VLog #74 – What is Time Management?

Video – VLog #74

What is time management and why is it important?

What are time management skills?

What is an example of time management?

Script – VLog #74

David Logan: Hi and welcome to The Techno Dinosaur Meets The I.T. Geek, number 74 …. seven four.

David Logan: My name is David Logan, the I.T. Geek, the guy who takes the jargon out of technology for you and allows you Techno Dinosaurs use technology before you speak to your grandkids, your nephews, and nieces …. make it easy for you to use.

David Logan: With me today is Willie Nicol, normal suspect, I don’t know where he’s based. So, Willie, how are you and where are you?

Willie Nicol: Thank you David. Yes, the normal suspect. I am Willie Nicol, the Techno Dinosaur – so named because I’m digitally challenged. However, I’m also a personal development life coach who helps people with the stuff in their lives. I’m based in Troon, a very sunny Troon today, in South Ayrshire, Scotland, U.K.

David Logan: Good. You’ll be pleased to know I’m based in Annan, Dumfries, and Galloway, south of Scotland and its red hot down here. I’ll be putting the suntan lotion on shortly. So, you help people with their stuff Willie? I would like a hand. Up to lately I’ve been struggling with time management. I still struggle. I find some tasks don’t get done and I find some stuff that I schedule over runs. How can you help me or others like myself?

Willie Nicol: Well, I can give you a few tips and hints certainly. Time management is quite important to get your work done, or other activities for that matter, and you can go online and find any number of websites that talk about time management, and any number of apps and so on to help you with your time management. But one thing to remember right from the start …. time management is not necessarily about managing your time, it’s about managing yourself, having the discipline to make sure you utilise your time to the most effective manner.

Willie Nicol: So, I’ve done a bit of research to save you doing it and all the viewers out there and I’ll refer to my notes. We all have 24 hours in a day, we’ve all got 24 hours in a day, but it’s how we use it that determines how effective that day’s going to be. Excuse me. So, here are a few tips.

Willie Nicol: Number one, be intentional in your time management. Set your intentions out, create a to-do list. We’ve talked about this before, David, a to-do list as opposed to a will-do list. However, for the sake of today, we’ll call it a to-do list. This is one of the most powerful ways to be as productive as possible. If you keep your list your list of tasks in front of you, you’re less likely to become distracted and you’re more likely to focus on what’s in front of you. If you get distracted, you look at your list and say, “Oh, I need to focus on that”. And there’s also that sense of achievement when you’ve completed the tasks and you can cross it off your list.

Willie Nicol: Another tip is to prioritise your workload, prioritise the work you have to do. After writing a to-do list, prioritise what needs done first or second or third. Once they’re dealt with, you can move on but don’t ignore them.

Willie Nicol: There is, and you can find this online, what we call the Eisenhower Matrix which is based on the working practises of the former U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower. And here’s how it works. If you imagine drawing a square and then splitting it into four quadrants, it doesn’t matter where each quadrant goes.

Willie Nicol: In number one, identify the tasks which are important and urgent, these are the two sides to the coin if you like. So, something that’s important or urgent means you have to do it because it’s important and it needs to be done now. So, for example, if you’ve got a big briefing tomorrow, you have to really focus on that to make sure it gets done. Secondly there may be tasks which are important but not urgent. You have a paper to write for a workshop in two weeks’ time. It’s important you do it but it’s not immediately urgent just now so you can put that one, maybe number two in the list of priorities. There may be number three tasks which appear urgent but are not important, for example, replying to your emails or looking at these texts. This appears to be important but is it urgent? If it’s not urgent it goes in that quadrant, important but not urgent. Lastly, you have tasks that are not important nor urgent. So, you ask yourself, do I need to do these anyway and if you don’t, you bin them.

Willie Nicol: So, that’s the Eisenhower Matrix. Four different quadrants and you allocate your tasks to each quadrant depending on whether it’s important or urgent.

David Logan: Would you say that’s almost like a form of prioritisation doing the four quadrants?

Willie Nicol: Absolutely, yes, prioritise your tasks, right. We talked in a previous vlog about, you know, eating that frog or how do you eat an elephant, right. Eating an elephant is in small chunks and the frog is that unpalatable task but you’ve really got to do it, so you’ve got to eat that frog, yeah?

Willie Nicol: So, prioritisation is really important. Next, be focused of what are the distractions. You know there’s a phone call there, or social media, or maybe I’ll just look at my emails, right? Despite our best intentions, we do get distracted. It happens to me, happens to you, happens to everyone.

Willie Nicol: But what we suggest here is avoid as much as possible being distracted. Apparently, it takes 23 minutes to refocus on a task once we’ve been distracted. So, if you’ve lots of distractions, you’re not going to get a lot of work done productively. Identify the source of these contractions, sorry distractions, and put controls in place. So, switch of the notifications on your phone. For that matter, switch off your phone. Switch off the telly because you don’t want to be watching Netflix and so on and so forth, avoid distractions.

Willie Nicol: Fourthly, they say be “structured”. Have a structure, block off your available time. Now, some people might get, and I’m prone to this, right, that hour there from 9 to 10, I’ll be doing this. From 10 to 11, I’ll be doing that. And so on and so forth. That turns a lot of people off. But you don’t have to be quite that structured. You can be a bit looser. Block off that period of time and decide what you’re going to do then and have a break. Breaks are very important. Block off that period of time for whatever and so on and so forth. You’re more likely to get your tasks done if you have some sort of structure to it.

Willie Nicol: Lastly, be “self-aware”. Track your time. We’ve all heard the phrase, “I lost track of time”, yeah? So, maybe one day or one morning or one afternoon when you’ve got your to-do list, start identifying what you’re spending your time on. Track your time and then you will find out what takes up most of your time, what takes up the least of your time, what’s productive, what’s un-productive and tracking your time can help you to be more effective and productive.

Willie Nicol: So, just to recap – to-do list; prioritise your to-do list using the Eisenhower Matrix or any one of a thousand apps that are out there; be focused; manage your distractions as much as possible; be structured, block off your time into chunks; and finally, track your time and identify where you’re wasting time that you shouldn’t be.

Willie Nicol: Now, time management is a bit dry, but we know that if you get it wrong you don’t get your work done. What does that lead to? Our old friend, stress, anxiety, procrastination and so on, none of which are good. So, just think about doing these time management techniques and you’ll end up minimising your stress, anxiety, and procrastination, getting your work done and feeling a lot better at the end of it.  I hope that’s been of some use.

David Logan: Fantastic Willie. Great, thanks for that summary, brilliant, at the end.

David Logan: To you the viewer, if you’ve got any further questions to Willie, if you want him to tackle your ‘stuff’, drop a comment below or send us a private message, normal stuff.

David Logan: Please share our videos. We want to go wide and far, share to friends, share to colleagues. Search for The Techno Dinosaur Meets The I.T. Geek. I’ll go now but have a great week everybody. One piece of advice I’ll give you …. do not do anything I wouldn’t do! Thank you.

Willie Nicol: David, David, thank you for that. Yes, always remember people, right, we’re here to help. So, until next time, stay safe, stay well. And remember …. have some fun! Bye for now.