Time Management in the Workplace

Time Management in the Workplace. Good Employee Time Management at Work is essential – there are many time-killers that can and should be avoided. What are time-killers? Unproductive black holes that gradually drain your time and energy away.

To achieve good time management at work, identify the greatest timekillers and get rid of them!

Which are the greatest time-killers?

Time Management at Work: Communication

Writing and sending emails, chatting on the phone, writing memos, leaving voice mails – unnecessary communication is the greatest time killer of all.

Employee Time Management: Dealing with voice mail

Get people to talk to you in person instead of leaving voice mails – this is especially true for the colleagues you see everyday!

Use email instead of voicemail, especially for long messages – people tend to ramble when they use voicemail, especially when they have yet to structure their thoughts clearly. Email helps a little by forcing them to at least structure their thoughts in writing.

Employee Time Management: Speak to the person directly, instead of using memos

Whenever possible, speak to the person directly instead of writing memos. It is not only much faster; you will also get to increase your personal interaction with your employees!

Employee Time Management: Do not give your cell phone number to everyone

For work purposes, it is wise to get two cell phones (or at least two SIM cards) – one for work and one for personal calls.

With your personal phone, be very selective as to who should get your cell phone number. Anyone who has your cell phone number can call you at any time, including at the most inconvenient hours. One advantages of this is that when you are not at work, all you have to do is to switch off the cellphone you use for work.

Time Management in the Workplace: Meetings

You probably would not be able to avoid meetings altogether, but you can always make them efficient. Follow the following basic principles.

Employee Time Management: Always have an agenda

Having an agenda is crucial – meetings without an agenda tend to be very poorly focused and extremely time inefficient. Without an agenda, the group tends to launch into irrelevant side conversations all too often, prolonging the meeting length without good cause.

Make sure that the finalized agenda is available at least two hours before the meeting, and ensure that everyone reads through it carefully before attending the meeting.

Employee Time Management: Meetings are usually most efficient the earlier in the day they are

The earlier in the day they are held, the less distracted people will be. They will not be thinking about where to go for dinner, what to do after dinner, and so on.

Employee Time Management: Always set a time limit for meetings

Meetings tend to continue forever if you do not set a definite time limit. Review the agenda and estimate the amount of time required. Make sure everyone at the meeting is aware of the time limit, and appoint a timekeeper to update everyone on the time left as each agenda item is covered.

Benefits of Good Time Management at Work

With good time management in the workplace, you build a positive work environment for success. Everyone will feel more motivated by the buzz of high energy and high efficiency – watch as the team’s productivity and performance increase!

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