

through college

I want to have $3 millions in my bank by my 50th birthday

I want to have at least 5 paintings ready for sale at an exhibition

I want to establish an animal shelter to cater for cats before I retire

All these can be part of your overall life goal. Note that each statement makes you feel alive and happy; it makes you want to get up and work hard to get there. That is the power of a goal  it gets you going. 

Rule No. 2 – The Goal must be SMART

“SMART” is an acronym for five specific attributes a goal should have:

SPECIFIC – the goal should be well defined and very clear.  If you close your eyes, you should it clear and without any ambiguity.

MEASURABLE – the goal should have clearcut indicators. You need to measure the time and quantity so you could space it. Saying, “I want to be debt free” is not a proper goal, because it’s neither here nor there. But when you say, “I want to be debt free within 3 years” the goal is definite. You have three years to get there, hence, you can plan your finances, activities and lifestyle accordingly. 

ATTAINABLE – the goal should be attainable as per your best belief. It can be as wild as you want, as long  as you believe it is possible. For example, “I need to learn to fly before my 30th birthday”.  The goal should be attainable; but be careful not to make it too easy. If it is too easy, it will not have the power to challenge you into concrete action. Have your goal set to be challenging, but achievable. For example, “I need to repay my $200,000 debt within 5 years”. This could be 

RELEVANT – your goals should be in synch with your beliefs and nature. Say, you want to become a veterinarian – if you love animals. It does not make sense to aim at becoming a pilot instead – just because it is more glamorous. You goals should reflect what you want the most, what makes you happy,   what gives you purpose. 

TIMEBOUND – the goal should have a timeline. I want to do XYZ by soandso time/ date. Unless you define the goal by time, you would not develop the urgency to plan for it. You 

Rule No. 3 – Write It Down

It’s easy to forget something that is not written down in concise terms. You need to write your life goal down and look it at every day while visualizing it already happened.  The wording of the goal is also very important. You need to use definite terms such as “I will” and avoid scope for ambiguity such “I would like”, “I might” etc. Examples:

Good Goal Statement – “I will be   debt free (all $50,000 of it) within 5 years from today; give date.” The statement says how much money needs to be repaid by what time. It is specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time bound.  It can be measured and you can plan for it; you can also verify whether you are succeeding/ making progress or not. 

Not Good Goal Statement – I would like to be debt free in the relatively near future. You would only know that you “would like” to be debt free. When? How much money? How? Nothing else is clear and hence, it would be doomed to failure from the beginning. 

 

Rule No. 4 – Back Your Goal with a WellDefined Action Plan

This is where you plan for the achievement of the goal you have set. The goal will require a concise plan of action, if you want to see any results. For example, the statement “I will be debt free (all $55,000) within 5 years” requires some strategic steps. You need to generate about $11,000 extra per year to achieve your goal. 

*How are you going to generate the extra money?

*How much need be saved for payments every month?

*What type of work you can do to generate the amount you require?

*What is the contingency plan – if you cannot generate this amount?

Rule No.5 – Once you set your goal, stay on the path to achieve it no matter what

You need to commit that once your goal is set, you would do everything within powers to achieve it. This means that you need to set up minimilestones that will get you there within the time limit set. It is very important that you stick to the plan and achieve your overall goal. 

To make it interesting and motivating, set the initial milestones with just the right amount of teasing/ challenging. As soon as achieve one, celebrate in an exaggerated manner. This will program your brain to want to achieve more, quicker. Pace the mini goals in such a manner that you will look forward to achieve each one of them, knowing that with each one completed you are closer to the overall life goal envisaged by you. 

Important: Mixing Business with Pleasure Is Good

Most people – when they think about goals – think that this concept is applicable only to career, professional profile and so on. Nothing could be further from truth. Your life’s goal should be first and foremost “to be happy”. 

This is an abstract premise, but an important one because it tells you that career and professional aspects are as important as your pleasure. Goals need to be set about where you want to reach   professionally and at the same time, it needs to show where you want to be emotionally. 

Say, you want to retire as the CEO or President of a Company. This is a good goal with respect to your career. For pleasure, you may say, “I need to learn Italian, German and Spanish languages before I retire.” Or you may want to learn painting, or anything that give you pleasure.  

A good goal looks at every aspect of your life and aspires to help a person grow exponentially intellectually, financial and personally. 

To Do Lists

Another very important for time  management is the “to do” list. This is a tool to help get organized mentally –which is tremendously important – and a weapon against all types of distractions. 

The “to do” list will tell you how many things you have to do during the day, which is the no.1 priority and which one can be deferred. It will also tell you how many tasks you have accomplished over the period and how many would need to be reinstated in the tomorrow’s “to do” list. 

Make no mistake of writing off this tool as insignificant or trivial because it most definitely is not. The “todo” list is perhaps the most critical of all time management tools; one that will keep your mind  uncluttered, focused and motivated to complete each day’s tasks. 

Each day thus completed will build towards achieving the ultimate – your life’s goal. The day is ultimately the smallest complete unit of your time and the “to do” list will ensure that it is used effectively and purposefully. 

There is another huge benefit you will enjoy from using the “to do” list – and that is, you will be able to measure your progress. At the end of the day, when you see all those completed tasks scratched off the list, you will feel good about yourself and hugely satisfied that you have achieved so much.  This feeling of satisfaction will act as a motivator to work more and better   the next day, convinced and happy that you are moving in the right direction and you are going to achieve your goal. 

