How to Manage Your Time Effectively at the workplace

1. Start with the end in mind.

It has been said that "Time is Money" -- but I disagree. When you think about it, isn't Time really LIFE? At the end of your life, can you even imagine saying to yourself, "I wish I'd made more money?" It's more likely you'd be thinking "I wish I'd had more TIME -- time to spend with my loved ones, time to enjoy my life more, time to take that special vacationג€¦". Here are my favorite strategies for managing that most precious of all resources -- TIME.

1. The first step is being aware of where your time is going, now.

You can't find something you've lost when you don't know where you might have lost it in the first place. So the first strategy for managing your time is to know where it's going, now. That means actually tracking or logging your time daily, for at least 1 week (preferably 2). Track the exact time you begin and end an activity, make a note of the duration in exact minutes, and a few words to describe the activity. This step requires you to be really honest with yourself and track EVERYTHING you do in your work day so you can see where your time is really going -- so if you spent 23 minutes chatting with coworkers at the coffee machine (no cheating by logging all your time in nice, even 15, 30 or 60 minute intervals) -- write it down EXACTLY!

2. Analyze and summarize your time logs.

At the end of the week, review your time logs and start to summarize the tasks (and the amount of time spent on each) into categories. You will create these categories yourself, and you should have between 6 and 12 categories. They should be meaningful to you, self-defining, mutually exclusive and as concise as possible. Some examples might be: Administration, Business Development, Sales & Marketing, Computer, etc. You will then summarize, for each day, how much time you spent doing tasks or activities for each category, in the exact number of minutes. You might also do a little math, to figure the percentage of time each category takes out of each day. You make this step as detailed as you like, but the key here is: AWARENESS.

3. Create a New Daily Routine.

If you were honest and diligent during steps 1 and 2, chances are you had a rude awakening when you reviewed and analyzed your time logs. You no doubt can see where the time drains are occurring -- and now you're ready to make better choices and create a new daily routine. This routine will maximize the time you spend on productive work by conforming to the natural flow of your day and with your natural rhythms, by taking into consideration when you're at your best for certain tasks, grouping similar tasks together for greater efficiency, and by setting aside dedicated time for doing uninterrupted work. How do you create your routine? Look at where you've been spending your time and start making some decisions about where the different tasks can best be fit into your dayג€¦ then actually write this routine down and post it where you'll see it every day. Strategies 4 through 10 will give you some food for thought as you develop and implement your new daily routine.

4. Prioritize and stay focused.

Once you've done the up-front work of tracking and analyzing your time, and creating a new routineג€¦ how do you keep it on track? You will also need to do some work on prioritizing what you do. You can create your own easy tools to do this. On one sheet of paper, create 5 sections: High Priorities, Secondary Priorities, People to Contact, Telephone calls, and Schedule. You can fill this out each day, first thing in the morning (or better yet, at the end of your work day so you are well prepared to start fresh tomorrow!) Each day, ask yourself: "If nothing else gets done today, what are the one or two items that absolutely MUST be done?". Those are the items you will use to focus your day. You should also periodically go back to the time logging exercise, so you can determine if you are slipping back into those old bad habits and take immediate steps to get back on track.

5. Reduce interruptions by creating stronger boundaries.

It is true that interruptions to your day can and will happen, and to some degree they are out of your complete control. However, you probably have more control than you think. Instead of blaming other people and getting frustrated with them for interrupting you, take responsibility for creating stronger boundaries with your co-workers where appropriate. Keep in mind, other people don't mean to be inconsiderate by interrupting, they are just caught up in their own "stuff" and probably don't realize. It is really up to you to set up some guidelines for when you can and cannot be interrupted, to communicate them to others, and then to stick by them. For example: you might institute a "quiet time" policy (mornings are usually best) where you let everyone know that this is a time where you cannot be interrupted -- and then set up another time later in the day where you have an open-door policy. This strategy creates a firm boundary but also provides time for you to be accessible to others. At first, those around you might try to cross your boundaries, and it's up to you to gently remind them that they can come back and talk during your "open door" time. After a while, they'll get used to it. Change takes time, so stick with it!

6. Structure your telephone time.

Set aside certain periods of the day to accept, initiate and return calls. The best time to accept incoming calls is just prior to lunch or at the end of the work day (the other person will not want to dawdle on the phone at those times either!) -- so whenever possible, let others know this is your preference and set that time aside so you are available. When initiating or returning calls, the best time to contact those difficult-to-reach folks is early in the morning, just before or after lunch, or late in the day. Other tips for making the best use of your phone time -- plan in advance what you need to cover during the call; and at the beginning of a call, you might say "I have about 10 minutes to spend with you now. If we don't finish, we can always schedule another time."

