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Have The Time of Your LifeCommon Sense Tips forCommon Sense Tips forEffective Personal Time Management

Time Effectiveness Questionnaire

Please turn to the Time Effectiveness Q ti i i h d t dQuestionnaire in your handout and answer the 15 questions.

This will only be a useful exercise if you are honest with yourself!

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SO, WHAT’S IT WORTH?

Annual Income Hour Minute

$10 000 $5 00 $ 09$10,000 $5.00 $.09

$20,000 $10.00 $.17

$30,000 $15.00 $.26

$40,000 $20.00 $.34

$50,000 $26.00 $.43

$60 000 $31 00 $ 51$60,000 $31.00 $.51

$100,000 $51.00 $.85

PARETO PRINCIPLE

A principle, named after economist Vilfredo Pareto thateconomist Vilfredo Pareto, that specifies an unequal relationship between inputs and outputs. The principle states that, for many phenomena, 20% of invested input is responsible for 80% of the results obtained.

Put another way 80% of Put another way, 80% of consequences stem from 20% of the causes. Also referred to as the "Pareto rule" or the "80/20 rule.”

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TIME MANAGEMENT TIPS

Timely Tips for More Effective Personal Time Management

PLAN & ORGANIZE

Using time to think and plan is time well-spent.

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PLAN & ORGANIZE

The great majority of problems arise from action without thought. Every hour spent in effective planning saves three to four in execution and achieves better results. By failing to plan you are planning to fail.

PLAN & ORGANIZE

Managers must plan for periods of uninterrupted concentration. The mistaken notion that managers should “always be accessible” has led to such abuses as the ever-open door that t d ti i i it ti tstands as a continuing invitation to

passersby and corridor-wanderers to drop in for a visit.

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PLAN & ORGANIZE

Arrangement of and controls over activities should be designed to minimize the number, impact, and duration of interruptions.

SET GOALS

Goals give your life, and the way you spend your time, direction.

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PRIORITIZE

Use the Pareto Principle (80-20 Rule) -80 percent of the reward comes from 20 percent of the effort.

USE A TO DO LIST

Some people thrive using a daily To Do list that they construct either the last thing the previous day or first thing in the morning.

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USE A TO DO LIST

A daily log of activities for at least one week, taken in fifteen minute increments, is essential as a basis for effective time analysis. It should be repeated at least semi-annually to avoid reverting to poorsemi-annually to avoid reverting to poor time management practices.

BE FLEXIBLE

Allow time for interruptions and distractions.

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BE FLEXIBLE

Flexibility of scheduling personal time may be necessary to accommodate to forces beyond one’s control. Time should not be over or under scheduled.

BIOLOGICAL PRIME TIME

The time of day when you are at your best.

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DO THE RIGHT THING

Noted management expert, Peter Drucker, says "doing the right thing is more important than doing things right."

ELIMINATE THE URGENT

Urgent tasks have short-term consequences while important tasks are those with long-term, goal-related implications.

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ELIMINATE THE URGENT

Managers live in constant tension between the urgent and the important. The urgent tasks call for instant action and drive out the important. Managers are thus tyrannized by the urgent and respond unwittingly to the endlessrespond unwittingly to the endless pressures of the moment, neglecting the long-term consequences of more important but less demanding tasks left undone.

INTELLIGENT NEGLECT

Eliminate from your life trivial tasks or those tasks which do not have long-term consequences for you.

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INTELLIGENT NEGLECT

Time available should be budgeted or allocated to tasks in ordered sequence of priority. Otherwise, managers tend to spend time in amounts inversely related to the importance of their tasksto the importance of their tasks.

INTELLIGENT NEGLECT

Response to problems and demands should be realistic and limited to the needs of the situation. Some problems left alone go away. By selectively ignoring those problems that tend to resolve themselves, much time and effortresolve themselves, much time and effort can be conserved for more useful pursuits.

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INTELLIGENT NEGLECT

Routine tasks of low value to overall objectives should be minimized, consolidated, delegated or eliminated to the extent possible. Managers should divorce themselves from unnecessarydivorce themselves from unnecessary detail and selectively neglect all but essential information.

AVOID BEING PERFECT

In certain cultures, only the gods are considered capable of producing anything perfect.

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LEARN TO SAY “NO”

Such a small word — and so hard to say.

FAULTY PERCEPTIONS

No one has enough time, yet everyone has all there is. This is the great “paradox of time.” It is the one resource which is distributed equally to all.

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FAULTY PERCEPTIONS

The manager’s time is rarely spent as s/he thinks it is. The mind plays tricks on its owner and deceives him or her into thinking that time is going where it shouldbe going rather than where it is actually

igoing.

FAULTY PERCEPTIONS

Managers tend to take an optimistic view of the time a task will take them to complete. They also tend to hope that others will be able to complete their tasks sooner than is likely. Hence, Murphy’s S d L “E thi t k lSecond Law: “Everything takes longer than you think.” Thus managers tend to accept themselves, and expect from others, unrealistic time estimates.

