Time is a fixed resource. We all have the same 24 hours to spend as we wish.

What is your attitude toward time?

What is your self-talk as it relates to time?

“I never have enough time”
“What a waste of time”

OR

“Time is on my side”
“I have plenty of time”

Over-stressed equals poor performance

Types of time management philosophies

1. Get organized- Having order=production
2. Warrior approach- Get control
3. Goal approach- Achievement driven
4. ABC approach- Prioritize

Change the paradigm for time management
I like how Anthony Robbins and Stephen Covey look at time management. They look at it as Life Management. Your life is how you spend your time. So make the shift to first getting clear on what life you want to live.

What a life management system can do for you.

1. More control
2. Less anxiety
3. Quality actions taken
4. Living the life you want

Become aware of your relationship with time.

Stop-watch exercise- Track how you spend time for a week

What is your life about now and what is your life going to be like in the future?

Clarify values/what is important

Clarify your roles in life- Example- Spouse, Parent, Entrepreneur, Friend, etc.

What roles are part of your identity of the life you want to lead?

Create a purpose/mission statement
Once clear on purpose
Begin to learn valuable skills in the use of time.

1. Planning- Monthly, weekly, daily
2. Grouping common tasks- Ex) Phone calls, emails, faxes
3. Scheduling- Put in as if an appointment you can’t break
4. Support- share your goals, planning, and scheduling with others, accountability
5. Focus
6. Evaluate- Are the actions taken matching the purpose
7. Educate- Be on the look out for ways to be more efficient
8. Delegate
9. Saying no
10. Power of Questions

a. What is the specific outcome you are committed to achieving?
b. What is your purpose?
c. What are the actions you need to complete for the outcome to be achieved?

11. The Balanced Life- Health, Career, Family, Spiritual
12. Journalize your successes
13. Funnel approach for gathering information

Multi-tasking-
Not always best/performance may suffer
Use down time for education to grow
Your life begins with this moment in time.

1. Use a stacking tray or file folder labeled “E-MAIL” to store paper items associated with e-mail you plan to send. You can process them more efficiently in a batch.

2. Schedule specific times during the day to check and process your e-mail. This reduces the tendency to constantly check it throughout the day and makes you more efficient.

3. Sort incoming e-mail by subject, key word, or author so you can process related mail collectively.

4. File e-mail you want to keep in the appropriate subject folder when you send or receive it. Do not store everything in your “Inbox” or “Sent Mail” folders. It’s not efficiently retrievable.

VOICEMAIL time management tips

5. Put routine requests, like your fax number or e-mail address on your outgoing voicemail message.

6. Leave brief voicemail messages. Give alternatives for contacting you; e.g. e-mail or fax.

7. Always end your message with your phone number. Do not assume someone has your number readily available.

PAPER MAIL/FAXES time management tips

8. Sort your incoming mail so that you can process like items together.

9. Have separate outboxes such as “To Be Filed,” “Fax,” “Copy”, and “Outgoing Mail,” if this makes it more efficient for you or an assistant to process outgoing information.

READING time management tips

10. Magazines pile up! Rip out and bind the articles that interest you and throw the rest away! Carry the binder to read while waiting in line, for appointments, etc.

GENERAL time management tips

11. Always ask yourself, “Am I doing what’s most important right now?” If it takes you closer to your goal, the answer is likely yes.

12. Clear out clutter! It distracts you, creates stress and makes you feel disorganized and out of control. Adopt the phrase, “place for everything and everything in its place.”

13. Return phone calls when the other party is not likely to engage in a long conversation, e.g. right before lunch and quitting time.

14. You’ll value your time more if you know how much each hour is worth. Do the math. And never forget: Your time is more valuable every year because there’s less of it ahead. Take action NOW!

15. Do not fear delegating! Let someone else handle the administrative tasks. Spend your time doing what you do best not shuffling paper.

16. Identify priorities as those that have the highest return on invested time, not those simply considered most urgent.

The Bottom Line – Manage your time, before your time is due

Goal realization requires effective time management through the use of discipline and action-oriented techniques.

Techniques that should be applied on a daily basis, to make the best use of the limited time available to us.

You have already done your goal setting and action plans and have prioritized the actions. For effective time management you need to do the same with each day’s activities.

Time management techniques suggests you break down the large tasks at hand into small, manageable pieces. Then accomplish some of these pieces each day. Before long you will have accomplished a large task.

Another good time management techniques is to end each day by writing a prioritized to-do list for the next day. At the end of each week and month do the same for the next week and month. Get organized.

Use a daily planner. You will be better organized if you write everything. That is where effective time management begins.

Clear your mind of clutter. Solve problems while they are small. Whatever you do, do it once, to the best of your ability, and move on.

Question all tasks to make sure they are worthwhile. Do the worst or hardest jobs first. That is effective time management.

Be decisive and remove time wasters, such as interruptions, from all of your activities. That is effective time management.

Remember to take care of yourself by exercising, watching your diet, and maintaining a balance in your life. And when evening comes and your next day’s to-do list is written, celebrate. This is effective time management

Action that gets rewarded gets repeated. Do this for 30 days and you will be transformed into an action- oriented, do-it-now person. That too is effective time management.

An action-oriented person is proactive. When you are proactive, you have initiative — you can see a need, figure out how to best satisfy it, determine the appropriate time to take the right action, and proceed.

When you are proactive, you lead. When you lead, you take control of yourself and get the things you want out of life. That is effective time management.

Try using the visualization technique to help yourself become action-oriented. That is effective time management.

When you set your goals you pictured something that you wanted to have, be or do. Everything we have or do is preceded by an image in our mind. Visualization is seeing the end result. It is a form of mental rehearsal. Through the use of imagination, what you see is what you will get. That is effective time management.

Your vision of your goals must be clear. There is a difference between “dreaming about having something in the future” and “visualizing having it in the future.” The power to believe makes the difference.

Visualizing implies a structured and disciplined view of what you are trying to accomplish. Through visualization you picture yourself already in possession of your goal.

By visualizing you look at your goal from many different viewpoints. By examining your goal from all of the viewpoints, you see the situation clearly and can act on the aspects that will result in the greatest payback. That is effective time management.

Make this a daily discipline. Visualize to actualize your goals. Forget all your inhibitions. See things as you want them to be, not as they are. Take time to sit back, close your eyes, and see yourself accomplishing your goal.

You are watching a movie based on the success that you have become. Focus your attention on the results. See yourself there. Feel the emotions. See the colour, the details; hear the sounds. That is effective time management.

If you form a clear and detailed picture of your future, ways and means of getting it will be revealed to you. Keep focusing on what you want, not on how you will do it. The laws of nature will take over.

The more your visualize, the more resources you will attract. Your vision will act as a magnet. It will attract people, events, and circumstances to it. It is a self-fulfilling prophecy. That too is effective time management.

And when you’re having a difficult moment during the day, take the time to visualize the accomplishment of your goal. It will refocus and relax you, and the issue of the moment will matter less. The major incident of today will probably be insignificant in the future. Don’t trip over molehills.

That too is effective time management.

The Bottom line: Manage your team to make your goals a reality.