The 30 best time management tips of all time
Great time management will help you get more done in less time, reduce your stress levels, have more free time for the activities you love, and create more opportunities for yourself.
To become good at time management, you need to develop specific time management skills and employ specific time management strategies that work best for you personally.
In this blog post, we'll focus on the 30 best time management tips of all time. These tips are very specific recommendations on how to manage time better.
Like time management quotes, time management tips are usually short, to the point, and to the point of knowledge that you can immediately apply and improve your time management.
Among our top 30 time management tips of all time, we've also picked the top 5 and explained them further. We hope you enjoy these tips and don't forget to implement some of them.
Here is the ultimate list of 30+ time management tips:
1. Always start with "why". Find out exactly why you want to improve your time management. Is it working less/more and earning more, or something else? Only a strong "why" gives you the mental motivation you need to really improve something.
2. Set SMART goals. If you want to improve your time management, you first need to know what you want and why you want it. Set specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and timely goals. When your long-term goals are clearly set, setting weekly and daily priorities is much easier.
time management tips
3. Prioritize tasks using the Eisenhower matrix and learn to separate urgent and important tasks. The tasks that are urgent and urgent should be done immediately. You should decide on tasks that are important and not urgent (for example, exercising). Tasks that are urgent, but not critical, should be delegated and the rest deleted from your to-do list.
4. Plan your work week on Sunday evening and select the three most important tasks for the day each morning of the week. Start your day with the most demanding tasks and complete these three most important tasks no matter what. The idea is called "eat the frog."
5. Use to-do lists. With to-do lists you free up your brain power; You have a big picture of what needs to be done and you can easily set priorities. You can also use other lists, such as reading lists, shopping lists, to-do lists, etc. Don't burden your brain with things that can be put on paper. Create your second brain with a good to-do list system and note-taking solution.
6. Timebox is the most important task in your calendar. Timeboxing means reserving a slot of time in your calendar for a specific task. It's the same idea as scheduling a meeting. When the scheduled time comes, you simply start working on the task and then do it for the entire reserved time block without any distractions.
7. To-do lists and a calendar should be your basic time management tools. Use both these and, as mentioned, meetings and time slots in your calendar to get important work done in complete peace. Other essential tools for good time management are a note-taking app and a good time tracker. Distraction prevention and habit tracking tools can also be extremely valuable.
8. Research shows that over 50% of meetings are unnecessary. People avoid their socialization, feel important, share opinions, make decisions, and so on. Minimize the number of meetings on your calendar, and only go to the ones that are really necessary.
9. Put a limit on how much time you spend on a task. You can dedicate 5 or 50 hours to it, and the quality of the output will vary accordingly, but just be sure not to overdo things or spend too much time on them, especially if they are not important.
10. If a task takes less than 3 minutes, do it now
11. You can manage what you measure. Make sure you track how much time you spend on a particular task and help yourself optimize how you spend time with good time tracking reports. A good time tracker can be one of the best ways to improve your time management.
12. Limit work in progress, such as making sure you don't put too much on your plate. If there are too many tasks on the to-do list for a week, you will feel overwhelmed and it will be counterproductive. Make sure you limit the amount of work you do.
13. When you work on important tasks, make sure you do deep work. You want to work on difficult tasks as much as possible during the day, without any distractions and with full concentration. Only deep work can give you elite output.
14. For all scheduled focused work in flow, place a "do not disturb" sign on the door, turn off your phone, and disconnect from the Internet. Let people know what time of day you're not available. Make sure nothing gets in the way of your deep work.
15. Batch similar tasks together. For example, have one meeting in the afternoon and batch all meetings in one afternoon for a week. Similarly, plan to work in the same location at the same timeslot.
16. Take regular breaks between tasks. Take a break after every 45 - 120 minute work block to refresh, stretch and recharge your energy levels. You can use the Pomodoro technique to plan your breaks.
17. Make sure you take enough time to recharge. At least one day per week, one extended weekend per quarter, and a full week twice a year. If you're overworked and don't take time to recharge, your productivity levels begin to decline. Likewise, make sure you take enough time away from technology and spend enough time in nature.
18. Find out where you waste the most time. Each of us has a "kryptonite" - an activity we spend too much time on for some emotional reason. It could be meetings, emails, logistics, social media, conflicts etc. Find your kryptonite in time management and start working on reducing time wastage.
19. We all feel super-productive when multitasking, but in reality, it's a big waste of time. You are much less productive when trying to accomplish several tasks at the same time. You can find hundreds of scientific studies that show very clearly that multi-tasking simply does not work, so avoid it.
20. Avoid a false sense of progress. Fake progress in your life occurs when you are doing activities that are closely connected to your goals but provide no real added value or progress. These are: too much research, too much planning, over-analyzing, information overload, talking about it instead of doing it, etc...
21. Learn how to say "no." You must carefully guard your schedule and your time. To do this, you need to learn how to say no to people and activities that don't resonate with your goals or your company's goals.
22. Just as you need to learn how to say no, you also need to learn how to delegate and outsource tasks. Make sure you focus on the most valuable tasks and leverage other people's time for the rest.
23. Email can be the biggest distraction at work. If your email client is constantly open while you're behind your computer, it can be a big obstacle to doing real deep work. The constant stream of emails can be a huge distraction. In some cases email can be the real deal, but in many cases it can be the biggest time waster. Learn other email management tips.
24. Have a neat and clean work environment. A clean desk can do wonders for your productivity levels. Make sure your work environment reflects you as a highly-organized person.
25. Make sure your computer and other tech gadgets are also optimized for productivity Don't have too many programs, keep your folders highly organized and make sure you don't have any malware. Buy a computer as soon as you can afford it.