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ANTICIPATION

A ti i t ti i ll Anticipatory action is generally more effective than remedial action. A stitch in time saves nine. Avoid surprise by expecting the unexpected and planning for it. Assume if anything can go wrong, it will. (Murphy’s Third Law)

OBJECTIVES

More effective results are generally achieved through purposeful pursuit of planned objectives than by chance. The fundamental concept of management-by objectives (MBO) is based on this provenobjectives (MBO) is based on this proven principle.

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DEADLINES

Imposing deadlines on yourself and exercising self-discipline in adhering to them aids managers in overcoming indecision, vacillation, and procrastinationprocrastination.

CONCENTRATION

AGAIN – think the Pareto Principle. Effective managers concentrate their efforts on the “critical few” events that will produce the major resultsproduce the major results.

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EFFECTIVE vs. EFFICIENT

Eff t h ffi i t ill t d t b Effort, however efficient, will tend to be ineffective if performed on the wrong tasks, at the wrong time, or without the intended consequences. Efficiencymeans doing the job right. Effectivenessmeans doing the right job right. Effective action produces maximum results with minimum expenditure of resources -including time.

ACTIVITY vs. RESULTS

M t d t l i ht f bj ti Managers tend to lose sight of objectives or intended results and to concentrate their efforts on activity. Keeping busy gradually becomes their objective. These managers tend to become activity-oriented rather than results-oriented. Instead of running their jobs they tend to be run by them. They confuse motion with accomplishment, activity with results.

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CRISIS MANAGEMENT

Managers tend to under-estimate problems, fail to anticipate them, or over-respond by treating all problems as if they were crises. This tendency toward crisis management and fire fighting causes undue anxiety, impairedcauses undue anxiety, impaired judgment, hasty decisions, and wasted time and effort.

PROBLEM ANALYSIS

Failure to distinguish symptoms from causes tends to result in wasted effort directed toward apparent rather than real problems.

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ALTERNATIVES

In any given situation, failure to generate viable alternative solutions limits the likelihood of selecting the most effective course of action.

INDECISION

The arrival of the point of decision causes many managers without apparent reason to hesitate, vacillate, or refuse to decidedecide.

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PROCRASTINATION

Deferring, postponing, or putting off decisions or actions can become a habit that loses time, causes lost opportunities, increases pressure of deadlines, and generates crises.

DELEGATION

Managers should delegate responsibility and authority to do a “whole task.” This saves time otherwise required to complete the task themselves and frees them for more important work. It also

h th ti f ti th i t illenhances the satisfaction their team will take in their work and improves the overall effectiveness of the organization.

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DELEGATION

M t d t d Managers tend to encourage upward (reverse) delegation unwittingly by fostering dependence of subordinates upon them for answers. They may do this by unconsciously being “too ready” with answers or by instructing subordinates to “do nothing without checking with me.”

DELEGATION

A th it f d i i ki h ld b Authority for decision-making should be delegated to the lowest possible level consistent with adequate judgment and available facts.

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CONSOLIDATION

Similar tasks should be grouped within divisions of the workday to eliminate repetitive actions and minimize interruptions, such as taking and returning phone calls. This will

i th tili ti feconomize the utilization of resources, including the personal expenditure of time and effort.

FEEDBACK

Feedback on relative performance against goals at pre-determined intervals is essential to insure progress according to plan. Progress reports should identify problems (deviations of actual from l d f ) i ti t t kplanned performance) in time to take

corrective action.

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EXCEPTION MANAGEMENT

Only significant deviations of actual results from planned performance should be reported to the responsible executive to conserve his or her time and abilities. Related to the “management-by-

ti ” t i th “ d t texception” concept is the “need not to know” concept of excluding all but essential facts.

VISIBILITY

Keeping visible those things you intend doing increases the certainty of achieving your objectives. You can’t do what you can’t remember. This principle of visible control is inherent in such time

t t l th D timanagement tools as the Daytimer pocket and desk calendars, and Outlook calendar.

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CLARITY

Simple, concise, unambiguous language insures understanding and saves time.

BREVITY

Economy of words and actions conserves time while promoting clarity and understanding.

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HABIT

M t d t b i ti f th i Managers tend to be victims of their own habit patterns. They tend to take on the practices of the organizations in which they manage. Breaking ingrained habit patterns is very difficult and requires continuing exercise of self-discipline.

WORK EXPANSION

Work tends to expand to fill the time available.

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MANAGERIAL IMPERATIVE

Irreplaceable and irretrievable, time is the most critical of all managerial resources. As Ben Franklin put it: “When your time is up, you’re done.” The ability to organize and use time effectively is the managerialand use time effectively is the managerial imperative – without it, nothing else can be managed.

REWARD YOURSELF

Even for small successes, celebrate achievement of goals.