A trick of time management

When we think of how to manage our time effectively we often think that we should try to get more done in the time available. This is missing one of the most simple and under-used time management skills

Human beings do like to complicate things. Even when the solution is apparent, many people will continue to do the opposite, even when they often repeat the solution to themselves every minute of the day.

What do I mean?

This…

We constantly find that we don’t have time to do everything we need to get done. “I don’t have the time…” is the sentence we repeat to ourselves almost like a mantra. In order to make time we try to organize our time more effectively, usually by doing things—or at least trying to do things—faster. Then when this approach fails we go back to looking at the list of things we need to do and banging our head against the wall as we try to squeeze more hours out of the day.

The problem is that we often get so attached to our tasks that we try to do them even when they are simple—yet time-consuming—tasks that anyone could do. And be paid a minimal amount of money to do at that. There’s something about doing those simple and time-consuming tasks that gives us a warm glow of satisfaction when we do them and tick them off our to-do list. It gives us a feeling of achievement and that we have our time under control when actually nothing could be further from the truth. This is not effective time management, but very poor time management. Or, put another way, effective time-wasting.

The most important thing to realize is that time really is your most precious resource, because it’s non-renewable. Once time is spent, it’s spent—gone forever. Almost anything else is renewable. You can always get more. But you just can’t get more time. That’s why trying to fit more in and do everything yourself is a road to disaster as far as time management is concerned.

What you need to do is look at those things that need to be done regularly—either daily, weekly or monthly—and ask yourself: “What process takes place when this gets done?” You can usually find that the process is pretty simple and straightforward. Do A, then do B, then do C…

Get it in writing

What you can do then is get the process down on paper and hand that piece of paper to someone else who will just carry out that process for you.

And often we don’t even need to get the process down on paper because a lot of what we do is already being done by others—and the process is called their business. Those businesses are glad to take that job off our hands, and do it for a fairly small fee because they have mastered the process that gets it done.

It can be difficult to give up those small tasks that take up so much of our time. This is one of the emotional blocks to time management that we need to get over. Without that cozy feeling of ticking things off our list we can feel that we’re not in control of our time as much as we used to be, and even feel that we’re not getting as much done as we used to when the opposite is actually true. Getting rid of the small tasks leaves us to work on the more important things, the big projects. Or even to work on designing more processes to hand to other people to manage our time even more effectively.

One of the most liberating experiences as far as time is concerned is to get used to spending money to pay other people to do stuff for you. You'll find that the more you pay people to do the simple stuff, the more you find you'll be willing to do it. It’s one of the best time-management techniques there is, and doesn’t take much time to master.

The business of time management

Time management in business is essential, especially if you run a small business and have to keep your eye on lots of different tasks.

So if you run a small business, this can be done by outsourcing simple tasks such as paying someone to handle the outgoing mail. Saving 30 minutes a day of a five-day work week adds up to 125 hours a year. That’s over three 35-hour working weeks. Imagine what you could achieve in that time.

If at home, it could be simple things like paying someone to do some of the cleaning. That might be just three hours a week, but even that adds up to 156 hours a year, which is over four-and-a-half 35-hour working weeks. In that time you could probably create something that would easily pay for the expense.

If money is short, then you may have to make choices as to what you want to spend your money on in order to pay for someone to do the simple tasks that take up your time. But as soon as you can, pay someone to do the things that can be broken down into a simple process. Start to do this and you’ll find you uncover huge blocks of time that have been spent just doing “stuff”—time which you can now use for doing other things, like making more money to pay for all those time-saving things.

That solution I mentioned at the beginning of this article, the one that people repeat to themselves constantly is this: “I wish someone else could do this for me.”

It sounds like wishful thinking, but it’s actually true. There probably is someone who can do this task for you. You just need to get over that emotional block to time management, of giving up the small tasks that give the good feeling of crossing things off the list.

To get more from your time, sit down and see what small simple tasks are taking up your time. Then get that process down on paper and ask yourself: “Is this something that could be done by someone else, someone who I could pay a small amount of money to do?”

If it is, you might be on your way to finding an extra three weeks of spare time… Maybe enough to take a holiday…