How to Prepare a ToDo List

Start by writing all the tasks that need to be done. This would be your working draft. List everything that comes to your mind; never mind in what order. Once you have everything in writing, prioritize the list either with the help of numbers (such as 1 is top priority and 5 the lowest) or letters (A for the most important and E for the lowest). Rewrite the todo list in the order you need to have the tasks completed according to the prioritization. 

There are a few things you need to  keep in mind when you do your todo list:

There are about 18 waking hours you can use out of the 24 hours; plan accordingly.

Attempt to complete the most unpleasant tasks first; because after the worst is over, everything else seems easier. 

You need to keep aside at least 56 hours for sleep and this is nonnegotiable. Without adequate rest, you would not be able to put in your best, hence any advantage gained by putting off sleep would be soon counteracted by decreased energy levels/ ability to work subsequently. 

Keep a little leeway time in  between tasks to make up for the need of a little break, sudden and unavoidable interruptions/ distractions, circumstances beyond your control, etc. 

Keep your to do list clocked; every task has a maximum amount of time allotted to it. Do not go over the time allotted to it unless it is both important and urgent. Normally, you should go to the next task on the list and defer the unfinished task to the next day’s todo list. 

Keep the high energy tasks allotted to your high energy time of the day, unless they are urgent and have to be completed in the morning hours. 

Complete the todo list for the next day at bed time and NOT in the morning or you would spend the better part of the morning planning the day. 

Keep the todo list somewhere where you can see it all the time and scratch off the tasks completed. It feels too good to see that you are making progress.

Allot time for a little relaxation/ fun every 23 hours. 

Allow time for a comfortable lunch – even if you eat at desk. 

If possible learn to take a power nap midday. This is a nap of 1020minutes after lunch. Many find it remarkably invigorating. 

Use Technology to Increase the Effectiveness of Your ToDo List While just having a todo list would improve on your time management considerably, using technology can make a huge difference. There are plenty of apps and software programs that you could use to make your life so much easier. A quick example is http://www.toodledo.com/  which is free and exceptionally good. Another similar program is http://todoist.com/. 

Keep in mind that you might like to test drive a few before you decide which one suits you best. What works for your friend/ colleague might not work so good for you. So, do not just pick one that has been recommended; rather look around and don’t stop until you are 100 percent happy with what you have. 

The good thing is that most of these “productive apps” are free. 

Use programs that you could synch between your smart phone and laptop/ PC so you could update either and still be on track. 

With your smart phone and laptop enlisted as aids, your todo lists can become the most powerful tools for time management. You can have alarms for reminders, you can have timers that will tell you when to switch to the next task, when to take a break, and you can have automated uploading of remainder (incomplete) tasks to the next day’s todo list and so on. 

Using technology is like having a 24x7 private assistant – which is superefficient, yet works for you   for free. 

Prioritization: What Do You Do When Priorities Clash 

When you draw up a todo list the first thing you need to do is prioritize the tasks according to their importance and urgency. Importance and urgency are not one and the same – and almost never interchangeable though they seem so. 

You need to prioritize the tasks according to your perception of urgency and importance. For example, answering the phone when it rings is urgent, but not always important; meaning you can let the telephone ring sometimes when you are doing important work. 

Be sure you understand which task needs to be done first. There should be no doubt in your mind about what is to be attended when; this is why you make todo lists.

What Happens When You Have Two or More SamePriority Tasks

You will be amazed how often this will happen. You look at the list and you end up with 5 tasks classified as No.1. What do you do? It sounds difficult, but as Sherlock Holmes is often quoted, it is in fact “elementary”.  You will have to look at the samepriority tasks and decide in which order you want them to be done – since, indeed you cannot do all of them at once. 

Once you put your mind to it, you will find that it is relatively easy to   decide which tasks you want/ need to be completed first. Do not stop until you have decided all your tasks in a decisive order. Though you could always do it manually, this is where a little help from technology would be a great boost in efficiency. 

Action Plan

Action plan is something like a local map to have you organized around your daily task and keep you oriented towards your main and major goal (or goals).  An action plan is therefore a tiny part of what the overall major plan.  

For example, let us say one of your major goals is to retire by the time you reach your 50th birthday. To get there, you need to be financially  selfsufficient and even comfortable. Hence, you would have to identity what amount of money would have you feel comfortable at retirement time and then take all the necessary measures to get there as desired. The following steps would be obvious:

Contact a finance/ investment expert.

Find out how much money you need to save/ invest per year to achieve your goal.

Find out what type of investments would make your money work for you and bring the highest possible returns with minimum risk.

Identify methods to maximize your savings.

Ensure that you are debtfree by the time you retire.

Prepare for your postretirement period. 

Each one of these subgoals could become an action plan. For example, let us take the first subhead:

Contact a finance/ investment expert.

Identify suitable finance expert

Educate yourself on the criteria needed to decide

What type of financial expert would suit your needs best

Decide whether you should use online experts or inperson

Negotiate shortterm/ longterm role

What would be the fees charged?

What are the advantages/ disadvantages of using longterm and shortterm

In this manner, each action plan would accomplish a task. These action plans would work together to accomplish each minigoal. As you can note, when the task is broken into smaller units it is easier to accomplish and the goal becomes workable. 

To ensure that you manage your time optimally, you need to break your main life goals into bite sized subgoals. In turn, these subgoals may be broken down into tasks and action plans so you know what to   do, step by step to get there.