How often do you get to the end of the day and wonder where the time went?
How good are you at planning ahead? And including time for unexpected interruptions?
How do you plan your day?
To change how you manage your time you must first commit to changing and sometimes eradicating your (bad) habits!
Always plan in some interruptions - review your last working day and think about how many times you were interrupted and how long for!
Be assertive (help people to help themselves!) - Depending on the situation you may be able to coach people to find solutions themselves so that they don't rely on you in the future.
Emails - do you have notifications turned off? Set aside certain times of day when you access your emails, you could also turn off notifications or close down outlook if you are in the middle of a task that you need to complete without being distracted.
Review your internal clock - when are you feeling at your best, and therefore your most productive? As far as you can, plan key tasks within these times.
It sounds basic, but make sure that you write a 'to do' list and prioritise each item - there are a number of different ways to do this and additional support is available if required. See techniques below.
Make time to plan - 10 minutes at the start and end of every day can help you to prioritise and determine what you need to do, it can help you to be more efficient.
Of course some interruptions are unavoidable, but planning ahead can help you to ensure that you are more productive and that you feel less overwhelmed.
I bet you're thinking that you already knew all of the above, let's face it we all do - but if you don't commit how will you save time and be more productive?
If a task takes 2 minutes or less to complete, do it straight away!
•Set a timer for 25 minutes and focus on 1 task for that time.
•When the timer goes off take a 2-minute break.
•Repeat 3 times, then take a longer break (15-20 minutes).
At the start of each day (or the end of the day before!) identify:
If a task feels 'big' break it down into smaller tasks.
We all feel that we have 7 hours (approx.) per day in which to carry out our job. However, we spend most of our time managing interruptions, sending emails, attending meetings, taking calls, holding conversations etc... All of which are a valuable part of our day and before we know it the working day is over and we haven't even started on our 'to do' list. This can be very disheartening, but the answer isn't to spend more time on our work, but to take control our our time.
Hold a time audit to work out exactly how you're spending your time every day. Use these 5 steps:
Now spend 10 minutes to planning out your day!
