How well do you manage your time?

If you are like many people, your answer may not be completely positive! Perhaps you feel overloaded, and you often have to work late to hit your deadlines. Or maybe your days seem to go from one crisis to another, and this is stressful and demoralising.

Many of us know that we could be managing our time more effectively, but it can be difficult to identify the mistakes that we're making and to know how we could improve. When we do manage our time well, however, we're exceptionally productive at work, and our stress levels drop. We can devote time to the interesting, high-reward projects that can make a real difference to a career. In short, we're happier!

In this post, we'll look at 10 of the most common time management mistakes that we have come across during the training sessions we deliver (both online and off), as well as identifying strategies and tips that you can use to overcome them. 

Mistake #1: Failing to Keep a To-Do List

Do you ever have that nagging feeling that you've forgotten to do an important piece of work? If so, you probably don't use a To-Do List to keep on top of things. (Or, if you do, you might not be using it effectively)!

As we discuss in the managing time training course use the ABCDE categories. A is for the top priority, then B’s and then C’s. The D’s are for delegating and the E’s are for eliminating.

If you have large projects on your list, unless you're careful, the entries for these can be vague and ineffective. For instance, you may have written down "Start on the budget proposal". But what does this entail? The lack of specifics here might cause you to procrastinate or miss key steps. So, make sure that you break large tasks or projects down into specific, actionable steps (like the Vision exercise in the leadership course or the big between session goal activity we complete at the end of every session – if you have sat them).

Mistake #2: Not Setting Personal Goals

Do you know where you'd like to be in six months? What about this time next year, or even 10 years from now? If not, it's time to set some personal goals! Honestly, in five years from now, you’ll be exactly where you decide you want to be from now – not many people believe me but look back at you ‘wishes’ 5 years ago, did you achieve them? I challenge you that’s because you didn’t set them down as goals to achieve, they were just wishes.

Personal goal setting is essential to managing your time well because goals give you a destination and vision to work toward. When you know where you want to go, you can manage your priorities, time, and resources to get there.

Goals also help you decide what's worth spending your time on, and what's just a distraction.

When you’re setting your personal goals it’s a great idea to write 3 under each of the following headings:

1.     Business goals

2.     Family/relationship goals

3.     Financial Goals

4.     Health Goals

5.     Personal and professional development gaols

6.     Community Goals

Mistake #3: Not Prioritising

A team member has just walked in with a crisis that he or she needs you to deal with right now, but you're in the middle of brainstorming ideas for a new client. You're sure that you've almost come up with a brilliant idea for their marketing campaign, but now you risk losing the thread of your thinking because of this "emergency."

Sometimes, it's hard to know how to prioritise, especially when you're facing a flood of seemingly urgent tasks. However, it's essential to learn how to prioritise tasks effectively if you want to manage your time better

It’s also a good idea to develop your team so they can make their own decisions and not be as over dependant. I use the phrase “Don’t bring me a problem, bring me some solutions too”, if they don’t it’s just being lazy!

Mistake #4: Failing to Manage Distractions

Do you know that some of us can lose as much as two hours a day to distractions every day? Think how much you could get done if you had that time back!

Whether they come from emails, IM chats, colleagues in a crisis, or phone calls from clients, distractions prevent us from achieving flow, which is the satisfying and seemingly effortless work that we do when we're 100 per cent engaged in a task.

If you want to gain control of your day and do your best work, it's vital to know how to minimise distractions and manage interruptions effectively. For instance, turn off your IM chat when you need to focus and let people know if they're distracting you too often. You should also learn how to improve your concentration, even when you're faced with distractions.

Mistake #5: Procrastination

Procrastination occurs when you put off tasks that you should be focusing on right now. When you procrastinate, you feel guilty that you haven't started; you come to dread doing the task; and, eventually, everything catches up with you when you fail to complete the work on time.

One useful strategy is to tell yourself that you're only going to start on a project for ten minutes. Often, procrastinators feel that they have to complete a task from start to finish, and this high expectation makes them feel overwhelmed and anxious. Instead, focus on devoting a small amount of time to starting. That's all!

There are 4 diseases for non-performance, and these are:

Excusitis, Blamalitis, Detailitis and procrastination so be careful!

Mistake #6: Taking on Too Much

Are you a person who has a hard time saying "no" to people? If so, you probably have far too many projects and commitments on your plate. This can lead to poor performance, stress, and low morale.

