Last week, I talked about Time, and how people’s understanding of time effects their daily routine, and that of others.Today I would like to elaborate on this idea, with an example to illustrate the point.
One client we worked for was always late for meetings, regularly 30 to 45 minutes late, every time.
There was one notorious occasion when a large meeting involving several companies was held up for over an hour; when this particular client arrived she apologised saying “I am sorry I am late, I’ve just been to a time management seminar”.
Some seminar! So how can you deal with people like this, who are inherently late? Even with important clients it is vital to set ground rules. For meetings, state in advance:
The time the meeting is to start
How long you have allowed for the meeting.
Send out an agenda, in advance, with an guide to the time allocated to each item
Stick to those timings. For longer items, or where it looks like you will overrun, particularly where there is unlikely to be a clear consensus, give a five minute warning. Say “we will vote on this in five minutes, has anyone any closing comments” and stick to that, as far as possible.
If attendees are late, don’t wait. Start the meeting and don’t re-cap. Your time is important and valuable too.
If latecomers insist on going over items they missed, you need to let them know that other items will have to be cut short or that you can only stay for the original time allocated.
Whilst these guidelines work best if you are the chair of the meeting, setting out your understanding of how a meeting will run in advance, can help all participants.
This is a book that strives to help you excel, to be better than just good, to be brilliant. Michael Heppell sets out a number of tools to help you focus on the various areas of your life and select those in which you are going to shine.
He starts by showing how to assess where you are now, and where you want to be, before providing tools and examples to help you to achieve a brilliant future.
This is not a book for the feint hearted – you have to be prepared to take up his challenge to be brilliant and to work through the exercises and tools. The promise of almost instant results is made early on, challenging you to see the results over a 90 day period, just three months. And the tasks are not difficult, although they do require some mental dedication and thought. The result is the potential to change the way you approach your daily activities and to truly ‘Be Brilliant’.
Interested in this book – buy it now or read more reviews at:
Today I would like to ask you to improve your relationship with time.
Get to meetings early.
The alternative is to be late (or possibly exactly on time).
When you are late, you miss things. Meetings have to be rescheduled, and you start to directly effect other peoples’ time apportionment. When you are late, you are rushed, possibly stressed and the result is you are less focused and do not perform as well.
So be on time, but have a selection of small tasks you can undertake (a report or professional magazine article you can read, for example) whilst you wait for the meeting to start.
Do you regularly have an idea on how something can be improved or a problem solved, and then, some time later remember that you forgot all about it?
Often these thoughts will come to you when you are least able to take action on them. If you keep a small notebook with you for jotting down these thoughts you need never forget them and can implement them when you have more time. Think of it as an ‘Ideas Diary’.
And you don’t need to limit this to ideas for improvements, add business ideas, inspiring quotes or interesting facts that you may use in the future. Alternatively, keep a Dictaphone or small digital recorder with you so you can make a voice memo there and then, but transcribe the thought at a later time.
If these are all written down in one place you can review them at your leisure and use them when you need to.
Stop wasting time shuffling paper around. As soon as you get a piece of paper across your desk, do one of the following:
1) If you can, delegate the task
2) If you can’t delegate it, but the job can be dealt with quickly, in a minute or two, do it, there and then and file the paper away
3) If it will take longer than a few minutes then add the task to your to do list, and put the paper away in a pending file until you need it.
This process can be extended to deal with emails, faxes and even voicemails, as well as traditional correspondence.
Have a productive week!
Do you have piles of paper all over your desk and stacks of files all around you?
Do you think that you know where everything is as it is close to hand, or that you need a lot of files because you are always referring to them?
In reality however, a messy desk can lead to distractions as you focus on the top most piece of paper, rather than the next item on your to do list and more importantly it is far easier for things to get lost amongst the disorder.
If this sounds like they way you work, try something different! Order your paper, throw away those that are so old they are no longer relevant and file others that you need to keep. For those items that need further action add them onto your to do list and put the item into a pending file for retrieval later. You can still have files to hand, but limit them to just the ones you really are working from, say three or four at the most.
The result – one clean desk and a more productive working environment.
Do you set deadlines?
If you don’t you should, because there is nothing like a deadline to galvanize you into action.
The tasks on your to do list that don’t have deadlines are far easier to put off because you have “too much to do” whereas those with a deadline will get done, and you will get them done first.
Don’t have a To Do list? Review our tips for better time management and see why you need one!
How can you manage a business effectively if you don’t manage your time efficiently as well?
Today we start a new series of articles with time management and personal development advice, with our
Beginner’s guide to better time management and will have regular Monday time management tips to help you get the working week off to a cracking start!
