Time Management Issues - Essay Example

Time Management I manage a small group of about 10 people and we are part of a larger operation which is in a large multinational corporation. Ido keep my office running on a fairly efficiently so when a seminar was put together by corporate on time management I was not particularly excited. I knew the basics of time management. I maintained an organized calendar and rarely missed deadlines. I never took on more than I could handle and I thought I lived basically a balanced life. However there was a memo which made this day long seminar a mandatory requirement for managers in my department so I there was no option. I definitely hoped that I would pick up some learning from this as I definitely did not want to waste time (that would have been truly ironic if that had happened. I was a tad bit skeptical as the seminar started, but the binder with the learning material caught my eye immediately. To allow oneself to be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns, to surrender to too many demands, to commit to too many projects, to want to help everyone in everything is itself to succumb to the violence of our times. Frenzy destroys our inner capacity for peace. It destroys the fruitfulness of our work, because it kills the root of inner wisdom which makes work fruitful.1 I was slightly taken aback because this seemed highly philosophical. And more importantly, what if I took on too many projects, all of them were properly scheduled and I made sure every hour of my working day counted. As the day went on I realized that this was not just about day planners and to do lists, this was about more than that. Indeed, both day planners and task lists play an important role in time management, but it was important to find out why we wanted to use time efficiently. Indeed if we were saving time what we were saving it for. We certainly could not bank time, so what was the end result there Both managing appointments and keeping to do lists were low hanging fruits. These had to be done anyway. But the purpose of this seminar was to show that there is a lot more to time management. All activities in our life could be put in one of four quadrants. They had to be either urgent and important, urgent and not important, not urgent and important, not urgent and not important. It was not about just getting things done it was getting the things which mattered done. Things which were urgent and important , are emergencies. A good time manager would avoid having too many items in this quadrant. Plan out the important things so that they never become emergencies. Urgent and not important, these are time consuming non critical activities , they either should be ignored or atleast be moved to the back burner. A Ringing phone for example cries for your attention but you are in the middle of an important project. Let the voicemail get it. You can pick up and call all your voicemails at one time later on. Important and not urgent is the quadrant you want all your entire to do list. No emergencies and you are working only important things. Not important and not urgent. These are items which have to be tossed. They serve no purpose at all. After this we briefly went over the POSEC method. POSEC is an acronym. PRIORITIZE-Your time and define your life by goals. ORGANIZING-Things you have to accomplish regularly to be successful. (Family and Finances) STREAMLINING-Things you may not like to do, but must do. (Work and Chores) ECONOMIZING-Things you should do or may even like to do, but they're not pressingly urgent. (Past-times and Socializing) CONTRIBUTING-By paying attention to the few remaining things that make a difference. (Social Obligations)2. It was important to learn that managing was not just about managing individual minutes or hours. It was a big picture which was trying to be put together here consisting of numerous small elements. The numerous small elements in themselves meant nothing unless an overall big picture came into place. Continuing on the philosophy of time management , we made a small detour into Maslow's hierarchy of needs. This proved to be a great illuminator as to what motivates human beings to do anything including spend time on anything. The hierarcy of needs was as follows3. Physiological needs :These are the basic animal needs for such things as food, warmth, sex, water, and other body needs. If a person is hungry or thirsty or his body is chemically unbalanced, all of his energies turn toward remedying these deficiencies, and other needs remain inactive. Safety needs With his physical needs relatively satisfied, the individual's safety needs take over and dominate his behavior. These needs have to do with man's yearning for a predictable, orderly world in which injustice and inconsistency are under control, the familiar frequent, and the unfamiliar rare. In the world of work, these safety needs manifest themselves in such things as a preference for job security, grievance procedures for protecting the individual from unilateral authority, savings accounts, insurance policies, .Love/Belonging/Social needs. After physiological and safety needs are fulfilled, the third layer of human needs is social. This psychological aspect of Maslow's hierarchy involves emotionally-based relationships in general, such as: friendship and sexual intimacy,having a supportive and communicative Humans need to feel a sense of belonging and acceptance, whether it comes from a large social group (such as clubs, office culture, professional organizations, sports teams,) or small social connections (family members, intimate partners, mentors, close colleagues, confidants). They need to love and be loved (sexually and non-sexually) by others. Esteem needs :All humans have a need to be respected, to have self-esteem, self-respect, and to respect others. People need to engage themselves to gain recognition and have an activity or activities that give the person a