<ul><li>Get some perspective. Develop a vision of what and where you want to be in a few years. </li><li>Develop an action plan. Break down you vision into manageable steps that are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound.</li><li>Take action. Use <a href="https://www.actitime.com/timesheet-software-list">time management software</a> to upload your plan and record your time.</li><li>Reflect on your progress. Review your performance regularly to to get new insights.</li><li>Ask for feedback. Turn to your boss and ask for their feedback. Be ready to take criticism.</li></ul>

Master Goal Setting & Reflection

<ul><li>Identify unproductive activities. Review your performance in your time tracking app to identify tasks that don’t contribute to the project’s success and that you can eliminate with little or no damage to the outcome.</li><li>Evaluate task importance. Even when you are in the middle of the task and you notice that it takes too much time already, step back and evaluate its importance and outcome.</li></ul>

Leave Out Low-Output Activities

<ul><li>Never lose sight of your vision. Reflect on how your daily tasks contribute to your goals. Adjust your vision if necessary.</li><li>Use peak performance time. Break your day into 3-8 time slots and assess your energy and productivity levels for a week. Rank-order the slots, find your <a href="https://www.actitime.com/productivity/make-the-most-out-of-your-peak-productivity-hours/">peak time</a> and use it for the most demanding tasks.</li><li>Get comfortable with imperfection. Remember that 20% of input produce 80% of results.</li><li>Practice self-care. Exercise regularly, develop a healthy diet, take breaks, meditate.</li></ul>

Use Your Energy Wisely

<ul><li>Estimate your activities for future productivity analysis.</li><li>Include buffer time for unexpected circumstances.</li><li>Use time tracking software. Upload your tasks and time estimates, record time and review your performance.</li><li>Calculate your fudge ratio. Build a list of tasks, estimate each item and track time. Add up your total time spent, divide it by the total estimated time and multiply the result by 100%.</li><li>Ask a neutral party for feedback to reduce estimation errors. </li></ul>

Improve Your Time Assessment Skills

<ul><li>Integrate apps and automate your routines with online calendars, scheduling apps, time trackers, <a href="https://www.actitime.com/software-collections/free-project-management-software/">project management systems</a> and other tools.</li><li>Delegate some tasks to focus on more important tasks and teach your team members new skills. Next time you feel overloaded, you’ll have a trained employee who can back you up.</li><li>Outsource tasks that take too much of your time and put your focus where it's needed most.  </li></ul>

Upgrade Project Management

<ul><li>Set deadlines to prioritize tasks with upcoming deadlines.</li><li>Focus on 20% of the tasks that bring 80% of results. </li><li>Separate urgent from important. Urgent tasks require immediate action, whereas important tasks have more significant and long-term consequences. Prioritize tasks that are both urgent and important.</li><li>Learn to say “no”. Don’t hesitate to politely refuse tasks and activities that are irrelevant to your goals.</li></ul>

Master Prioritization

<ul><li>Create a routine. Use calendar apps to block time for planned activities and add new items immediately as soon as they are planned. </li><li>Schedule protected time. Identify your peak performance time and ensure that you dedicate this time to the most demanding and important projects.</li><li>Schedule me time. Include fixed commitments (meals, commute, sleep), self-care activities (exercise, meditation), guilt-free time (socializing, hobbies) in your calendar.</li></ul>

Improve Scheduling

<ul><li>Create to-do lists and cross off items as you complete them. When you write down your tasks, you take them off your mind, leaving mind space for focus and concentration.</li><li>Take notes to document ideas, key points of conversations to unload your mind and consult these notes any time.</li><li>Create running lists: Skills to improve, books to read, courses to take, you name it. </li></ul>

Save Your Brain Power

<ul><li>Know your tools. <a href="https://www.actitime.com/software-collections/email-management/">L</a>earn keyboard shortcuts, labeling systems and other tiny features of your apps and tools that can save hours of work time monthly.</li><li>Document guidelines, meetings, procedures to unload your mind, refer to and share them with others in a few clicks.</li><li>Store passwords, login data, usernames and other credentials in password managers (like <a href="https://clipperz.is/app/">Clipperz</a>).</li><li>Backup important data. Have a copy of important docs on your cloud or external storage.</li></ul>

