Personal Time Management is about controlling the most valuable resource in life. Time management requires an important shift in focus from activities to results. It also helps you to be in control of your time and your life. If there is any one thing worth fighting in life is more time. Time is what we want most, but what we use worst. -William Penn

Time cannot be replaced or saved.  It can only be reallocated from one activity to another. All work requires time, we should therefore organize works in order of their priorities. Definition of priorities can be challenging for some people, however this depend on the list of the activities in hand. Your activities can also be list into personal and business goals. Once activities are identified, you can then organize the list by priority. Decide on your highest value goal, and work on an important task first. If you can, work on that task before you do anything else. Let’s say your most valuable goal today is management reporting, the important task could be information gathering from the relevant sources. This is personal time management.

 Personal time management enables you to choose what to do first, what to do second, and what not to do at all.  It enables you to organize every aspect of your life so that you can get the greatest joy, happiness, and satisfaction out of everything you do.- Brain Tracy

Here are my 10 tips of Effective Personal Time Management:

1. Delegate – If someone else can do the job, please pass it to them. Train someone how to do the task and use your time for something else. Remember the principle of delegation; the responsibilities of the task outcome still stays with you.
2. Prioritize –Work on the important tasks first. Think of using the Italian economist, Vilfredo Pareto’s principle of 80-20 Rule. Focus 80% of your time on the top 20% tasks.
3. Focus – Sometimes multitask may not work, why not focus on one thing at a time.
4. Set Reminders – You have a meeting at 11 a.m. and you don’t want to be late? Then, set your reminder at 15 or 30 minutes to the meeting time.
5. Learn to Say “No” – If more activities are coming to your desk, do not take more than what you can handle within a given time frame. Hence, if someone brings a task that is of less priority learn to use the two letter word “No”.
6. Use a Calendar – If you do not have one, please use Microsoft outlook. You can even set reminders in this office application. Most people miss meetings because they do not use their calendars.
7. Daily Plan or To do list – As an Accountant, I usually list my opening balance every morning. I mean the list of key tasks for the day. Some people do it in the evening before closing for the day.
8. Personal Deadline – If your “Oga” sets deadlines for you, try setting your own deadline before this official deadline.
9. Break Down – If you are doing a bigger task, why not break it into smaller tasks. For example, if you are writing report about competitors performance, you can break the task into data collection, data analysis, draft report writing etc.
10.  No Excuse – Don’t create an excuse that you do not have enough time

Peter Drucker once said, “Efficiency is doing things right, but effectiveness is doing the right things”

Therefore focus first on effectiveness (identifying what is the right thing to do), then concentrate on efficiency (doing it right).

My question, how do you manage your time?