Effective Schedule : Planning To Make The Effective Use Of Time

So far, this section of Mind Tools, we took into account the priorities and goals - These specify what they want to do with your time. Planning is where these aspirations meet reality for the time you have available.

Planning is the process by which you look at the amount of time available to you, and plan how you will use to achieve the goals you have identified. Using an appropriate form, you can:

Understand what you can get realisticaly time.

Plan to make the best use of available time.

Allow enough time for the things you must do.

Keep an emergency plan to deal with "unexpected".

Minimize stress by avoiding the commitment that you and others.

Using the tool:

There are many good planning methods, such as diaries, calendars, paper organizers, PDAs and integrated software packages such as MS Outlook or GoalPro 6 The synchronization tool is best for you depends on the situation, the current structure of your work, your taste and budget: The most important things you can easily input data, and to be able to view the details properly suitable interval.

Planning is best done on a regular basis, for example at the beginning of each week or month. Go through the following steps in preparing your schedule:

Start by identifying the time you want to keep your job. This depends on the design of their work and personal goals in life.

Then block the actions you must take to do a good job. These are often things that are evaluated.

For example, if you manage people, you must set aside time to address the problems that arise, training and supervision. Similarly, you must allow time to communicate with your boss and key people. Although people may be you can get away with it "neglects them" short-term, the best efforts of time management definitely derailed if not the time for those who are important in your life.

Check your task list and schedule of activities in high priority tasks urgent and essential maintenance that can not be delegated and can not be avoided.

Then the block in appropriate contingency time. You will learn much of what you need for the experience. Normally, the more unpredictable your job, the longer an emergency need. The reality of the work of many people is a constant interruption: Studies show some managers get an average of six minutes of uninterrupted work done at once.

You obviously can not tell when interruptions occur. But leaving space in your calendar, you give yourself the opportunity to rearrange your schedule to respond effectively to problems as they arise.

What now remains is his "spare time": the time available to deliver its priorities and achieve their goals. Review your to do list priorities and personal goals, assess the time required to perform these actions, and planned for in

At the time you get to step 5, you may have little free time or not. If this is the case, review the assumptions used in the first four stages. If things are absolutely necessary if you can delegate, or if you can do for short. Remember that one of the most important ways to learn to succeed is to maximize the "leverage" they can do with your time. Increase the amount of work you can handle by delegating work to others, spend money outsourcing key tasks, or use technology to automate the work as much as possible. This frees you achieve your goals.

Furthermore, using this as an opportunity to review the list of tasks and goals. Have you set goals that are simply not possible with the time you have? You take on additional duties too? Or deal with the most important things really are?

If your free time is limited, so you may have to renegotiate your workload. With a well thought out test plan, you may find it surprisingly easy.