The 80/20 Rule
TIME MANAGEMENT AND THE 80/20 RULE
SCOTT AND JONI HAMMOND IN PORTLAND OREGON'S ROSE GARDEN
Time management—
We all possess valuable resources, but none is trickier or more valuable than time. Managing your time is THE key skill set in managing your life. Show me what you do with your time and I’ll show you what your value system is all about. When leveraging time you will utilize and expand on core strength. If you can manage your time well you can accomplish almost anything. Using time incrementally, methodically, and strategically will help you stay on track and achieve your life priorities.
Personal productivity is only as limited as your proper use of time. Wise use of time maximizes and leverages all resources and helps you achieve your goals, objectives, and priorities. Good time management allows you to plan ahead and to use your purpose and passion with laser focus—nothing becomes impossible. Your productivity, as you leverage your passion through good time management, increases exponentially resulting in compelling accomplishment.
“Plan your work, then work your plan” is a great axiom. The “work your plan” part has to do with time management. Planning is great, but is useless without execution. Time management is all about the execution of your plans, goals, passions, and objectives.
Time management can be leveraged through productivity systems and good planning.
The 80-20 rule is evidence of this…. You accomplish about 80% of your results from 20% of your work. The key here is to find your personal “prime time” then leverage that time in the most productive way possible. To schedule around your 20% “prime time”, where you are most productive and efficient is the key to leveraging time, productivity, and accomplishment. For most people their prime time is in the morning. This is the time to get all of your core work accomplished. This key time is to be secured and set aside as the valuable commodity it truly is. Prime work time should be scheduled on a daily basis and should have compelling content at its core. Planning, goal setting, reviewing, communicating, executing initiatives, key meetings, key document creation, and much more are all the key elements of utilizing your prime time window.
Procrastination and its opposite workaholism are both dysfunction to avoid. Our society allows for both to its detriment. It takes discipline and self control to avoid the dysfunction of workaholism and over commitment and the sickness and the result they produce. The same can be said of procrastination—we are to avoid it like the plague. It all starts with analysis and admission and truly owning our own poor habits.
The idea here is to have a balanced life. This begins with healthy relationships and healthy personal spirit. Living your life in balance and alignment starts with living your priorities. The piece and congruity that results is compelling. A life lived well, living your priorities, and being able to have fun productivity that energizes you is a compelling work style/lifestyle.
The Covey idea of sharpening your saw and resting so you can work more efficiently is the key. A life lived in balance with family, work, community, friendships, and personal fulfillment is truly a productive life.
It all starts at time management, personal discipline, and self-control. Just do it.
Time management is—
The definition of Time management is a set of skills, tools, and systems that work together to help you get more value out of your time and leverage it to accomplish what you want.
Learning time management will do the following:
Give a personal definition of time management, and how you can use it
Help you know the signs that you’re off-track
Help you know the signs that you are on the right track
Help you know what your focus should be on
You know you’re on the right track when—
Your customers, boss, family and peers praise your accomplishments.
You meet your sales, personal, or family goals and have a positive performance
You are often considered for additional responsibility and special projects.
You feel good about your work and family and are energized by them.
You know you’re off-track, when—
You’re working really hard, and little is being accomplished
You’re not meeting your sales, personal, business, or family goals
People around you complain about you
You’re the only one who seems to think you’re doing a great job.
You’re always putting out fires
You’re spending a lot of his time socializing and complaining
Eight most common time wasters—
Lack of planning
Lack of priorities
Over commitment
Management by crisis
Haste
Paperwork and reading e-mail
Routine tasks
The telephone
How to combat procrastination—
Accept that procrastination is common, and that you are not unique
Fearing failure is absolutely normal… we often procrastinate because we fear failure
If you find you tend to procrastinate in certain situations… face them head on
Never choose low priority work in front of high priority work
Control your socializing at work
Schedule start time as well, as the finished time for your work being planned
Adopt single handling thinking. Touch it wants. You’ll pick up one job only and only put it down when it’s finished. Multitasking is a myth…
We should focus on activities that—
Contribute to your customer, family, stakeholders success and satisfaction
Booster personal productivity and performance
Support your family or organization’s strategic vision and goals
Time management tips—
Know and use your calendar or Daytimer
Prioritize demands on your time
Keep your priority list in front of you
Keep checking your progress with time management.
Stockpile work or questions, and to schedule says its time work on them. Only work on things in your scheduled to do so.
