After observing the present generation of young and energetic students and aspirant employees, I am of the opinion that these people are not following the principles of
“TIME MANAGEMENT”. Keeping in view of this, I have collected and codified
some management principles, deliberated by management experts, if read and followed , at least some them, I am sure they will be definitely in the path of success and sure to fulfill their aspirations. Please read and comment on my collections.
TIME IS ESSENCE “Time is not a bottomless well. You have an inventory of time every day -
Twenty-four Hours. We all do. There is nothing more democratic.
You have just as much time as the President of United States and the bum
On the street -no more, no less. How well we succeed is largely a function of how we use this inventory of time.
--- EVERETT T. SUTERS
LACK OF TIME: A PERPETUAL LAMENT “Time is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent. Be careful lest you let other people spend it for you”.
Carl Sandburg (1878 - 1967)
“I don’t have time; otherwise, “I wish I do this, but where
is the time? “I could have done it much better, if only you had given
me more time.”
“There are so many things I am supposed to do, but in such a short time,
how could I do all this?
•You hear all these and similar statements and you yourself make them
so often that they have become a part of your daily life.
•People living in their sixties and seventies, who have not much to speak
of their accomplishments, talk of “paucity of time” but for which they
would have done wonders.
•People in their youth complain that they do not have enough time,
otherwise, What with their energy and enthusiasm, they would show
what they were capable of doing.
•In fact, so much conscious are we of shortage of time that even as
school going children, our frequent grouse is that we don’t have time,
otherwise we would learn this, do that and be on top of the world…”
If only we had time then seems to be the lament of almost every-one.
TIME: HOW MUCH FRITTERING DO WE ALLOW? A close look into the lives and behaviors of people who always
insist that they are short of time may reveal interesting facts:
•These may be the people who do not know how to regulate and
plan their lives.
•“Punctuality” may be a word that has never found a place in there
vocabulary; still less in their behavior.
•Watch them: there may be the people, who don’t attend the office in time,
late to arrive, early to go, eager to enjoy unauthorized recess.
•Tea and coffee sessions with friends, they believe are all very well and
one may enjoy good company for gossip too. It doesn’t better even if this
is in working hours.
•They don’t have time: when their family needs it, it is for office;
when their office needs it, it is for friends;
when work needs it, it is for entertainment
and, don’t be surprised when we say, when they are in entertainment,
they may be worried that work will be staring at their face when they
go back to it!
• hese verily are the people who can neither enjoy work, nor leisure and
forever grumble over what they would not have achieved if only time
was theirs!
REMEMBER: Although Time waits for none, it decidedly cares for
those who are careful about it.
TIME: THE BIRD ON THE WINGS Time is, no doubt, a constraint and it is true that we do not have all
the time in this world to do all the things in accordance with our hearts
desire or the demands placed on us.
•But it is equally true that people have, within that same constraint,
made use of the available time and given results.
•Was it that the day for such people meant more than 24 hours or
an hour more than 60 minutes?
•A question you may laugh at, but no laughing question this is!
•It is necessary to sit up and think how others have been able to make use
of the same limited time to achieve results while we have been caught
grumbling about its shortage or non-availability.
•Time is a raw material but most of us use it as a consumer’s finished
product available free, better still, as children use ice cream; taste it,
enjoy it while it last, and wonder what happened to it before they knew.
REMEMBER: Time, if used as raw material can, along with other
inputs, yield excellent results provided we organize it, and more
important, organize ourselves. LET’S SEE HOW!
GOAL SETTING All of us think that we have an idea of what we plan to do and achieve
in a given span of time; an hour, a day, a week, a month, a year and
so on.
• Pick up a piece of paper and pencil and just try to jot the idea down:
you will find, to your surprise, how mistaken you were.
• You really don’t know what you want to do, much less achieve, during
a given time, although you thought all the while that you did know.
It speaks a lot about how much do we need to organize ourselves?
• First of all, it is necessary to determine the goals we wish to set for
ourselves: goals to be achieved in a day, in a week, a fortnight,
a month and so on.
• A goal should be concrete, unambiguous, and achievable despite
constraints and time-bound.
• It should not be too easy, nor should it be impossible.
• It should be spelt in terms of ACTION.
• And, it should be reduced to writing.
REMEMBER: Half the battle is won on time front if we spell out
our objectives in clear workable written terms. Conversely, whole
of the battle can be lost if goal remains unidentified, ambiguous
and unwritten.
DETERMINING PRIORITIES You may like to achieve a thousand things in your life: and why not?
• But, wait, not all of them in just the same moment.
• Sit, think, and determine what you want to do first, second, third and so on.
Discuss your thoughts with someone who is connected with or involved in
your work or on whom the effects of your actions and priorities are likely
to be.
• It may happen that you are working for some one/ some section or some
department and priorities as perceived by you may be different from those
perceived by this person or the departmental head.
• No priorities, wrong priorities, diverging priorities, conflicting priorities;
And you end up where you started, i.e. groping for direction and fumbling
for action.
• Now, don’t blame ‘Time’ for having not been able to do what you
wanted to do.
• Blame yourself because either you did not (a) identify your goal clearly
Or (b) plan your action properly, or (c) determine your priorities
taking all the foreseeable factors into account.
• REMEMBER: You don’t identify your objective, or plan your action or
decide your priorities and consequently, don’t achieve results, TIME is
not failing you. You are failing yourself
MEMORY IS TRICKY: DIARY IS HELP • Some people have a phenomenal memory, only some: most of us think
that we have a very good memory.
• And this is one of those traps most of us walk into.
• It is O.K to test your memory when you play games. It may prove
dangerous to depend entirely on it when you are at work which is time
bound.
• Keep a diary; note what you propose to do, when? Where? How?