Or you might be a micromanager. Someone who insists on controlling or doing all of the work themselves, because they can't trust anyone else to do it correctly. (This can be a problem for everyone – not just managers!)

Either way, taking on too much is a poor use of your time, and it can get you a reputation for producing rushed sloppy work.

To stop this, learn the subtle art of saying "yes" to the person, but "no" to the task. This skill helps you assert yourself, while still maintaining good feelings within the group. If the other person starts leaning on you to say "yes" to their request, learn how to think on your feet and stay cool under pressure.

“Thank you so much for thinking of me for this, but I was planning to spend this week working on [name of other projects], which has to be completed by….”

“I appreciate you asking me Karen. That sounds like an exciting initiative. Unfortunately, I’m terrible with social media so I’m afraid I wouldn’t be much help.”

“Thanks for sharing those suggestions, George. For this particular project, we need to follow the directions exactly as they’re outlined if we want to meet our deadline. We’ve gotten approval on this plan, and any changes might send us back to the drawing board. As always, please let me know if something is unclear or if you have any questions.”

“I hear your concern that you aren’t sold on the proposed new tagline. However, I worry the one you suggested is very similar to the competition, and I know one of your main goals is to stand out. May I walk you through how we came to this one and other contenders you may want to consider?”

Mistake #7: Thriving on "Busy"

Some people get a rush from being busy. The narrowly met deadlines, the endless emails, the piles of files needing attention on the desk, the frantic race to the meeting - What an adrenaline buzz!

The problem is that an "addiction to busyness" rarely means that you're effective, and it can lead to stress.

Instead, try to slow down, and learn to manage your time better.

Mistake #8: Multitasking

To get on top of their workload, team members regularly write emails while chatting on the phone to clients. However, while they think that this is a good use of time, the truth is that it can take 20-40 per cent more time to finish a list of jobs when you multitask, compared with completing the same list of tasks in sequence. The result is also that the team member does both tasks poorly – their emails are full of errors, and their clients are frustrated by their lack of concentration.

So, the best thing is to forget about multitasking, and, instead, focus on one task at a time. That way, you'll produce higher quality work.

Also, no matter who you are, in certain tasks you can’t multitask because you are using two parts of the brain at the same time. For example have you ever been lost whilst driving and then turned down the radio so you can concentrate on finding out where you are?

Mistake #9: Not Taking Breaks

It's nice to think that you can work for 8-10 hours straight, especially when you're working to a deadline. But it's impossible for anyone to focus and produce really high-quality work without giving our brains some time to rest and recharge.

So, don't dismiss breaks as "wasting time" they provide valuable downtime, which will enable you to think creatively and work effectively.

If it's hard for you to stop working, then schedule breaks for yourself, or set an alarm as a reminder. Go for a quick walk, grab a cup of coffee, or just sit and meditate at your desk, if that’s your thing. Try to take a five-minute break every hour or two. And make sure that you give yourself ample time for lunch – you won't produce top quality work if you're hungry!

Mistake #10: Ineffectively Scheduling Tasks

Are you a morning person? Or do you find your energy picking up once the sun begins to set in the evening? All of us have different rhythms, that is, different times of day when we feel most productive and energetic.

You can make the best use of your time by scheduling high-value work during your peak time, and low-energy work (like returning phone calls and checking email), during your "down" time. Don’t get me wrong these are all important tasks, but they shouldn’t be done during the high energy times of the day.

About Ultimate Leadership training

Our Mission:

“We want to create a society where it's normal for the new generation of leaders (and existing ones) to lead their teams with compassion, empathy, drive and enthusiasm and to not feel trapped by the old ways of leadership that no longer work”.

“We know we can make a bigger impact by helping other people, like you, shift the perspective of your industry and I want to give you the tools to engage your teams further with The Ultimate Leadership Training Methods” (Adrian Close – Learning and Development Director)

We are training consultants, but it is important to say that we were business managers and leaders first. Our training and the information we cover is from bloody nose experience rather than ivory tower philosophy. We have a proven track record of building multi-million-pound businesses and large teams and some of us have won multiple awards.

We know how challenging it can be to develop emotional intelligence whilst ‘on the job’ but our advice and practical knowledge will help your team members overcome these obstacles.

Rather than manage your time manage your energy instead

Please do contact us to arrange a call back to discuss any of your training and development goals. We have a list of sessions we can deliver on or offline or alternately we have sessions we sell and can train your trainers to deliver them

Cheers

Adrian Close - Learning and Development Director

[email protected]

www.ultimate-leadership-training.co.uk