Seek support when you need it— delegate
Develop techniques that help you when in a unique situation
Pick a morning or an evening to work when no one is around and get organized. Order creates less stress and helps focus
Spend a few minutes at the end of the day putting everything in its home base and getting ready for the next day. Remember… trash it, act on it, refer it, or file it away.
10. Keep yourself motivated.
More tips for time management—
Making a commitment that you’ll measure time more efficiently to be the best promise you ever make to yourself. In the long run, you’ll be glad you did. Here are some tips that may help to some move your way to a little more time efficient life. You may even find that after you get the hang of it, you’ll have more free time!!
Manage your availability— in which coworkers know when you are available to help them and when you’re not.
Learn to prioritize—one of the most important things you can do in your search for more time. Prioritize your commitments. If you belong to any organizations that are turned into obligations, just give up your membership. There is not enough time to spend on doing things which aren’t that important to you.
Make all your calls in the morning—this is when people are most likely to be available. Then, block off the rest of your day on interrupted work.
Schedule time every week to take care of your filing—take time every week to get your filing done and keep up the organizing and purging of your files. This will go a long way to help you stay on top of your job responsibility. The get and stay organized.
Create an activity log—keep a detailed personal activity log for several days to determine how you’re actually using your time. See where you’re spending too much and not enough time.
Control your busywork—it’s not always easy to admit that sometimes we allow ourselves to get immersed in busywork. Focus on the job at hand and don’t let meaningless tasks consume your precious time.
Create a system for yourself—no one knows your schedule better than you do. Incorporate simple and effective systems in your life that help you do what must be done on a daily basis so that you actually can get things accomplished. Get a routine and form positive habits.
Don’t bite off more than you can chew—break up big projects into manageable pieces. Divide your projects and concentrate on one part at a time. Gradual progress and growth is the best practice.
Never forced the finishing of a project, if it can be helped—there’s no point in force yourself to finish a job when you’re not making any headway. Switch to another project in the new challenge will refresh and renew your mind so that you can return to the original job. You will then feel ready to complete it.
10. Plan ahead—this tip will eliminate the procrastination and ensure higher productivity. Estimate how long a job will take. Then at about one third more time. Then count the number of days back from the deadline, and set that as your defining starting point…Hot tip!
11. .Learn what is urgent, versus what is important—there is a tremendous difference. Too often we respond to the urgent and forfeit the necessary. In other words, things that demand our media attention usurp what is necessary. By contrast, important tasks might not require an instant response, but they necessitate important activities that will keep you on track in achieving your goals. Be wary of the Tyranny of the Urgent!
12. Under promise and over deliver—this is a very old axiom, but nonetheless very true. Never promised too much; you’re more likely to disappoint people. Instead, with all things, under promise and over deliver. People will be pleasantly surprised when you’re done more than originally planned.
Five ways to improve productivity—
There is so much happening and less and less time to handle of all these days. Learning how to increase your productivity could give you the edge you need to get it all done. The idea of getting it all done is nebulous at best.
Do we ever truly get it all done?
To think that we could have it completely whipped is a fallacy and a dangerous life paradigm. Could you get at least some of it done? It is possible…. here are a few ways and strategies that can increase your productivity:
Schedule your time for work—be consistent. Don’t do personal things in your schedule to work. Make it to do list and prioritize your tasks. A list is often more effective for those of us need to consult a reference or see it in writing. When you’ve completed a task, cross off your list. You get a real sense of completion in satisfaction as you see your list getting shorter and shorter.
Do the most difficult, time-consuming, least favorite jobs first— do the first things first. Do the hardest task at hand when you have the most energy and motivation to tackle the project. If you tackle the toughest job first, the rest of your tasks will seem that much easier.
Do not allow yourself to get interrupted by other people’s emergencies or drama—be able to say No. Learn to have boundaries. Learn to say no and a polite but firm way. Be professional, kind and understanding, but also be ready to use the most famous boundary word of them all: NO.
Organize your files—set up the system right from the beginning. Don’t reinvent the wheel. Use a Daytimer for scheduling. Have a 31 day and 12 month filing system. You can have technology, but don’t let technology have you. Do not reinvent the wheel. An ordered space will allow you to be less stressed.
Organize your workspace—the better organized and efficient your workspace, the more efficient you will be in time management. The time it takes you to search through out all your piles of paper or to remember where you put that file could be spent in working on new projects. Put the things you use most on your desktop and always put them back in the same place when you’re done. Keep a file organizer on your desk for current projects, so they are always at your finger tips. Have clearly delineated places for everything.