Posts Tagged ‘better time management’

One of the things that most managers and leaders find a struggle is to get everything done in the time that they have available.

So if you need to boost and improve your personal productivity to get better results, check out the short video below and then leave a comment with your best tips.

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps highly rated professionals to become highly effective managers and leaders.  He invites you to click here to take advantage of his free Weekly Leadership and Management Success Tips.

When it comes to money, the vast majority of leaders and managers will be able to give an excellent account of where they spent the budget they were allocated and what they delivered with that budget.  On the other hand if you asked them how they were using their biggest limiting factor, time, how many would be able to give a clear answer?

In truth, very few of us ever take the time to accurately capture where we spend our time and what results we deliver from the time we have invested.  So why should you bother anyway?

1. You might discover that your time utilisation is a bit like a leaking water pipe.  A lot is being lost but you are not quite sure why.

2. You might be struggling to achieve deadlines or rushing at the last minute to deliver because you are not investing your time wisely.

3. You might be having to continually work extra hours (usually unpaid) to get everything done.

Not taking care of how you spend your time is a bit like not bothering to take care of company money or company equipment.

Doing a time analysis is really easy to do and has a ton of benefits, for example:

1. You start to discover if you are spending your time on what is really important to your success as a leader.

2. You start to become much more conscious of the cost of doing certain things.

3. You find ways of adding more value to the organisation without having to make more and more personal sacrifice.

Bottom Line – Time is probably the biggest limiting factor for just about everyone.  So what action could you take starting today to tackle the biggest limiting factor to you delivering results and achieving success

Ask any manager what one of their biggest challenges is and chances are that a lack of time will be pretty high up the list of answers.  Given that the total time available per day, week, month or year is out of your control, it is how you use it that matters.

With lengthy job descriptions and vague objectives being the norm, you need to take control and get clarity on your priorities.

It is pretty easy to do this.

1. List out your understanding of your priorities

2. Arrange to meet with your boss

3. Ask him or her to tell you what they see as priority

4. Come to an agreed list of priorities

5. Plan your time to focus on these priorities

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements helps professionals, teams and organisations develop their management and leadership capability.