Arrange Your Tools

<ul><li>Manage your attention. Recognize when your mind starts wandering and redirect your focus when it slips up.</li><li>Block time for emails. Turn off email notifications and schedule two or three time blocks daily for checking emails.</li><li>Declutter. Messy desks <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/high-octane-women/201203/why-mess-causes-stress-8-reasons-8-remedies">make</a> us feel anxious, stressed and overwhelmed. Spend a few minutes daily to declutter space around you. </li></ul>

Eliminate Distractions

<ul><li>Create contingency plans. When planning your next task or project, consider worst-case scenarios.</li><li>Identify your stressors. Practice journaling for a few weeks to identify sources of stress and look into ways to manage them effectively.</li><li>Pursue hobbies. People who regularly engage in hobbies perform 15% to 30% <a href="https://www.spring.org.uk/2014/04/the-positive-effect-of-creative-hobbies-on-performance-at-work.php">better</a>. Schedule at least one block of time every week for your hobby.</li></ul>

Master Stress Management

<ul><li>Use productivity apps - <a href="https://www.actitime.com/features-in-detail/simple-time-tracking">time trackers</a>, checklist apps - to measure your performance, keep track of your progress and identify opportunities for growth.</li><li>Work in focused time intervals. When overwhelmed, use short bursts of effort to avoid procrastination.</li><li>Reduce time wasters. Use do-not-disturb time blocks and block distractions during peak performance and critical work time.</li><li>Establish boundaries. Stick to your working hours and leave work at work. </li></ul>

Improve Focus & Concentration

We all have 24 hours in a day and time is ticking away second by second. We can’t save, store or reuse it. There’s no way to manage time but we can manage our attitude, activities and environment to…

Time Management

Master These Three Skills to Improve Time Management

Perfectionists strive to deliver high-quality work, but their high standards cause stress, burnout and anxiety in the long run.Time management tips:<ul><li>Get comfortable with imperfection. Ask yourself: "Am I being productive? Can I get more results with a handful of imperfect tasks?"</li><li>Reflect on your progress on a weekly, bi-weekly and monthly basis.</li><li>Ask for perspective and support. Show your work to your supervisor to learn if you are doing good and the current quality of work is sufficient.</li></ul>

1. Being a Perfectionist

It happens to the best us when our minds are wandering, making us unable to concentrate.<h2>Time management tips:</h2><ul><li>Use peak performance time. Use the most productive parts of the day to do the most demanding tasks.</li><li>Take breaks - they refresh your mind, replenish mental resources, restore motivation and reduce decision fatigue.</li><li>Limit your social media time. Social media and search engines narrow our attention span and our ability to focus.</li><li>Practice single-tasking. Try using task timers.</li></ul>

2. Not Being Able to Concentrate & Maintain Focus

A never-ending circle of tasks may feel devastating, cause stress, depression and burnout. Time management tips:<ul><li><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Eat-That-Frog-Great-Procrastinating-ebook/dp/B001AFF25W">Eat the frog</a>. Do the most important or challenging task first thing in the morning.  </li><li>Try <a href="https://www.nifs.org/blog/productivity-hacks-prioritize-tasks-with-the-ivy-lee-method">Ivy Lee Method</a>. Create six-item lists for each day sorted by priority. Complete items one by one and move unfinished tasks to the top of the next day's list.  </li><li>Narrow down your list of tasks. Prioritize activities that will deliver the best returns.</li></ul>

3. Scheduling Tasks Ineffectively

Without vision, you can't create the results you want and feel joy and excitement to keep on going.Time management tips:<ul><li>Get a bird’s eye view. Think of how your tasks at hand contribute to your personal or professional goals. Maintain your focus on the end result.</li><li>Identify time wasters. Notice activities that don't move you forward and turn your focus to the things that matter.</li><li>Create a <a href="https://www.projectmanager.com/blog/contingency-plan">contingency plan</a>. Be ready for the worst-case scenarios.</li></ul>

4. Lack of Vision

Develop strategical thinking and set short-term goals to achieve extraordinary results.Time management tips:<ul><li>Develop awareness. Think about how your time and efforts you invested today will contribute to your tomorrow’s reality and bring you closer to your goals.</li><li>Use 7-minute rule. Spend 7 minutes in the morning to plan your day and 7 minutes before you go to sleep to review your day and prepare a plan for tomorrow.</li><li>Review your progress. Use tables, charts and reports to see how you are doing.</li></ul>

