It is actually worth thinking that do we fail in managing time or managing self. Managing time is really about managing self, managing priorities and sometimes even managing stress. Let’s look at some of the reasons that make time management a big task for us:
Procrastination Procrastination Procrastination
This is the biggest evil that can ever be. We are somehow in a habit of delaying work till the time it becomes absolutely urgent. Procrastination is a habit, which makes us push the smallest to biggest tasks. The fact is that we can’t do everything that’s there on the list. Somewhere creative procrastination is needed. It’s important to plan the daily workload in advance. That gives us the opportunity to manage tasks better.
Clarity of purpose
We must have clarity of purpose before we undertake any task. That helps us to decide the relative importance of each activity that we undertake. The biggest of the frogs can be broken into simpler steps and attempted one by one. We need to understand the return on investment on each piece of work that we perform every day.
Not writing it down
To-do lists might sound cliché but they retain their charm even today. The only difference is that paper has been replaced by laptops and phones. There is a lot of power in writing. It only takes about 10-12 minutes to plan a day in advance. These 10 minutes might end up saving hundreds of valuable minutes at work. Decide each day what you want to do and then organize a list by assigning a priority as well as a sequence to your activities.
Inability to manage distractions
Most of the times distractions drift us away from our goals. These distractions are not only external but can also be internal. External distractions could include noise, lack of support, lack of motivation, self created pressure and much more. On the same hand, internal distraction can also create disturbances and kill our valuable time. Such distractions could include laziness, lack of prioritisation, emotional imbalance, stress and even over estimation of abilities.