Time management strategies Seaway NExT Workshop April 23, 2010

Time management strategies

Seaway NExT WorkshopApril 23, 2010

Setting the stage

“Why is it that as we develop more things to save us time, we end up with less time to do things?”

– Geico junk mail

“Time? What time do you think we have?” – Saruman, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

Problem

• I feel like I don’t really have any time to manage!

• I don’t seem to have much choice about what to do at any given time.

• This predicament is not uncommon, apparently.

• The tyranny of the urgent

The changing nature of work

Primary reference: Getting Things Done by David Allen

It’s harder to know when we’re done with a task now.

Eg. Chopping woodWhen are you done ...preparing a lecture?

...doing research?

...with a service commitment?

The nature of work is CONSTANT CHANGE

• “I often ask in my seminars, `Which of you are doing only what you were hired to do?’ Seldom do I get a raised hand.

• “The organizations we’re involved with seem to be in constant morph mode,... These ... shake up structures, forms, roles, and responsibilities.”

• “Little seems clear for very long anymore, as far as what our work is...”

—David Allen

Do these statements apply to math professors?

Questions

How can I keep email under control?How do I process and track all the items coming to my attention?How can I avoid distractions?Can time-management systems really work? Or do they just make me feel better?Are the systems designed in a way that will work

for math professors?Should I manage work and personal life

separately?

Questions

Doesn’t time management take a lot of time?Why should I care? Is time management worth the effort?Should I make a to-do list? (What if I do and it has hundreds of items?)Is it important to prioritize tasks?Should I make a daily/weekly schedule?What if I’m a perfectionist? How can I finish anything?

Questions

What kind of goals should I make?How can I get motivated to stay on track with

time management?What is the philosophy behind time

management?How can I overcome procrastination?

Dealing with the inbox

“Control your time. If you’re working off your in-box, you’re working off the priorities of others.”

—Donald Rumsfeld (RUMSFELD’S RULE #57)

One huge issue is the amount of information 1) being presented to us and 2) available for us to use.

“How much available data could be relevant to doing those projects `better’? The answer is, an infinite amount, easily accessible,... through the Web.” —Allen

e-mail

“Not emptying your in-basket is like having garbage cans that nobody ever dumps—you just have to keep buying new ones to hold all your trash.”

“The in-basket ... is the best that many people can do in terms of organization—at least they know that somewhere in there is a reminder of something they still have to do. Unfortunately, that safety net gets lost when ... the inventory of e-mails gets to extensive to be viewed on one screen.” —David Allen

Get “in” to empty

The inbox is just to hold emails until you can process them.

Process all emails in your inbox regularly.“Process” does not mean “finish” what’s in each

email, but decide what to do with it and route it accordingly.

I have a number of subfolders in my inbox.Whatever I can’t deal with right away, I route to

one of these.

Partitioning the inboxThis has been really helpful!It’s much easier to manage my email and find important items.But—I usually don’t quite get “in” empty.

Problem: This approach to email does not really work as intended unless the inbox is regularly emptied all the way.

Inboxes

Def. Any place where a person receives work or other information is an inbox.

Inboxes are crucial in the Getting Things Done system.• Know where all your inboxes are.• Minimize the number of inboxes.• Don’t try to keep incoming information in your head.

Write it down and put it in an inbox.• Empty your inboxes regularly

My “collection buckets”Shoebox on Grandpa Wehrenberg standPile on ledge in dining roomFiling tray on island in kitchenSUNY Fredonia email inboxYahoo email inboxMath dept. mailboxOffice listHome desk listDownstairs listOffice—on radiatorPaper in walletFront door mail slotBig box in dining room

Inboxes

Problem: To be part of an effective system, these inboxes all need to be processed and emptied regularly.

I empty some of mine, but others I don’t empty all the way, and on some I don’t even come close.

This points to an even more fundamental question about time management.

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BEEZ SCHELL, PHDJENNIFER COSTA

Time Management Part II

Assessment Time

Managing Interruptions

What kinds of interruptions do you encounter in your daily life?

What kinds are the most common?What kinds of interruptions are the most

distracting?How much time do you lose in a day with

interruptions?

Managing Interruptions (con’t)

How do you manage interruptions? Plan for them by planning your reaction

Take a message and get back to the person Let the phone go to voicemail Ask a colleague to interrupt if they see you getting

interrupted by a non-business passerby Always maintain a high level of customer service and

don’t make the interrupter feel like they are an inconvenience or interruption

Managing interruptions should not lead to procrastination

My advice

Close your email program!Also, beware of instant messaging and the like.

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Can time management work?

Good news: There are time management systems that do seem to help quite a bit in using time efficiently.

Larger problem: Some of the systems don’t work very well unless you apply them carefully and fully, exactly as specified.

“Most people don’t have a really complete system, and they get no real payoff...” —D. Allen

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Is it all about feelings?

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Time Management Part I

Assessment Time

Why do we need to manage our time?

Make us more effective and efficient

Helps us function efficiently and effectively under intense pressure

Helps us to control workload

Can eliminate stressOthers?

The time factor

Problem: Time management takes time!David Allen calls for a Next actions list, a

Projects list, a Maybe/Someday list, and a Waiting for list.

When going through an inbox, if an item will take less than two minutes to complete, he advises to do it right away because keeping track of the item on an action list would take about 2 minutes.

