Effective Time Management make you Money and reduces Stress!

No need for time management courses!!, just Read On, it is simple.

Lack of effective time management leads you to feel stressed out at work or home. It makes you feel not accomplishing “anything”. Don’t attend courses (!!), just read on. Time management skill can be learned easily.

Time management techniques are second nature to all of us once we know how to plan and schedule our lives efficiently. You can simply have a to-do-list hanging in front of you, plan it all in your head, or use the latest Personal Digital assistance (PDA) which alerts you for the next task in your life. The to do list helps you prioritize: what is important and what is urgent.

Effective time management is all about setting your priorities right to achieve a certain goal by the end of the day, week, month or year.

We live in a fast forward world. Everything tries to grab our attention when we are awake: the TV news, TV ads, billboards in the streets, newspapers, magazines, colleagues, kids, mom, dad, brothers, sisters, phone calls in the office, mobile phone…..etc.

Signs of lack of effective time management:

If you have the following “symptoms”, they you most probably require our time management tips in this site:

Cannot find things

Missing appointments

Forgetting important appointments

Always late for your appointments

Unprepared for your meetings

Over working while other colleagues watch and can afford a cup of coffeeAlways tired and stressed

When you have to set an appointment, ask yourself the following:

What was planned originally for the same time?

What other things are important to attend?

What do I miss if I don’t attend?

Can I ask someone else to attend or help (Delegation)

Now, let’s have a look on what usually wastes your time:

Unplanned meetings or appointments

Lengthy phone calls

Unscheduled coffee break imposed by a fried, neighbor or a colleague.***S250.shtml***

The effective time management solution:

Effective time management skills require that you change your lifestyle drastically. You need to plan and organize your life in a way that is totally new to what you are used to. To gain the effective time management skills, consider the following:

1- Identify what wastes your time:

Some suggestions in this matter from our own experience might help:

a. TV: this is the worst enemy of effective time management!

b. Phone calls (unless it is your job to answer the phone!)

c. Internet surfing

d. Emails readinge.

e. Email notificationsf.

f. Meetingsg.

g. Traffich.

h. Saying yes to new tasks at work that should be done by someone else normallyi. Doing everything yourself (not delegating)j.

i. Too much reporting and documentation of what you do for livingk.

j.A process or a system

These are suggestions to what could be wasting your time on daily basis. You might want to use this template to list the things that you do on daily basis and see how much of that matches our list.

2- Effective time management tips:

a. Challenge everything that you think is a waste of your valuable time and space. Start with the TV programs! Their time schedule should never ever control your life. Use a tape recorder if you have to.

b. Remember that the process or a habitual system is meant to assist you and not to stress and stall you.

c. Prioritize your daily activities. Consider how many hours you intend to spend at work, for example. Your to do list should start with the highest priority task. More on this below.

d. Avoid meetings for the sake of meetings. Attending meeting that cannot start without you might be a good practice.

e. When you attend a meeting, show up on time and excuse yourself at the end of the scheduled time.

f. Show respects when you decline a meeting request or when you shorten a lengthy phone call.

g. Explain to everyone that you have a schedule and you must stick to it.

h. Delegate tasks that other can do. Others could be a colleague or a partner.

i. Find a space for yourself at work and at home. No interruptions for 15-30 minutes. Listen to yourself only. Music in the background can help. Lock the door, unplug the phone, and switch off the mobile.

j. Plan your weekend as you like and not as others like.

k. Always be firm, but diplomatic with others about your schedule.

l. Question deadlines set by others. Make them realistic. If everything is urgent, nothing is really urgent.

source:http://www.skills-guide.com/time_management.html