7. Don't procrastinate.

Procrastination is probably one of the biggest "time hogs" we haveג€¦ not only are we NOT doing the thing we're procrastinating about, but we also end up wasting even more time worrying about how much we're procrastinating. So, if you have an unpleasant task to do, simply make up your mind to take care of it immediately and just get it done!

Why do some Business managers reach the gain target more often than others? They do it because they maintain their operation
pointed in this direction - direction of profit earning. They never drop sight of this goal - to complete the year with a gain.

This guide Gives suggestions that should enable an owner-manager to zero on profit making. It points out that you have to stay
informed, make timely decisions, and take effective action. In effect you need to control the actions of your organization instead
of being controlled by them.

Topnotch Performance in golf, shootingfishing demands knowledge, training, and endurance.

Likewise in Small businesses, year-end profit arrives to the owner-manager who strives for topnotch performance. You attain profit
making targets by knowing your performance, by practicing the art of earning timely, balanced decisions and by controlling the
company's actions.

Adapt the Suggestions in this manual to your circumstance. They ought to allow you to predict the shots to maintain your company
headed in the right direction - toward profit making.

First Rule of Gain Making: Know Your Small Business. The Time-honored truth"Knowledge is power" is especially pertinent to this
owner-manager of a small business. To maintain your company pointed toward gain you need to keep yourself well informed about it.
You have to know how the organization is doing before you can enhance its operation. You must know its weak points before you can
correct them. A number of the information you need you pick up from day-to-day personal observation, but records should be your
principal source of information about gains, expenses, and earnings.

Know Your Profit. The gain and loss statement (or earnings Statement) prepared frequently each month or every quarter from your
accountant is among the most essential indicators of your business's worth and health. You need to be certain that this
announcement contains all of the facts you will need for assessing your profit. This statement must pinpoint each earnings and
price area. By way of example, it should show the gain and loss for all your products and product lines in addition to the gain
and loss for your whole operation.

It's a great Thought to have your profit and loss statement prepared so that it shows every single product for the current period,
for the same period this past year, and also for your present year-to-date. For instance, a P&L statement for the month of
November would show expenses and income for the current month, for November last year, and prices for the eleven months of this
current calendar year. Many businesses publish their annual reports with several previous decades so stockholders can compare
earnings.

Comparison is The key to using your P&L announcement. If your accountant is not already furnishing figures that you may compare,
you need to discuss the possibility of getting them supplied.

Financial Ratios from the balance sheet also help you to understand whether your gain is exactly what it should be. For example,
the proportion of net worth (return on investment ratio) reveals what the business earned on the equity capital invested.

Know Your Costs. An owner-manager ought to understand prices in detail. Then, you can compare your price figures as a proportion
of earnings (operating ratio). Be sure your prices are itemized so you can put your fingers on those that seem to be climbing or
decreasing according to your experience and the cost figures of your industry. When costs are itemized, you are able to spot the
culprit once the overall figure is higher than what you'd budgeted. Take advertising costs for example. You can grab the offender
if you break out your advertising expenses by product lines and from media. In addition, a comprehensive check of inquiry returns
from advertising will help to avoid unproductive publications.

In knowing your Prices, keep in mind that the formulation for profit is: Profit equals Sales minus Costs.

Know Your Product Markup. Be certain The pricing of your products provides a markup adequate to the sort of profit you expect to
achieve. You must keep constantly educated on pricing since you have to adjust for increasing costs and at precisely the exact
same time keep costs competitive. Knowledge about your markup also helps you to run workouts with your eyes open. Continuing to
make something that only a few customers want is an effective merchandising tool just once you use it on purpose - for instance,
to hold or draw buyers to other high markup solutions. Don't hesitate to drop a loser from online.

Garbage-In, Garbage-Out. An Owner-manager shouldn't fudge the records. The acronym GIGO the computer industry uses is accurate
with manually kept records in addition to with machine-processed ones. If an owner-manager lets"garbage" to enter the records, the
reports will include"garbage." Reports need not be extensive but they need to be accurate.

Look For Trends. Try not to look at one month's earnings or Profit picture by itself. The characters in your working statements
are meaningful only when you set the image in the right framework - which is, look in the figures in the context of what's
happened and what's very likely to take place. In that manner, you catch a downward trend before it gets out of control.

You should also Concern yourself with all the figures behind the dollars - for instance, the amount Of units offered or the amount
of orders. Insist on cost-per-unit statistics. The Fluctuation of the cost-per-unit can be much more meaningful than simply
looking At the dollar figures alone. Another idea would be to display these comparative Figures on graphs so that significant
trends can be viewed easily.

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