Time Management

Essentials of time management

• Contrasting time planning and time management
• Avoiding the psychological time trap
• Taking control of your life through the choices you make

Determining your time style

• Evaluating your current strengths
• Characterizing your personal style of time management
• Recognizing opportunities for improvement
• Assessing the effect of your time style on others

Gaining control over your time

• Identifying your unique pivotal time-related issues
• Appraising your situation with an Issues/Impact matrix
• Targeting factors that adversely impact your time

Incorporating a time-planning process model

• Harnessing the power of a structured approach
• Reusing the model throughout your life
• Customizing the model to fit your style and needs

Determining your primary purposes

• Assessing clarity of purpose
• Mind-mapping your current situation
• Defining the purpose for each of your commitments

Assessing your realities

• Weighing the value of current efforts
• Making choices in a planned way
• Deriving tasks — the raw material of time planning

Envisioning where you want to be

• Leveraging the power of imagination
• Articulating your personal mission
• Choosing a future that works for you

Formulating challenging goals

• Creating a sense of direction
• Generating personal momentum for action
• Setting WISE goals

Moving toward your goals

• Initiating changes to your situation
• Selecting steps and actions

Focusing your attention

• Taking steps to boost your concentration
• Profiling your energy levels
• Aligning tasks with your high and low periods

Proactively identifying your priorities

• Maximizing the Important/Urgent matrix
• Applying the Pareto Principle for the greatest results
• Developing the habit of immediate attention

Building your schedule

• Assigning tasks into a weekly and daily schedule
• Scheduling to create greater work/life balance
• Creating a dynamic to-do list
• Reducing mental clutter

Overcoming procrastination

• Identifying the root causes of inaction
• Beating the deadline-driven trap
• Approaching your tasks positively

Diffusing the impact of others

• Asserting yourself politely and calmly
• Conquering overcommitment

Dealing proactively with information overload

• Customizing your workspace
• Stepping off the "e-mail-go-round"
• Evaluating your information flow and retrieval process

Analyzing your progress

• Conducting regular reviews
• Comparing planned vs. actual usage with a time log

Changing your time habits for the better

• Calculating potential time savings
• Exercising the freedom to do it your way