Time management
1. Definition:
Time management is the process of organizing and planning how to divide your time between specific
activities. Good time management enables you to work smarter – not harder – so that you get more
done in less time, even when time is tight and pressures are high. Failing to manage your time damages
your effectiveness and causes stress.
Managing your time well can help you improve in your career. Organizing each day helps you to
complete work on time, stay engaged during important meetings and give you space to be creative and
proactive in your tasks. Having strong time-management skills can ultimately lead to accomplishing key
goals and advancing in your position.
2. What are time management skills?
Time management skills include a variety of skills that will help you manage your time well. Some of the
most important time management skills include:
Organization: Staying organized can help you maintain a clear picture of what you need to
complete and when. Being well-organized might mean maintaining an up-to-date calendar,
being able to locate certain documents easily, having a tidy environment and taking detailed,
diligent notes.
Prioritization: Assessing each of your responsibilities for priority is key in being a good time
manager. There are many ways to prioritize what you need to accomplish. You might decide to
complete fast, simple items followed by longer, more involved ones. Alternatively, you might
prioritize your tasks starting with the most time-sensitive, or a combination of both.
Goal-setting: Setting goals is the first step to becoming a good time manager. Goal-setting allows
you to clearly understand your end goal and what exactly you need to prioritize to accomplish it.
Setting both short and long-term goals can lead to success in your career.
Communication: Developing strong communication skills can allow you to make your plans and
goals clear to people you work with. It also allows you to delegate, which lets you focus on
completing the most important, relevant tasks that align with your goals.
Planning: A fundamental part of time management is planning. Being efficient in planning out
your day, meetings and how you will accomplish things will help you stick to your schedule.
Delegation: Being a good time manager means only completing work that will help you and your
company accomplish goals. While this skill is most often done by managers, you can also
practice delegating tasks if you are managing a project. While it can often be difficult to say “no”
when someone asks you to do something at work, it is important to practice having boundaries
to manage your time well and ultimately accomplish your goals.
Stress management: When practicing good time management, you should also be attentive to
your mental health. Handling stress in a positive way can help you stay motivated.
3. Understanding the importance of time management
The importance of time management cannot be denied as it plays an important role in life of every
individual. We all are just dependent on time. With-out time we are nothing.
Time applies in our every walk of life. From sunset till night, the high tide and low tide due to moon, our
seasons everything is totally dependent on time. Time never wait for any one.
Everybody has same number of hours in a day, the 24 hours in whole daytime is important form student
till the managing director of some company but what makes difference is the efficient use of the time.
Time is a precious commodity which cannot be stored or kept in pocket. Every man no matter how rich
or poor spends time the same way, it doesn’t speed up for the rich and slow down for the poor.
Time is scarce and rare and once it is gone it cannot be bought back at any cost.
Every work or activity in one’s life needs some time and everything needs time to materialize. With time
management, each task is given enough time to be finished. By giving a sliver of time for each of your
goals and accounting for it wisely, you will be able to achieve them, plus make time for other activities.
With the help of effective time management you would be able to finish more jobs with less effort. If
you are allotting a certain amount of time for each activity, you don’t have to worry about the next thing
that you will do. With time management, you become more organized and the things you do become
more habitual than panic-driven. By making it a habit, you can increase your efficiency and productivity.
4. How to improve time management skills
Working on your time management skills can help you be a better employee and strong candidate when
you apply for new opportunities. Here are a few ways you can improve your time management skills:
Set short and long-term goals: Practicing regular goal-setting can help you clearly understand
exactly what you need to accomplish to achieve certain results. To hit larger, long-term goals,
identify smaller milestone goals along the way. For example, if you have a goal to be promoted
within six months, you might need to set smaller goals to improve on certain skills. Your goals
should be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-based. For more on setting goals,
visit SMART Goals: Definition and Examples.
Manage your calendar: Setting time aside to complete the most important tasks on your list is
important for managing your time. You might consider blocking off certain brackets of time on
your calendar on a regular basis so you are guaranteed to have time in your schedule without
distractions or meetings. You should also consider whether or not attending certain meetings is
beneficial. If you feel you will not add value or contribute in any certain way, you should feel
empowered to decline certain meetings. If you do this, use discretion and be polite–you might
consider sending the meeting owner an email letting them know why you have declined.
Prioritize your assignments: Prioritization is a difficult skill but gets easier with practice. You can
practice prioritization by making to-do lists. Writing or typing out everything you need to get
done can help you physically prioritize the tasks that are most urgent or easy to get out of the
way. If you need help, you might consider asking your manager or a colleague who is good at
prioritizing how they would complete work. Understanding due dates and how the task affects
others and business goals can help you to get certain things done ahead of others.
