- 8 hours: Sleeping
- 3 hours: Eating (Okay, you might not spend 3 hours each day eating, but think about the time it takes to go out for a nice dinner or even meal/food preparation - even mac and cheese takes prep!)
- 1 hour: Hygiene
- 2 hours: Commuting (Even if you don't have a long commute, think of the trips to the store to get your necessities or groceries - that's not added into these numbers anywhere else. For me, driving "Mom's Taxi" makes this number climb quickly!)
- 8 hours: Working (Does anyone really only spend 8 hours at work anymore? A majority of my clients spend more than 8 hours/day at work - and then after work and on the weekends they're on their Blackberry's!)
- 2 hours: ????
- Schedule time for the most important things. When most people come to training, they have other things they could be doing. Why did they come to the training? Because it was scheduled. It was on the calendar. The same can be said of meetings you have - you have other things to do, but because the meeting is scheduled, you attend that. Anything that is important for you to get done needs to have time blocked off in your schedule (including tasks, big projects, coaching employees, etc.). If what you'd like to get done is on a miscellaneous list or is a "I should really...", it won't happen. Put it on the calendar - even at a specific time of day - then it will get done. By the way, you will spend almost all your time fighting fires if you don't make a commitment to investing your time in preventing them (things like training, for example).
- Do the most important things first. Most people will admit they do the quick or easy things first - so they can cross those things off their to-do list. As you cross off the last quick/easy task, you look at the clock. It's 2:00 p.m. The problem? You still have your most important thing(s) to do. The worst part is that the most important thing(s) will take you 6-7 hours and they have to be done before tomorrow. Looks like you'll be working until 9:00 pm. Prioritize and start with the most important things, even if they are bigger (and less easy to cross off). Like Steven Covey says, you always have to keep first things first.
- Allow time in your schedule for the unexpected. I did some training with water and waste water treatment folks a few years ago. This particular time management point was one thing that really hit home with them... They agreed they don't know when a water main break is going to happen or when a customer will call in with a sewer back-up, but what they do know is that those things are going to happen. So, we talked about the need to allow at least a couple hours of "unscheduled" time each day - you can't plan what is going to happen during that unscheduled time, but you can plan that something undoubtedly will pop up!
- Don't check your e-mail every time it beeps. E-mail can be one of the biggest time wasters (I hear that almost everywhere I go)! It is quite possible that for many of you, reading and responding to e-mail could be all that you get done in a day. This is especially true if you check your e-mail every time it beeps. To manage your e-mails more effectively, set aside time throughout the day to check your messages. For example, rather than checking it and responding every time you get a new message alert, pick two-three times throughout the day (maybe at the beginning of the day, before you go to lunch, and before you head home for the day) to read and respond to your e-mail messages. At a recent leadership team retreat, we actually set a "ground rule" that when something was needed immediately, a phone call was made. E-mail responses could be expected back within 24 hours. E-mail wasn't designed to be instant communication, just faster than "snail mail".
SHINE ON!