26. An easy way to make a big improvement in productivity is to have two large monitors. You should probably use all three, but they can emit too much radiation and cause headaches. Regardless, you won't believe how much more productive you can be on a computer with multiple screens than a laptop or tablet.
27. Try to start your day early. As Benjamin Franklin said, "Early to bed and early to rise make a man healthy, rich and wise." Between 5 am and 7 am, when everyone is asleep, you can do a lot of productive work.
28. Each of us has a different personal biorhythm. Find out more if you are a morning or an evening person. Identify your personal biorhythms, then plan naps and walks for less energetic times of the day and creative flow or agile execution for the times of the day when you feel most productive and energetic.
29. If possible, don't do anything when most people do - for example commuting during rush hour or going to the gym when it's busiest.
30. Establish healthy routines. A routine is something you do automatically, without any effort. For example, if you create a routine of starting your day with the most important task, it will become something you get used to doing and your productivity will skyrocket.
31. Drinking at least 2 - 3 liters of water per day will help you stay fresh, focused and energized. If your mouth is dry, you're already too late. The best way to follow this advice is to always keep a bottle of water with you and drink it throughout the day.
32. Negative people are super-uncomfortable distractions in your life. Not only do they waste your time, they also drain your energy. Stay away from such people. Surround yourself with people who inspire you, encourage you and help you achieve your goals.
Top five time management tips explained
Out of all 30+ time management tips, we have selected 5 best time management tips of all time. You should fully implement these to improve your productivity and become a master of time management.
- Learn how to manage distractions
- Work in flow as much as possible
- Sharpen the saw - Invest in yourself regularly
- Pursue minimalism and light resource living and living "in the cloud".
- Track how you spend time
- Now dive deeper into each time management tip.
1. Learn how to manage distractions
The biggest productivity killer is distraction. Every interruption or distraction response from your environment is a productivity disaster. Because every time you get interrupted it takes 5, 10, 30 or more minutes to get back into a workflow.
Here is a list of the main distractions that try to steal your attention:
- the meeting
- The manager and the people are stopping by
- social media
- Instant messaging
- daily news
- conference
- Logistics and waiting time
- Entertainment (TV, games, etc.)
- Smartphones (as a public distraction)
- Power vampires
- worry
By far the best advice for dealing with distractions is to eliminate them before they have a chance to throw you out of your work flow. You have to overcome all distractions and obstacles.
You need to analyze your weak points, set rules to help neutralize the weaknesses, grab the most suitable productivity tools and create a unique system that really works for you. You have to get beyond yourself and the environment you are currently working in.
Put your phone on airplane mode, unplug your computer from the Internet, put a "do not disturb" sign on your office door, and make sure nothing distracts you when you want to do deep work.
It's not that easy to do, but it's hard to be productive if you don't organize yourself and everything around you in a smart way. Also, never rely on your self-discipline, because that's not how you win this game. Think of yourself as the architect of a system that will enable you to be super productive.
2. Work in flow as much as possible
To work in flow, you need to work on a task that is a little outside of your comfort zone, a task that represents a challenge for you, and something that you are naturally good at. Additionally, you need to work with complete focus, without any distractions and interruptions. You should also be well rested and mentally calm.
When you become great at managing distractions, you need to train your brain to work in flow and do deep work. You need to train your attention span and brain power to do more demanding tasks for longer and longer periods of time.
3. Sharpen the saw - Invest in yourself regularly
A very important rule in time management techniques is sharpening the saw. Sharpening the saw means not forgetting to take care of your four bodies – physical, mental, emotional and spiritual.
The more you take care of yourself, the more energy you have for productive work.
For your physical body, exercise, eat healthy, avoid stress and get plenty of sleep.
For your mental body, connect with positive people, love, think optimistically, enjoy everyday life, be grateful, believe in yourself and manage your emotions.
For your mental health, read books, do something new, do some brain exercise, create something artistic, go to a museum, do some math, brush your teeth with your non-dominant arm, brainstorm, meditate, and more. do
For your spiritual life, keep finding and rebuilding your life purpose, give back to the community, be a good person, help others and donate etc. What you give, you will get back.
4. Pursue minimalism and resource-light living
To be completely organized, you should be a fan of minimalism. Try to keep as few things in life as possible. Much like man, thought, word and deed; Material things also take up space, energy and time in your life.
Throw away anything you haven't used in the last three months. Keep as few things as possible. All you need is your brain, happiness, some money in your bank account and stuff in your digital cloud. Remove all waste from your life.
You want to put as many things as possible in the "cloud" - from your music to your movies, documents, software, notes, records and more.
If you have everything in the cloud, even if you lose your device or it breaks, you won't lose anything. You just buy a new device, enter your password and everything will be synchronized.
You can be really productive by organizing your life in the cloud. You can work from anywhere; You are not chained to your personal physical things, etc. All you need to do is make sure your life in the cloud is as fully organized as possible.
You don't want to waste your time looking for files, folders, notes or information. If you have a good system in place, living in the cloud can do wonders for your personal productivity. You can read more here, Why move to the cloud?
5. Track how you spend time
We here at Spica may be biased when it comes to time tracking, creating My Hours, the simplest and most useful time tracker, as well as our time and attendance tool, All Hours; But we've often seen what time tracking can do for individual and team productivity.
A good time tracker gently pushes you to be more productive, enables you to analyze how you spend your time and, on top of that, allows you to better focus on more important tasks.
As the saying goes, you can manage what you measure. By employing time tracking, you have a clear picture of how you spend your time, how much you work on different projects and how much you actually earn.
With the right statistics you can optimize your time better. If you use a time tracker, you'll also tend to use other time management techniques consistently.