5. Never Thinking About Tomorrow

Time tracking reveals unexpected trends and insights and ecourages a more strategic approach to time management. Time management tips:<ul><li>Pick a time tracking tool: a timesheet app, a desktop time tracker, a mobile app, a <a href="https://www.actitime.com/browser-extension">browser extension</a> or a stopwatch timer.</li><li>Track even the smallest tasks like phone calls, meetings, coffee breaks, distraction time.</li><li>Review your performance regularly with charts and reports. </li></ul>

6. Not Tracking Time

Review not only your daily and weekly performance but look into monthly and half-year reports to get a birds-eye view of your efforts.Time management tips:<ul><li>Avoid <a href="https://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/how-the-sunk-cost-fallacy-makes-you-act-stupid.html">sunk cost fallacy</a> — investing too much time into ineffective tasks. Question the efficiency of ongoing tasks. </li><li>Review your schedule regularly. Review daily schedule to plan your workload. </li><li>Build a <a href="https://www.skillsyouneed.com/ps/planning-personal-development.html">personal development plan</a>. Document your goals, plans, skills to master. Review your progress regularly to make sure you stay on track.</li></ul>

7. Lack of Regular Time Management Review

Persistent exposure to stress can put your health and performance at risk.Time management tips:<ul><li>Identify your stressors. Practice journaling, search for patterns and look into ways to cope with stress.</li><li>Develop healthy responses to stress: exercise, yoga, meditations, hobbies, favorite activities, quality sleep.</li><li>Set boundaries. Stick to your working hours and leave work at work. </li></ul>

8. Not Being Able to Cope With Stress

<a href="https://www.realsimple.com/work-life/life-strategies/time-management/attention-management">Attention management</a> - the ability to recognize your brain state and consciously shift yourself into the state that will serve you best at the moment.Time management tips:<ul><li>Control your environment. Communicate to others that you try to stay focused. </li><li>Review your attention-stealing habits. Background TV noise, checking out phone notification - identify and eliminate these. </li><li>Exercise and meditate to improve memory, concentration, and mental sharpness, reduce mind wandering, boost focus and memory</li></ul>

9. Not Practicing Attention Management

We all have 24 hours in a day and limited energy capacities as human beings.Time management tips:<ul><li>Outsource. Weigh the opportunity costs, take some load off your shoulders and focus on hign-impact activities.</li><li>Automate your routines as much as possible.</li><li>Delegate a part of your workload to other team memebrs to teach them new skills and grow a reliable assistant.  </li></ul>

10. Doing Everything On Your Own

Most of us tend to underestimate how long projects and tasks will take us to finish. Time management tips:<ul><li>Calculate your <a href="https://medium.com/swlh/your-schedule-needs-a-buffer-3930bebc0cfa">fudge ratio</a>. Build a list of tasks, estimate and track time against them. Then add up your total time spent, divide it by the total estimated time and multiply the result by 100%.</li><li>Assume the worst-case scenario. Include possible interruptions and roadblocks into your estimates.</li><li>Have someone else estimate for you: we make more accurate estimations for others. </li></ul>

11. Being Bad at Estimating Time

Busy time doesn’t bring you closer to your goals, making you feel anxious and unsettled - maximize the productive time.Time management tips:<ul><li>Apply the <a href="https://learn.g2.com/pareto-principle">Pareto principle</a>. Focus on 20% tasks of the highest value that give 80% of results.</li><li>Consider the <a href="https://www.calendar.com/blog/using-the-4ds-of-time-management-to-your-advantage/#:~:text=If%20you're%20unfamiliar%2C%20the,the%20things%20that%20really%20matter.">4Ds technique</a>. When a new interruption shows up, delete, delegate, defer or do it now.</li><li>Try the 1–3–5 strategy. Commit to 1 big task, 3 medium and 5 small tasks every day.</li><li>Set agile results: Focus on 3 key results to achieve over a week, month or year.</li></ul>

12. Being Busy Instead of Effective

Without mastering hard and soft skills, no amount of time management advice can make you grow faster and achieve more.Time management tips:<ul><li>Hone your professional skills. Review your skills regularly, think of how you could improve them, what additional skills you could benefit from.</li><li>Know your tools. Learn shotcuts and make use of tiny features. </li><li>Improve your soft skills. Be more conscious about how you deal with feedback, communicate, learn new things, adapt to changes, work through conflicts.</li></ul>

