Time management is extremely crucial in the modern digital world. With the help of technology, we can undertake more tasks within a short amount of time. However, it has reached a point where at least some of us are getting overwhelmed.
In some cases, the use of technology to increase the efficacy of work can even lead to increased stress levels in individuals who are unable to cope with the increasing pressure of undertaking tasks as efficiently as possible. Hence, time management skills have become an essential part of undertaking daily work for the modern ‘employee’.
So, we are sharing 10 of the best time management and organisational skills to ensure that you succeed, along with 10 effective strategies for managing your time productive time better.
What is Time Management?
Time management is the act of utilizing your time efficiently to maximize your productivity. With the right time management skills, you will be able to undertake your tasks on time, while also staying mentally healthy and avoiding stress.
Time management helps you accomplish tasks on time by prioritizing the most important ones first. As a result, you can complete urgent and important tasks first, leading to easier completion of tasks. It also leads to reduced stress, since you have a plan at hand, and are completing tasks based on a pre-defined plan. Being good at time management also enables you to have sufficient time for undertaking other stuff such as leisure activities, personal time, hobbies, and more.
Top 10 Time Management Skills
Now that we have checked out some of the most effective strategies for efficient time management, let us share some of the best time management skills in the workplace to ensure your success. These skills are essential to manage your time efficiently, which will help you stay productive without having to stress over the completion of these tasks.
So, we are sharing 10 time management skills examples which will help you succeed:
1. Rise Early
The most essential time management skill that you can learn is to rise early as it literally provides you with more time! By getting up early, you can undertake more tasks since you can take advantage of the whole day. Additionally, you will perceive the day to be longer since you woke with the sunrise, resulting in the completion of more tasks.
2. Plan Ahead
Another major factor that helps with effective time management is planning ahead. Once you have a robust idea of the allocated tasks, you can create a plan to undertake them. However, you should keep in mind that the most well-thought-out plans can also go haywire; hence, it is always best to create buffer times too.
3. Prioritise Tasks
It is also essential to prioritize your tasks based on different factors associated with the tasks. By setting priority for each task, you are essentially creating a schedule since you should undertake the tasks with the most priority first. You can use the techniques we shared above to help you prioritize the tasks according to your requirements.
4. Set Goals
You should also have clear goals set before undertaking the tasks since it will help you stay focused on accomplishing them. With the lack of well-defined goals, it is easier to get distracted and hamper your productivity. If you require further motivation, you can also set rewards for yourself after each goal, which will motivate you to stay focused.
5. Stay Organized
It is also essential to stay organized and disciplined to manage your time efficiently. By staying organized, you would have clarity of thought, making time management easier. You can also use employee timesheet software and any technology at your disposal to categorize your work, as well as your workplace.
6. Minimise Distractions
Distractions have become the bane of the digitally connected world, where you have all the tools to while away your time at your fingertips. Hence, it is essential to minimize and avoid all kinds of distractions. You can start by putting your smartphone offline as well as using any app blockers if required.
7. Breakdown Tasks
By breaking down major tasks into smaller ones, you are essentially making them easier to do. It is a widely acknowledged fact that we tend to undertake smaller tasks well when compared to a larger complex task. Hence, you should break down your tasks to the smallest denominator, making them easier to accomplish.
8. Set Firm Boundaries
It is also essential to set firm boundaries to ensure that you stay on track with your commitments and can complete the tasks within the stipulated time. By setting firm boundaries, you also let your colleagues and others know that your ‘undivided attention’ is required for the task at hand. Hence, it also helps minimize distractions from external factors such as family or colleagues disturbing you.
9. Avoid Multitasking
While this might seem counter-intuitive, it is best to avoid multitasking if you wish to manage your time effectively. If you are multitasking between two different tasks, you are simultaneously thinking about two different things, which drains your energy, offsetting the time saved with multitasking. If you undertake the same tasks sequentially, it is easier for the brain to process, while also ensuring that you concentrate completely on one task at a time.
10. Delegate Tasks
Similarly, you should also delegate tasks to others whenever possible. By delegating tasks to your team members, you are essentially creating more time for yourself. Hence, if you know that you have a team member who is better at tackling a certain task, you can delegate the task to them, which will ensure its successful completion.
Importance of Time Management Skills
Time management skills are extremely important since they provide the following benefits:
- Increased productivity
- Reduced stress levels
- Better confidence
- Improved mental health
- Increased job satisfaction
- Better focus in work
- Enhanced goal achievement
- Improved work-life balance.
