What is that one thing that you can’t reverse back? We can all agree it’s time. Once it’s gone, it’s gone for good. That’s why it’s important to spend time achieving the things we love as much as we can. If we don’t spend time well, someday we may end up regretting not doing the things that make us happy.
Whether it’s for your business, your family, or pursuing your passion, it’s important for us to develop time management skills to be able to accomplish all the tasks and responsibilities assigned to us.
“Lost time is never found again.” – Benjamin Franklin
How do we develop our time management skills? Here are our top 5 tips to help you manage your time to increase your productivity.
List all your activities for the day
Before you start working, it’s important that you to list down all the activities you’re planning to do for the day. Whether they’re related to work, personal appointments, or a night out, list them down. The point of listing them is to determine which activities matter to you and which activities can wait.
Yes, we’re going to filter out your activities based on priorities. Those activities that cannot be delayed such as work-related tasks should be put on the “must-do” list. Browsing through your social media accounts, replying to emails, and chit-chatting with your friends, can be put under “want to do” list. In this way, you’ll be able to filter out which activities you should accomplish first. This will help you to manage your time properly as you’ll prioritize important things over leisure.
Eliminate the distractions in your workplace
Now that you’ve already identified the activities that don’t need your immediate attention, it’s time to keep off from them. If you don’t, you’ll only be distracted from doing your work. Remember that the temptation of doing something pleasurable (which, usually, is not overly important) is typically at its peak when you’re busy.
This will help you to focus on the task at hand. If you concentrate enough, you’ll be able to do the task before the set deadline and also deliver quality output.
“By prevailing over all obstacles and distractions, one may unfailingly arrive at his chosen goal or destination.” – Christopher Columbus
Stop multitasking
This is actually in connection with tip #2. We might think that multitasking is awesome, but believe us when we say that it just doesn’t work like that in the real world. In fact, it is the opposite. Multitasking will pave your way to having a time suicide. Why? It’s because your attention is divided. You’re unable to focus on getting one task done.
Instead, what you should do is to think about strategies to complete one task at a time. We recommend that you implement the divide and conquer strategy. You already identified the important tasks at tip #1, right? Now it’s time to start completing those tasks step by step. Before you realize it, you’ll have accomplished all tasks in due time.
Read time-management books (And take the advice!)
If you’re still finding a difficult time in managing your time, maybe it’s time for you to get some inspiration by reading time management books. Not only will you get some tips from experts on how to manage your time, but you’ll also read a glimpse of the stories from successful entrepreneurs to inspire you into making wise moves and decisions to be successful in life.
Use your dead time doing something productive
Let’s say that you finally have two hours as free time for the day. While resting might sound like an appealing activity to do, ask yourself whether you really need to spend that whole time sleeping. We don’t think so. In fact, you only need about 15-30 minutes of a nap to have enough rest. What should you do with the remaining 1 hour and 30 minutes? We suggest you spend it doing something productive.
Do you want to finish reading your favorite book? Read it. Want to finish writing that chapter? Take the time to write. Want to learn a new skill? Take the time to study and polish your skill. Remember, that time is precious, so you should grab every chance to fulfill your passion!
“If time were to take on human form, would she be your taskmaster or freedom fighter?” – Richie Norton