You Can't Manage Time!

First in a three-part series, from Susan de la Vergne’s soon-to-be-released book, You CAN’T Manage Time – But You CAN Manage Many Priorities

 

What’s the Problem Here?

Everyone, it seems, shares this problem: Too much to do, too little time. Regular demands of the job, emergencies at work, time needed at home, in the community, chores, errands. There must be a way of getting more done, we think, so we cruise the Internet looking for solutions – classes, books, tools, support groups, something!

There we find “time management” tools, techniques and courses all aimed at solving the problem of “managing time” – as if you could actually do that: Manage time.

But you can’t. That’s right. You can’t manage time!

There is nothing you can do with time. You can’t extend it, you can’t make it last longer, and you can’t shorten it. You can’t save up time to use later when you need it or spend it faster than it comes to you (not that I can imagine anyone would really want to do that very often). Time proceeds at exactly the same pace, every day, week, month, year, decade. It never slows down, never speeds up, and it won’t respond to you no matter how you try to manage it.

No, there is nothing you can do with time except live in it.

So if you can’t manage time, then what can you manage to help you get more done?

You manage creativity. You manage communication. You manage energy. You manage yourself.

That means optimizing your energy and creativity and deepening your understanding of the circumstances that put you in the middle of managing many, often conflicting, priorities.

Efficiency Opportunities

How well do you know yourself? Can you answer these questions?

• When are you most creative?

• How do you boost your own creativity?

• When does your attention span expire?

• Do you sweat the details? Should you?

• What doesn’t stress you out (that does stress out others)?

• What do you know you spend too much time on, or not enough?

All of these represent opportunities to improve your personal efficiency.

Simply put, Efficiency Opportunities are:

• Recognizing the ways you don’t optimize your time and energy …

• Knowing the ways you personally can and should optimize time and energy …

• ... and doing so!

Recommendation

Here’s one idea: Take advantage of your best hours. Rather than doing anything whenever or as soon as it hits you, try to take advantage of your most creative and energetic hours of the day. If you’re not optimizing your talents well, consider rearranging your schedule a bit so you do your hardest work when you’re “on,” when your creativity is at its peak.

Are you a night owl or a morning person? Jeff Davidson in his book Complete Idiot’s Guide to Getting Things Done is one of many researchers and writers who says a normal cycle looks like this:

10 a.m. – noon: You’re at your maximum mental skills

 Noon: The dip in energy and effectiveness begins

 3:00 p.m.: Alertness returns

Start working on a difficult, long or otherwise intimidating assignment when you’re at your best, not when you’re dog-tired and have nothing left to give. If you’re a morning person, use the morning hours to your advantage. If a morning person waits until the sun is well on its way to the horizon, that intimidating assignment will take a lot longer to do.

Next time: The Productivity Pillagers™ - the four most widely acknowledged challenges to productivity among today’s professionals!
 

Managing Many Priorities