Common Challenges in Time Management
While time management sounds simple on paper, it is often easier said than done since there are multiple challenges associated with it. These challenges make it harder to implement robust measures to manage your productive time while staying relaxed, ensuring that the goals set by your performance management software are fulfilled.
Hence, we should discuss these challenges as you will be able to avoid them when trying to manage your time effectively:
➔ Procrastination
Procrastination is the act of delaying tasks until it is impossible to avoid them. It is often a sign of other issues such as lack of motivation. It can also occur due to an individual having a perfectionist attitude towards tasks. No matter the cause, procrastination is a major challenge for any individual wishing to manage their time efficiently.
➔ Distractions
Since we are living in the digital age, there is no lack of distractions, especially with technology. There are several distractions in the workplace, including smartphones, social media, colleagues, and more. Distractions not only prove to be detrimental to staying focused but also make getting back to the task at hand difficult for the individual.
➔ Lack of Planning
Another major challenge is planning effectively. Since the tasks you are required to undertake can vary a lot depending on your work, planning often requires meticulous knowledge of the tasks. Hence, due to a lack of planning, there can be a shortage of time for completing the tasks at hand.
➔ Lack of Organization
Along with the management of time, it is equally important to have a structured approach to manage time effectively. Hence, a lack of organization could derail your time management strategies despite meticulous planning. While scheduling tasks for the day, you should also consider the priority of these tasks to ensure their successful completion.
➔ Lack of Discipline
Following through the plans set by you requires you to stay committed to the tasks at hand. In this scenario, lack of discipline becomes a major issue since it distracts you from the task, leading to time management issues. Without discipline and commitment, it is impossible to meet deadlines and stay on schedule.
➔ Taking More Tasks
If you have difficulty saying ‘no’ to tasks, it is bound to wreak havoc with your time management goals. It leads to overcommitment and underperformance, resulting in burnout, while also being perceived as an underperformer. Hence, it is essential to allocate time to your tasks and deny more tasks being allocated if you find that the time won’t be enough to complete them.
How to Improve Time Management Skills?
Since we have understood the major challenges in time management, let us check out 10 of the most effective strategies to improve time management skills. These strategies are devised by experts, who have undertaken research and developed them to ensure robust time management for any work.
Hence, let us check out these strategies:
1. Eisenhower Matrix
The Eisenhower Matrix is a time management method which considers the importance and the urgency of the task at hand to allocate time for it. Using this matrix, you can place your tasks into the 4 quadrants of the matrix:
➔ Quadrant 1: Important and urgent tasks are put into this quadrant. You should complete the tasks that are in this quadrant first since they are both important as well as urgent.
➔ Quadrant 2: Important and non-urgent tasks are put into this quadrant. You should complete the tasks in this quadrant eventually since they should be completed eventually, while not urgent.
➔ Quadrant 3: Unimportant yet urgent tasks are put into this quadrant. You can delegate the tasks in this quadrant since they are not as important but are required to be undertaken urgently.
➔ Quadrant 4: Unimportant and non-urgent tasks are put into this quadrant. The tasks in this quadrant can be omitted from completion since they are neither important nor urgent.
2. Kanban Technique
The Kanban Technique is a system developed by Taiichi Ohno, who was an industrial engineer at Toyota. Hence, it is also called the ‘Toyota Nameplate System’ in the automotive sector. It makes time management easier with the use of the Kanban board on which tasks are placed in a certain manner. Once a task’s status changes, it is moved forward on the Kanban board.
This process of moving the tasks keeps on repeating until the task is accomplished, upon which, it is removed from the board. Since the Kanban board is visible to all team members, it vastly improves the transparency of the tasks, while making it easier to identify bottlenecks.
3. GTD Method
GTD or the ‘Getting Things Done’ Method was popularized by author David Allen in his book, ‘Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity’. The idea behind the method is simple as it involves organizing the tasks at hand.
To complete tasks successfully using the GTD method, you need to follow the steps below:
➔ Capture: Capture every task that you have into a collection.
➔ Clarify: Clarify whether you can act on the task right now. If not, you have multiple options such as deleting the task or putting it on pause.
➔ Organize: Organize the tasks into categories for undertaking them.
➔ Reflect: Reflect and review the tasks at hand to gain control and focus.
➔ Engage: Engage with the task to accomplish it successfully.
