I love time management tips. And when I find a list of ten, twenty, or fifty time management tips, I feel like I’m on cloud nine. With all of those tips, there has to be something on there that will help me be even more productive.
But as much as I love those long lists, I also know they have their downsides.
It’s like being at a buffet. Everything looks so good, and you want to try it all. So you get a little of this, and a little of that. Problem is that you have so little of everything that you can’t truly savor any one thing.
And if you try to adopt too many of the time management tips on a long, tempting list, chances are you won’t get the full benefits of any one method.
This is why I put a few guidelines in place for when I come across one of those big lists of tips.
Just One
First, I can only try one tip at a time.
Just one.
So I look over the list and try to pick the tip that I find most interesting. Which tip do I think will help me the most? Which one sends an enthusiastic shiver up my spine? (I believe a time management method has a better chance of working for you if you’re excited about using it.)
Give It Time
Once I pick one tip, I commit to it. And until I get used to utilizing this new method (or I decide it just isn’t for me and abandon it), I don’t add anything new to my time management system.
Like a new skill, a new time management method will take practice to learn. Just because a method doesn’t work all that well for me at first doesn’t mean it never will. So I give myself time to get used to the method. For something simple, that can take just a week or two. For something more complex, it can take a month or more.
Only when I feel I’ve gotten the hang of using one tip do I consider adopting another.
When you come across a big list of time management tips, it’s natural to want to try several things on the list. But don’t. Instead, pick just one tip to give a test drive.
And save that list. Because once you get the hang of using the first tip, it’ll be time to choose another.
If you wrote an article about your favorite time management tips, which ones would be on your list?
