Proper time management is good and will improve productivity and focus in your working place. It also reduces anxiety and the stress that comes with time mismanagement.
Many people find it difficult to manage time effectively which leads to poor productivity and lack of motivation with achieving their goals.
If you are struggling with time management in your workplace, or generally with your daily activities, do not worry, it happens to the best of us.
In this guide, we will explain what time management means and then proceed to show you 7 tips for proper time management.
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What is Time Management?
Simply put, time management is the process of doing the right thing at the right time. It is the process of organizing and planning how to effectively share your time between different activities.
For proper time management, you need the help of productivity tools such as a to-do list, calendar, and alarms/reminders to help you keep track of your activities and time spent.
Good time management gives room to carry out personal activities like hobbies, and exercising, which are essential for your mental health.
7 Tips for Proper Time Management
These are very important tips to guide you towards managing your time effectively.
Minimize multitasking
Many of us think that multitasking is an advantage for achieving more activities in a day, but instead, it can lead to poor productivity.
When you occupy yourself with numerous tasks at once such as writing, talking with your phone, or probably checking your email, you lose the concentration required to sufficiently complete one task.
Also when you multitask, you overstimulate your brain capacity and also risk skipping an important piece needed to thoroughly accomplish tasks.
Multitasking can also increase your stress level which most times leads to burnout. So try to minimize the number of tasks you work on at a time.
Starting Early to Improve Time Management
Waking up and working on your tasks in the mornings can improve productivity. Study shows that the brain is more active in the early hours of the morning after the night’s rest.
Later on in the day, your energy and thinking capacity start going down due to temperature change, and noise, amongst other distractions. At this point, you tend to make mistakes which generally reduces productivity.
If you are not the early morning type you can try making it maybe thirty minutes earlier than your usual waking period and be surprised with the level of task you can accomplish.
Setting up deadlines
Set up a deadline when you have many tasks to accomplish, you can as well as put down the list of things you want to do on a short note and stick it on your working table.
When setting up deadlines for tasks, you need to take into account the number of hours it would take to complete the task. This would generally influence the amount of time you allocate to each task.
Knowing you have a deadline to meet, you tend to work with the time you established for every task on hand.
Avoid procrastination
Many people tend to be less successful and unproductive because of the negative impact of procrastination.
Overcoming procrastination can be very difficult at some points in our life. This is because some factors can affect your productivity and drive.
If you have a full-time job, or you are studying for a test, it can affect your productivity because you will naturally focus on the most important tasks.
You just need to find the best work-life balance to enable you to rest and refresh your brain.
Take Breaks in between tasks
It is also important to take regular breaks when you are feeling tired or stressed while working. A 5 to 10 minutes break, although it seems small can have a huge impact on your brain performance.
Regular breaks help you feel more relaxed and refresh your brain energy level to continue with work.
Play some video games, listen to music or take a few minutes of walk or exercise. The idea here is to at least take a long break to cool off yourself.
Organize Tasks Based on Priority
If you organize your tasks properly, it will help you to focus on the most important task first, before moving to tasks with less severity.
I once built a javascript application for task management. The app lets you add tasks and set the severity levels for the task. Based on the severity level, you can decide on the task to work on first.
Use Productivity/Time Management Tools
Saving the best for last yeah!!! Time management tools can improve your productivity when used rightly. There are tools to manage tasks, set reminders, and add todos amongst others.
For task management, I recommend using tools such as Notion, Asana, and Google Calendar for setting reminders.
I use the notion tool to organize my work and personal life and also add tasks and todos for each activity.
Conclusion – Time Management Tips
Nothing beats having the right mindset. If you are lacking motivation, it may be due to poor time management. This is also true for people that feel overwhelmed when faced with multitasking challenges.
The best way to protect your brain from burnout and increase productivity is to properly manage your time. We have shown you seven tips to improve your time management skills.
If you are a writer, then check this guide to learn how to become a better writer. We hope you find this guide helpful.