These small hints will make you stand in good stead.
• Keeping a diary and pencil by your side - be it the work table or the
bedside table is of great help. Use it whenever you are called upon to
do a work in the immediate or not so immediate future.
• Very soon you will discover that you are not wasting your time, that you
are working in accordance with a schedule and that at the end of the day,
you have the satisfaction of knowing what you have done.
• And, then there is another factor too. Let’s see!
.
A DIARY IS YOUR TENSION - BEARER• It frees your mind from details and trying to remember and categorize
all things you want to do.
• You get time- yes, mark it, you get time to think more creatively and to
spend more time thinking about plans for future rather than the details
of today. A diary thus gives you more time for planning activity.
• It eliminates the frustration of feeling that you ought to be doing something
that you are not doing and constantly going over and over in your mind
about things to be done.
• It helps you to ‘stay on track’, and direct your effort towards your
highest priority objectives without being distracted by less important
matters.
• It enables you to use your time better with a greater return for the
amount of effort required.
• You can maintain an orderly work pace and enjoy your work because
you are not constantly pressed for time.
• You gain a reputation for having an excellent memory although the fact
may be that your memory is just average.
REMEMBER: There are managers working perhaps 12 to 14 hours of the day.
yet, when you happen to meet them, you feel that an air of being free and at
peace surrounds them. There are others who, may be, do not have to put in
8 hours work and yet they agitated, tense and loaded. There are two secrets,
which the Managers in the former category have learnt. 1) They have learnt to
Organize them. 2) They have learnt to organize their time.
• We know, there are rush hours and rush days when you find that time
be slipping and work mounting. But you will be surprised to see the
miracles of organizing yourself and your time.
• It is precisely during those rush hours and rush days that you would have
turned out some of your best performances, for over a period of time.
Your mind learns to organize itself, discipline its activity and identify
inevitable constraints.
We, therefore, repeat: Give yourself TIME to think, plan and prioritize. TIME,
in turn, shall give you yield, output result or whatever names you choose?
Endeavor and action have, of course, to be yours. So next time when your
lips are about to say, ‘I don’t have enough time’ hold on and think what
you are saying?
• Is it really the shortage of time or your own inadequacy?
• Inadequacy to think
• Inadequacy to decide
• Inadequacy to plan
• Inadequacy to prioritize
• Inadequacy to imbibe team-spirit
• Inadequacy to act
We are confident that nine times out of ten, you will be able to see
one or more of the above mentioned inadequacies rather than the
inadequacy of time.
USING TIME: SOME CHECKPOINTS1. Think; take stock of the previous day’s work carried over to this day.
2. Consult your diary; decide priorities of the day.
3. Don’t allow, unless it is absolutely essential, yesterday’s work to be
carried over to tomorrow. Finish it today. Today’s work, do it now
and tomorrow’s work finish it today. That should be the spirit.
4. Note down your dos of today.
5. Don’t shuffle papers. Take up one job at one time. See it through.
only then move to the other.
6. Don’t keep your entire day’s schedule full. Leave an hour or so open.
there are always exigencies and emergencies.
7. Do the urgent. But don’t forget the important.
8. Discuss one thing at a time. Don’t allow several things to be discussed
simultaneously.
9. Keep a paper by your side. Let it be your memory chart. While doing
some work you may be reminded of certain other things,
note down on this paper. At the end of the day, go through this paper, strike off what has been done Note the remaining ones in the next day’s diary.
10. Try to understand the Boss’s mind. You will then not be wasting your time
and effort, in doing things he does not want you to do.
12. Monitor work- flow of your department / Section.
13. Allow your subordinates time to discuss matters they want to discuss.
If you are not available immediately tell them to discuss later. But do be
available later for the purpose.
14. Listen with concentration. Don’t start answering, or even thinking of answers,
before your subordinate has completed what he wanted to say.
15. Don’t forget planning in the rush of today’s work. Earmark time of meeting
People with business potential.
16. Plan your business strategies consciously and conscientiously.
17. Act according to those plans.
18. Don’t be pre-occupied with other thoughts while doing what you have on hand.
this will spoil both, i.e. work on hand and one in the pipeline.
19. Relax. Give yourself breathing time. Don’t develop ulcers.
20. At the end of the day, see what you planned in the morning, how much could
you, how much you could not achieve.
21. And why? with what result?
22. Don’t develop a habit, but carry over what couldn’t be done today.
23. Like in factory or production line check leakages and wastage of time,
plug them let not time be unproductive.
24. Give yourself time; Think.
REMEMBER; Thinking without planning, planning without action and action
without thought, result in confusion, loss of labor and, ultimately frustration and,
therefore
REMEMBER too: For achievement and success use your time as a resource,
Spend time to plan, plan your action and remain in gear.
LASTLY: THE TAIL PIECEWe have lots of situations in our routine life, over which we have no control and
these situations contribute for waste of time. These situations are created due to
some external factors and some are due to internal factors. However, we have no
control on the external factors, but we can do something on the internal factors.
Externals Factors: A) Telephone Interruptions,
B) Meetings,
C) Visitors,
D) Socializing,
E) Lack of Information,
F) Excessive Paper Work,
G) Communication Break Down,
H) Lack of Policies, Procedures, & Coordination of the same,
I) Lack of Competent Personnel,
J) Lack of Relevant Skills.
Internal Factors:A) Procrastination,
B) Failure to Delegate,
C) Unclear Objectives,
D) Failure to Set Priorities,
E) Crisis Management,
F) Failure to Plan,
G) Poor Scheduling,
H) Lack of Self-Discipline,
I) Attempting to do too much at one time,
J) Red Tape
Labels: TIME MANAGEMENT = TIME IS ESSENCE
