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I’m far from being the expert on time management, but what I have achieved is an incredible level of efficiency when it comes to blogging. Feel free to check out my guest posts on how to put your wordpress blog on autopilot and 6 tips for efficient blogging.
If you really want to see the best time management articles I’ve come across recently check out Sid Savara’s recent post and Luciano’s post at Litemind. These guys have broken down time management into a much more sophisticated process than I have here. But, I wanted to share with this with you because it’s something I really resonated with.
Yesterday I was on my way back to Los Angeles from my parents house and anytime I’m in the car for more than an hour I will listen to some sort of self help tape. I was listening to Brian Tracy’s tape on goals and he gave one of the simplest time management techniques I’d ever heard. He said “continually ask yourself, is what I’m working on right now the highest value task that I could be working on?” He even recommended printing it up and putting it up on your wall at your desk.
Just by asking myself that question today I’ve found that I’m immediately wasting minimal time on Facebook and focused on my highest value task, which is writing blog posts. Just to give you some idea of how to use this if you are a task master, I’ll give you a break down through an example.
High Value Tasks:
- Writing Blog posts
- Submitting Resumes
- Content Brainstorms/Podcast Edits
Medium Value:
- Comments on other blogs
- Any blog marketing efforts (depending on who you are)
- Calling ATT to lower my cell phone rate
Low Value:
- Facebook status updates
- Tweeting about bull#$$#
- Instant Messaging/Chatting
- Reading email
I think you get the general idea. I love the fact that efficiency is determined by that one simple question. Am I doing what is of the greatest value right now? Try it out for a week and tell me what happens.
{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
As business people, we have to ruthless about how we spend our time.
You may be interested in “Dave Market Quadrant” which you can find very easily using Google search.
Thanks Dave. I will have to check it out. BTW, I haven’t announced yet but I’ve started a new surfing blog. I’ll send you details.
I love it and am going to print it now. I’m taking action, baby!!!!
Hey Srinivas, you are perfectly right about dividing the activities you do, and congratulations for your achievements so far!
@Gordie: I’m glad you found it useful.
@Oscar: I find that dividing tasks is a really great way to focus on things. Right now I have 4-5 task calendars, but I think I’m going to break it down based on this system.
Srini,
I remember listening to those sales tapes when I was a headhunter. Although it’s a great question to ask yourself, sometimes we trick ourselves into thinking (as I did plenty of times) what really is the highest value activity. This gets especially ambiguous when you’re deciding between two different high value activities in different areas of your life: between family and work, for example. Also, sometimes activities which we think are high value, (making sales calls, for example) aren’t high value because if we aren’t meant to be a salesperson, obviously the higher value activity is to look for another job or learn new a new skill.
It’s a good rule of thumb, but sometimes it can get you going in the wrong direction.
Kenji,
Those are all great points. Obviously if you are headed down the wrong path (i.e. making sales calls when you don’t even want to be in sales), then definitely this question can possibly do more harm than good. That being said I have found a tremendous increase in productivity through using this method.
Recently, I got out of the habit of asking myself this question but since I feel like I’m on a better path than I was before I can see how this would be useful for me. Thanks for the reminder.