What if you have hundreds of such items?back

Perfectionism

“This is the problem of perfectionism. We stop ourselves from engaging in those tasks that move us forward in our abilities because we spend too much time focusing on the small decisions instead of the big decisions.”

—Peg Boyle Single, Demystifying the Dissertation

Sometimes... but I can also spend too much time focusing on the big decisions!



Assessment Time

Clarifying Your Goals

What you want to achieve across your lifetime: Career, family, social,

community, etc.Large ones first (5-10

years) Then break into smaller

goalsPositive statementsPrioritizeWrite them downBe specific

Be realisticRelate to performance –

not outcomeCelebrate achieved

goalsBe flexible and willing

to adjust your plan

Be SMART with your goal setting

S - specificM - measurableA - attainableR - relevantT – time bound



Assessment Time

Scheduling

The process by which you look at the time you have, and plan how you will use it to achieve the goals you have identified. By using a schedule effectively, you can: Have a realistic understanding of what you can

achieve with the time you have available Plan to make the best use of the time available Allocate ample time for things you absolutely must

do Reserve contingency time to handle 'the

unexpected’ Minimize or eliminate stress by avoiding over-

commitment

Scheduling (con’t)

Scheduling is most effective if done on a regular basis – i.e. at the beginning of each week. The following steps from www.mindtools.com can help you in preparing your schedule:

1. Start by identifying the time you want to make available for your work. This will depend on the design of your job and on your personal goals in life.


2. Next, block in the actions you absolutely must take to do a good job. These will often be the things you are assessed against.

For example, if you manage people, then you must make time available for coaching, supervision, and dealing with issues that arise. Similarly, you must allow time to communicate with your boss and key people around you. (While people may let you get away with 'neglecting them' in the short-term, your best time management efforts will surely be derailed if you do not set aside time for those who are important in your life.)


3. Review your To Do List, and schedule in the high-priority, urgent activities, as well as the essential maintenance tasks that cannot be delegated and cannot be avoided.


4. Next, block in appropriate contingency time. You will learn how much of this you need by experience. Normally, the more unpredictable your

job, the more contingency time you need. The reality of many people's work is of constant

interruption: Studies show some managers getting an average of as little as six minutes

uninterrupted work done at a time.

Obviously, you cannot tell when interruptions will occur. However, by leaving space in your schedule, you give yourself the flexibility to rearrange your schedule to react effectively to urgent issues.


5. What you now have left is your "discretionary time": the time available to

deliver your priorities and achieve your goals. Review your Prioritized To Do List and personal goals, evaluate the time needed to achieve these actions, and schedule them in.


What happens if you get to Step 5 and have no discretionary time left over?

Revisit the assumptions you made in Steps 1-4 Can anything be delegated? Outsourced? Abbreviated? Automated through technology?

Review personal goals and to do list – Are they realistic? Can they be achieved in the time you have allotted? Are things being treated as more important than they

really are?

Hold on...

David Allen argues that scheduling of this type is completely impractical in today’s workplace.

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Assessment Time

Prioritization

Prioritizing what needs to be done is key!Without prioritization?

Your most important goals may not get achieved because you’re spending your time working on less important, lower valued tasks.

Prioritization is more than just a to-do list A to-do list is a collection of tasks that need to be

accomplished – SO -- In order to be effective these tasks need to be

prioritized based on strategic importance

Tools to Help You Prioritize

Activity logs help you analyze how you actually spend your time

Prioritized To Do Lists List all of the things you need to do with the most

important on top and the least important on the bottom

Action Priority Matrix a diagramming technique to help you choose which

tasks to prioritize and which ones to drop

Urgent/Important Matrix helps distinguish and prioritize between urgent and

important

Hold on....

“ ‘Setting priorities’ in the traditional sense of focusing on your long-term goals and values, ... Does not provide a practical framework of a vast majority of the decisions and tasks you must engage in day to day.”

—David Allen

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Perfectionism

Prop. Perfectionism is the #1 enemy of effective time management.

(for me anyway!)Any other candidates for #1 enemy?Theorem. It’s impossible for anyone to manage

his or her time perfectly.Proof. We’re human!

Advice

Lemma. You can’t finish something if you don’t start it.

If you want to finish a task, start it NOW!Furthermore, do a sloppy job!(You can always revise and improve it later.)“The challenge is to lower our standards. We

need to put words on the page so that we can revise and raise our writing up to our standards.”

—Peg Boyle Single, Demystifying the Dissertationback



Assessment Time

Time Management Mantra

According to mindtools.com – “At the heart of time management is an important shift in focus:

Concentrate on results, not on being busy

Many people spend their days in a frenzy of activity, but achieve very little, because

they’renot concentrating their effort on the things

that matter the most.”



Assessment Time

How to beat procrastination

1) Recognize you do it Putting things off? Do minor tasks for

others first?2) Figure out “why”

Unpleasant? Overwhelming?

3) Getting over it Unpleasant?

What motivates you? Reward yourself Peer pressure

Overwhelming? Break down into

smaller tasks Focus on small

successes

Because I want to get my stuff done…

Video10-Minute Rule

Overwhelmed? Break down ‘big’ jobs 5-10 minutes to

complete3 Magical Questions

Where are you? What do you want to do? How will you feel when

done? This practice can get

you going on the task…

Ultimate Goal vs. Immediate Desire I want now? I want later?

Example of small tasks…

Conclusion

“So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us."

—Gandalf, The Fellowship of the Ring

Documents

Time management strategies Seaway NExT Workshop April 23, 2010