4. Time Blocking Method
The Time Blocking Method is used by successful CEOs all over the world, including Elon Musk, Bill Gates, etc. It includes a 3-step process, which helps you block time effectively, helping you improve your time management:
➔ List: Divide the entire day into smaller blocks called ‘Time Blocks’.
➔ Plan: Estimate the time required to accomplish certain tasks and break them down to ensure individual task is completed within a time block. Allocate each time block to a task.
➔ Buffer: It is recommended to have buffer time to give room for unexpected delays, which ensures that the time blocks remain at play despite any interruptions.
5. Parkinson’s Law
Parkinson’s Law states that ‘Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion’. It was published by The Economist in an essay written by naval historian Cyril Northcote Parkinson. In other words, you can infer that a task requires only that much amount of time that we allocate for it.
Hence, although it may sound philosophical, it is an excellent time management technique. For example, you can allocate the time for a task based on your estimate of how much time it will take for the task to be completed, and it will take nearly the same amount of time to accomplish the task.
6. Deep Work
The concept of ‘Deep Work’ was developed by Cal Newport in his book, ‘Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World’. In this book, he has made the distinction between deep and shallow work. He has defined shallow work to be less stressful tasks, while deep work requires you to focus more and is more strenuous in nature.
Once you bifurcate your tasks as shallow or deep, you can plan on executing the deep tasks according to your preference, while the shallow tasks would also have a dedicated spot on your timetable. However, this timetable will vary from one person to another since different individuals have different productive hours and you can set your time accordingly.
7. SMART Method
The SMART method is used as a productivity hack that helps you manage your time efficiently while staying productive. It is primarily a way to set goals, which helps you undertake tasks effectively, while also ensuring its successful completion. Additionally, this method is used to achieve short-term goals, which makes it ideal for daily task allocation.
The SMART acronym stands for the following factors:
- Specific: The goals you set for your tasks should be specific to help you stay focused.
- Measurable: Similarly, it should be measurable to understand the progress of the task.
- Achievable: The goal should also be attainable within the defined timeframe.
- Relevant: These goals should also be relevant to the task, as they should ensure the task’s completion.
- Time-bound: It is also essential to have a well-defined timeframe to accomplish the task.
8. POSEC Method
The POSEC method is another acronym-based time management technique which helps you organize and accomplish your tasks within the specified time. It was defined by author Steven Lam, in ‘The POSEC Method of Time Management’, which itself was based on Abraham Maslow’s Theory of the hierarchy of human requirements.
The POSEC method uses the following factors to ensure time management:
- Prioritize: Set priority to each task to ensure that the most important ones are separated from others.
- Organize: Organize the tasks into categories to develop a plan for undertaking them.
- Streamline: Simplify the tasks at hand into smaller units to make them easier to undertake.
- Economize: Cut back on the tasks that are recreational in nature.
- Contribute: Make a difference with your contributions to ensure that the tasks remain meaningful for you.
9. Technique
The concept behind the 1-3-5 technique is effective since it is very simple at its core. It is especially effective if you have a lot of tasks on your platter. The basic idea of the 1-3-5 technique is to categorize the tasks at hand into three categories, big, medium, and small.
Once you have categorized the tasks, the next step is to undertake them in the following order:
- Undertake 1 big task.
- Complete 3 medium tasks.
- Finally, accomplish 5 small tasks.
Undertaking tasks in this 1-3-5 order ensures that the tasks get completed, while you do not remain stressed over how to accomplish them. Since you are dealing with just 1 big task in a cycle, you feel less stressed completing the comparatively smaller tasks.
10. Biological Prime Time
The basic idea of the ‘biological prime time’ is to identify the time when your body’s ability to work is at its peak and undertake the most stressful tasks in that time. You should observe your daily routine and determine the exact duration when your energy levels are maximum. Once you understand this period, schedule the most important tasks for that duration, which will help in accomplish them easily.
You can concentrate on other smaller tasks even after the completion of this ‘prime time’ since they can be accomplished effortlessly. It will also leave you with more energy for the smaller tasks since your biological prime time will not drain much of your energy when undertaking the more important tasks.
Conclusion
That was quite a list to go through! While we started with discussing what exactly is time management, we ended up sharing 10 of the most effective strategies for better time management, as well as 10 of the best time management skills to ensure your success. Following these strategies and learning these skills will surely set you on the path to tackling your tasks and managing your time better.