5. The importance Of Time Management For Students
Many people face the troubling in time management as we all know, in many of the cases lack of time
are there. Someone has to finish his a task is suitable to the lack of prioritizing the task. Often people
tend to have trouble managing time because they try to manage too many tasks at a time and also there
are many people who just waste their time doing nothing just because of their pure laziness. Off lately
time is becoming one of the most valuable resources which is wasted by many people because they
don’t know how to manage time. Many people in life do things which have no value to time. To prove
this, walking through a dorm on a week night several students can be found sitting around and playing
video games when they have a paper or an assignment due the very next day, and also can find
employees sitting around the office playing solitaire while the hours are meant to be used to get
productive work done.
It is observed that for many, time may not be of any great significance but to others it lies of extreme
importance. In my eye the constructive use of time is beneficial and that in any aspect of life one shall
realize the significance of time and must measure the value of every minute and each second. Speaking
of the use of personal and professional use of time I find that the use of both in an appropriate way is
important. Personal as well as professional goals and the objectives are achieved or unachieved on the
grounds of how one uses their skills. The results of one’s efforts are directly attributed to the time
management skills that they develop and often employ in many cases. Speaking of each in sequence I’d
discuss the following in detail.
Target goals ahead, is always good to plan the future ahead or say prior to the assigned time in order to
achieve the maximum output. Goal setting, goal setting is where the scheduled target is mapped out. It
shall be preplanned to take up the top priorities and to schedule the major pieces of thoughts in
advance, making a good use of time effectively and smartly, Delegating or getting rid of the clutter,
achieving a balance is equally important.
Punctuality is an important character in the world that we live, people need to make well use of the time
that they have because time is scarce. When we talk of time management and the importance of time
management for the students, the punctuality comes at the top of the list. Realizing the value of time
and making good use of its essence.
All the above can be considered to be the skills of the effective time management. Let us move to the
real topic of discussion. The above was important to have been discussed prior to the actual discussion
due to the fact that I disclose all that I personally had in my mind and at the same time to bring forth the
matters of discussion in sequence.. There is a lot to say on that as it is a vast topic, let’s begin with the
real key to effective time management and how it relies on the focus of their goals by the individuals as
well as the choices these individuals make for their achievements.
Coming to know of what your goals are and what time is available to you helps you decide of a good use
of time and self-management. My day begins at 6:00am every morning, I rush to have a shower, say my
prayers and have my breakfast at 7:00am.Next I have to catch my bus at the bus station, from home to
the bus station it takes about 10 minutes or more. Then on it takes 45 minutes for me to get to college.
in the meantime as I travel I’d take a piece of reading material to make good use of the travel time daily
(it can me a magazine ,news article, a comic or some sports update.
I like listening to the radio too so often when I am not reading on the bus I’d probably listen to a radio
programmed to pass time out. I’m at college at about 8:00 am -8:10 am. This certainly is when I’d sit
back and relax myself or engage in a discussion with friends till it’s time for the class. At 8:30 am sharp
the class begins and so does my actual day. I spend time studying and keeping me engaged into multiple
activities round the clock, utilizing each jiffy effectively. This includes all from making use of the
computer labs to reading books at the college library. I come home after college watch T.V. hangout
with friends over a pot of coffee at Starbucks or others go for a walk and sit for some net surfing. Late at
night I’d sit to study have dinner and sleep and so the next day begins.
Time is very crucial; people need to make the best of the time in their possession as by doing so a lot can
be achieved in their lives. Time being a limited resource means that a minute lost is hard to be return,
life is short people need to make the best of it by making every minute count, by doing so most people
can achieve their goals in life.
Students should generate a habit of utilizing time more efficient and affectively. They are the new
generation of the developed world therefore with the punctual character they could be unstoppable in
the world. They can accomplish a lot in life therefore the world will be a better place. Time management
is a skill that can be learned, and when done so can make life less stressful and productive. Everyone has
different task assigned that need to be done differently.
Thus time management increases chances of success as it will make you productive using improved time
management skills and tools, and can accomplish more with less effort and time. It will help you reduce
wasted time and energy, help you become more creative and productive, and enable you to do the right
thing at the right time. Definitely it would increase chances of you success.
6. Benefits of time management:
If you can manage your time more effectively, you will be rewarded in a variety of ways:
Efficient: You will be more efficient in serving your district and will be able to support your clubs
better.
Successful: You will achieve greater success in your very important, and highly visible, role as a
Lions Leader.
Healthy: On a personal level, you will certainly feel healthier, more energetic, and in a generally
better mood.
7. Make Lists and write down your goals
Make plans everyday by either you are walking, driving, showering, or otherwise “dead” times to plan.
Think about what your goals are for that day or the next. Which goals are most important to you?
Concentrate on One thing at a time because the human mind works more efficiently when it is focused.
At any cost and in any situation avoid procrastination.
Set up your Personal deadlines and monitor yourself that you are going in the right track or not.
It is not possible for a human to do all the work and overestimation of one’s abilities, though not
necessarily a bad thing can often result in stress and more work for an individual. Thus delegation saves
time.
References
http://www.enotes.com
https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newHTE_00.htm
https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/299336
https://www.ukessays.com/essays/education/time-management-for-students.php