Tips to help you with preparation
- Do it the night before. It can help you so that you don't have to scramble, for instance, to find clothes or to look for a missing item.
- When possible, do it well in advance. It will sort out unforeseen issues.
- Do the pre-work. Read the materials, Review the data. Practice the activity so that you are ready.
- Preparing saves you time. It reduces errors, prevents re-work, and shortens activities.
- Reduce your stress. When you are ready, you feel confident. Your stress is reduced because you have less to worry about.
- Make it a habit. Make it part of your lifestyle.
MORE IDEAS FROM THE ARTICLE
Planning as a first step is good. But preparation is even better.
Planning helps you to know what you will be doing on a day. Preparation gets you ready to actually do the tasks.
RELATED IDEAS
- Have a List – Many people say, “I know what I have to get done.” But, they don’t have a list. Until you have written your tasks down and compared them against each other, it is difficult to have a clear picture of what is truly important.
- Rank Your Priorities – This activity makes people uneasy. However, you need to rank your priorities. Put them in order of importance. When you need to make a tough decision, you will know whether the gym or writing is more important to you. You can always change the order later, so don’t stress this task.
- Put Work Before Play – Always do the work before you do the fun. It is easy (and enjoyable) to do the small and inconsequential tasks. It requires discipline to do the hard and distasteful ones first.
- Schedule Time for the Important – Don’t let your priorities get overrun by the busyness of your day. Unless you schedule time on your calendar for your priorities, you won’t get around to them. Whether it is a workout at the gym or writing time for your book, put an appointment with your priority on your calendar . (link)
- Evaluate Priorities Regularly – What was a priority today, might not be tomorrow. As I mentioned earlier, you can change your mind. Even your life events will shift your priorities.
When you do, you will find that much of tasks you were doing were inconsequential. And the smaller, less important work will fade into the background when you are working on what is truly important to you.
Knowledge workers usually have to play 2 roles at the same time - the boss and the worker: They have to choose what their work is (boss-mode) and they have to do the actual work (work-mode), for example.
This situation has the potential to create conflict and lead to indecision about which role should have their attention at different times of the day.
Trying to apply time management tools without having prerequisite time management skills is unlikely to work effectively. The prerequisites are:
- Awareness about time being a limited resource.
- Arrangement and designing of goals, plans, schedules, and tasks for maximum time-efficiency.
- Adaptation in your use of time, including adjustments and improvisation.