I don’t have time. I’ve got loads of tasks piling up. I’m behind on my assignments. I haven’t read all the new rules they’ve brought in. The working day isn’t long enough. I’m fed up to the back teeth with work.
How many times have we heard these or similar phrases from our coworkers, our team, people in general, complaining about how hard the daily grind is? There is a competency called “working under pressure” that would apply here, and another, “organizing time in daily work”, which is the one we’re going to devote a few lines to on this blog.
Defining the competency: time organization
Let’s start from the fact that four out of ten workers say they suffer from information overload at work, that they can barely process and absorb the information they receive every day. It’s a symptom of working under pressure and of how time is organized.
A worker who feels comfortable in their job, who accepts challenges, suggestions and new lines of work, will do well to make sure that their time management lets them organize and distribute their working time properly among the tasks they’ve been given, so they can meet every demand placed on them on time.
The benefit of good time organization, for both company and employee, lies in the physical and mental health of people who are able to take charge of their tasks and fight back against daily work pressure.
How to organize your time
A sheet of paper, a pen and a little time are all you need to learn how to manage your time and succeed at your daily tasks without feeling overwhelmed, without stress, and performing well for your team and your company.
Every day, we’ll work on a sheet of paper, listing each of the activities planned for the working day.
Once all the tasks are listed, we need to assess the seriousness, necessity, added value, urgency and productivity of each one. With that assessment in place, we’ll arrange all our tasks in order of priority.
Now all that’s left is to give each thing its time. Each task and each priority will need its own slot, and that’s how we’ll organize our working day. But we mustn’t forget to leave time for “interruptions”, meaning phone calls, emails, requests from coworkers and so on, which also need to be given their due share of time and priority.
Things to keep in mind when managing your time
Let’s get to know ourselves. Let’s also identify the times when we’re at our physical or mental best, depending on each person’s needs, so we can schedule the tasks that demand the most attention or effort for those moments.
Plan for the present and the medium term, and don’t forget to give yourself rewards for things done well. Don’t be too hard on yourself either: perfection is fine, but taken to excess it isn’t helpful.
Featured image: Ivan Radic, CC BY 2.0, via Flickr.