13. Not Mastering Your Skills & Tools

Emails, notifications, social media, paper clutter, low-priority tasks - learn how to manage these effectively. Time management tips:<ul><li>Define your boundaries. Make time for phone calls and emails, use chat statuses to communicate when you are available, and, most importantly, schedule time for demanding tasks.</li><li>Learn to say no. Avoid participating in team chit-chats and postpone low-priority tasks.</li><li>Schedule work time, self-care activities, guilt-free time. </li></ul>

14. Not Managing Distractions

Habits are routines that you do with little or no conscious thought, also meaning little energy investments.Time management tips:<ul><li>Build the habit loop. Choose a trigger, execute the routine and do something enjoyable afterward. Let’s say at 10 a.m. you have a standup meeting (trigger). Next, you disable notifications, put your headphones on and attack the most demanding task (routine). After that you go for lunch at around 2 p.m. or whenever you are done. </li></ul>* check <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1847941834/ref=as_li_qf_asin_il_tl">Atomic Habits</a> by James Clear

15. Doing Routines Instead of Habits

Regardless of our occupations, many aspects of our jobs are repetitive and open to automation.Time management tips:<ul><li>Improve routine tasks. Review your routine activities regularly and brainstorm ideas of how you could tackle them even more effectively.</li><li>Automate management routines with time and project management tools. </li><li>Use automation tools. Automate routines in your web apps with tools like <a href="https://zapier.com/">Zapier</a> and <a href="https://ifttt.com/">IFTTT</a>. </li></ul>

16. Avoiding Automation

Big projects look overwhelming and often lead to stress and procrastination.Time management tips:<ul><li>Break it down. Whenever you start a new task, break it down into steps that you can complete in 20–30 minutes, even if they look trivial.</li><li>Develop a logical sequence. Complete tasks in order, one by one, to feel the progress.</li><li>Review your progress regularly. Break your tasks into an easy-to-follow steps. Or use task boards like <a href="https://www.actitime.com/getting-more-efficient-with-actitime/kanban-system/">Kanban</a> to visualize your progress.</li></ul>

17. Not Breaking Down Big Projects

Our average working memory capacity is <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2864034/">limited</a> to three to five items. Anything that exceeds these limits has a high chance of falling out of our brains.Time management tips:<ul><li>Use external storage: organizers, notes, task apps and software to unload your mind and come back to these tasks when needed.</li><li>Use collaboration software to brainstorm and discuss ideas with your team.</li><li>Simplify everyday choices. Reduce the number of everyday choices not to waste your energy on trivial decisions.</li></ul>

18. Not Conserving Your Brain Power

Time management tips:<ul><li>Follow the <a href="https://oxfordre.com/psychology/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190236557.001.0001/acrefore-9780190236557-e-12">Goal-Setting Theory</a>: set specific, difficult and challenging goals.</li><li>Review future plans. Even if you aren’t excited about your current project, a long-term perspective may provide you with motivation to keep on going.</li><li>Trick your brain. Whenever we accomplish a task, our brains release dopamine, which is connected to feelings of pleasure and motivation. Break down your tasks into small goals to keep yourself motivated during long-term projects.</li></ul>

19. Being Unmotivated

On the one hand, an increasingly digitalized lifestyle shortens our attention span and concentration abilities that can be <a href="https://time.com/3858309/attention-spans-goldfish/">compared</a> to those of a goldfish. On the other hand, modern tools can save you hours if used wisely.Time management tips:<ul><li>Use technology to plan your day. Consider <a href="https://www.lifewire.com/free-online-calendars-1357935">online calendars</a> and scheduling apps for personal time management purposes.</li><li>Try <a href="https://www.actitime.com/time-tracking/how-to-stay-focused-with-a-time-tracker/">time trackers</a> to get new productivity insights.</li><li>Consider <a href="https://www.actitime.com/software-collections/project-management-tools/">project management tools</a> to manage team performance.  </li></ul>

20. Not Taking Technology Along

Smart time management enables you to work smarter, not harder so that you get more done in less time. If we could squeeze this concept into a single piece of advice, it’d be the following: think…

Master These Three Skills to Improve Time Management

20 Most Common Time Management Problems & Solutions

Anastasia S