How many times have you heard the phrase, “Time Management”?
A Google Search of this phrase brought up 242 MILLION hits, so obviously the topic is of importance to somebody.
Ironically, unless you are a physicist, the entire concept of time management is nothing but MYTHOLOGY. Within the boundaries of our current technological capabilities, it’s safe to say that the following are all true:
- You cannot travel in time.
- You cannot stop or slow time.
- You cannot reverse the affects of time.
In fact, we can all basically agree that time is a force that we have no actual control over: No matter what you do, there will always be 24 hours in a day, 7 days in a week and 365 days in a year.
Most importantly, you only have a finite amount of time in your life to advance your business in order to achieve your personal goals. While we cannot manage time, we also must recognize that the most dangerous adversary of any business is not a lack of money, a lack of clients, a large number of competitors, or a poor economy.
THE MOST DANGEROUS ADVERSARY OF ANY BUSINESS IS TIME.
Three Critical Steps to Managing Yourself
For all size businesses, there are three essential activities that enable business owners and employees to get the most out of themselves. If you eliminate any one leg of this triumvirate, you will find yourself as a victim of events, instead of achieving your goals for your business and your life.
1. Business Planning:
Running a business without a plan is the same as operating a boat in a storm without charts, radar and a radio. For many entrepreneurs, there is something gutsy about “winging it.” As romantic as that all may seem, especially in our new economic reality not having a plan is fool’s errand. At a minimum, you need to develop an annual plan that realistically assesses where you are and what you are trying to achieve and then establishes SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-Specific) goals and strategies to get there.
2. Default Calendar:
In terms of managing your use of time, one of the most effective tools is to create a calendar of the things you should be doing during the critical hours of each day of the week in order to achieve your plan.
3. Weighted Important Task System (WITS):
As defined by Steven Covey, in the war against time there is no better tool than this. When a conflict arises in your default calendar, this is the easiest system for determining essential and non-essential activities.
Here’s how it works:
Urgent and Important: All emergencies are urgent and important. A customer/client complaint has to be taken care of right away (unfortunately, whether it’s legitimate or not). If you focus all your efforts on crisis management, you will take yourself away from your long-term goals.
Not Urgent and Not Important: Let’s face it, if you really don’t know what is not urgent and not important in your line of work then you are either very lucky or spending down your inheritance… Expending any real effort in this area is the fastest path to bankruptcy or losing your job.
Important But Not Urgent: These are the strategies and tactics that you establish to directly move your plan forward. They are the things that you are most in control of. They also offer you a choice: Do them or don’t do them at your own peril. The less effort you devote to them, the more power you give to other people and issues and the less you stay focused on your own goals and future.
Urgent But Not Important: E-mail, phone calls, meetings… You can’t avoid answering the phone. The same is true for faxes, accounts receivable and accounts payable. However, you do have a choice as to how and when you will address these tasks instead of having them run your life. The more effort you devote to urgent but not important issues, the more that hamster will start spinning on the wheel inside your head.
Conclusion
Your business and ultimately your life are in your hands. If you focus on managing time then you let others define your future and your fate. Taking responsibility for managing yourself gives you the ability to make the best use of the time you have. Three simple steps to managing yourself are creating a business plan, establishing a default calendar and keeping your WITS about you.
Written by Certified Business Coach, Josh Slavitt, pictured here with his son Liam.
If you are looking for business advice in CT, why not attend one of our upcoming profit building seminars or contact us at 203.210.7003.