sense of contribution, to feel accepted and self-valued, be it in a profession or hobby. Self actualization : is the instinctual need of humans to make the most of their abilities and to strive to be the best they can. Working toward fulfilling our potential, toward becoming all that we are capable of becoming. After POSEC , the Hierarchy of needs clearly pointed to a single thing. The goals we set in our life and the time we spend on those things have to be the things which we want to do and be motivated to do. A person who is starving will not think about making a huge donation to a charitable cause. A person who does not have a happy marriage will not necessarily be motivated to win a popularity contest . This does not mean that we will not attempt to spend time on items which are not in the current hierarchy of our needs. But those attempts are doomed to failure as we simply would not be motivated to pursue them. With this the beginning but the most important part of the seminar came to an end. We had to know what we wanted and what was important to us , but also what motivated us. This brought us to the next item on the agenda. What kind of people we were. I was surprised to see that the next section was on Belbin team roles4. I could not quite figure out what Belbin's team roles had to do with time management. Team role is defined as a tendency to behave, contribute and interrelate with others in a particular way. What became apparent is that most of time management is about interacting with other people in the corporate world. And it is important that most of these interactions of part of a larger picture. It is important you figure out what kind of person you are or to be more precise what kind of role you could perform The first role is that of the Co-ordinator. co-ordinator is a person-oriented leader. This person is trusting, accepting, dominant and is committed to team goals and objectives. The co-ordinator is a positive thinker who approves of goal attainment, struggle and effort in others. The co-ordinator is someone tolerant enough always to listen to others, but strong enough to reject their advice. The next role is that of the shaper. The shaper is a task-focused leader who abounds in nervous energy, who has a high motivation to achieve and for whom winning is the name of the game. The shaper is committed to achieving ends and will 'shape' others into achieving the aims of the team. The Plant is the third team role. The plant is a specialist idea maker characterised by high IQ and introversion while also being dominant and original. The plant tends to take radical approaches to team functioning and problems. Plants are more concerned with major issues than with details. The fourth role is that of the resource investigator The resource investigator is the executive who is never in his room, and if he is, he is on the telephone. The resource investigator is someone who explores opportunities and develops contacts. Resource investigators are good negotiators who probe others for information and support and pick up other's ideas and develop them. They are characterised by sociability and enthusiasm and are good at liaison work and exploring resources outside the group. The next role is of the implementer. Implementers are aware of external obligations and are disciplined, conscientious and have a good self-image. They tend to be tough-minded and practical, trusting and tolerant, respecting established traditions. They are characterised by low anxiety and tend to work for the team in a practical, realistic way. Implementers figure prominently in positions of responsibility in larger organisations. They tend to do the jobs that others do not want to do and do them well: for example, disciplining employees. The next role is that of the monitor evaluator. According to the model, this is a judicious, prudent, intelligent person with a low need to achieve. Monitor evaluators contribute particularly at times of crucial decision making because they are capable of evaluating competing proposals. The monitor evaluator is not deflected by emotional arguments, is serious minded, tends to be slow in coming to a decision because of a need to think things over and takes pride in never being wrong. Then there is the team worker. Team workers make helpful interventions to avert potential friction and enable difficult characters within the team to use their skills to positive ends. They tend to keep team spirit up and allow other members to contribute effectively. Their diplomatic skills together with their sense of humour are assets to a team. They tend to have skills in listening, coping with awkward people and to be sociable. sensitive and people oriented. After that we have the complete finisher. The completer finisher dots the i's and crosses the t's. He or she gives attention to detail, aims to complete and to do so thoroughly. They make steady effort and are consistent in their work. They are not so interested in the glamour of spectacular success. Then finally we have the specialist. The specialist provides knowledge and technical skills which are in rare supply within the team. They are often highly introverted and anxious and tend to be self-starting, dedicated and committed. It is important that you know what role you are capable of playing. It is important that you spend most of your time in the role which you are good at. Most likely if you are good at it you probably enjoy it and if indeed you enjoy it you probably will make the most effective usage of time in that role. Conclusion: To be an effective manager of your time you need to figure out what all your long term and short term goals are, and then identify all the tasks which you need to do to get there at the same time avoiding unnecessary tasks and emergencies. One must examine one's motivation and strengths which follows a realization is that the most effective usage of time is usually when that happens. Read More