What is time management?
Time management at work means taking measures to manage your staff’s time in the workplace more effectively. It can include planning tasks for employees that need to be completed in a set timeframe, prioritising certain tasks over others, or delegating duties to various team members according to their strengths.
Poor time management can lead to missed deadlines and disgruntled customers or stakeholders, which will eventually lead to a loss of income. Strong time management strategies are therefore an essential part of any successful workplace.
Related: Help your employees achieve better results with a Performance Improvement Plan.
Benefits of managing time at work
The advantages of successful time management at work are many. Let’s take a look at the most important ones:
Less stress
Employees who feel in control of their workload are less likely to become overwhelmed and take time off sick but will feel more relaxed, which is always a plus.
Increased productivity
The more relaxed your staff are, the more productive they will be, as they can fully focus on their assigned tasks and responsibilities without needing to worry about missing an important deadline.
Faster results
If processes are more streamlined and everyone knows exactly which part of the process they need to complete and by when, your business will likely achieve results faster and reach milestones more quickly, which will please customers and stakeholders alike.
Better quality
Not only will your team deliver results faster, but if everyone’s time is managed effectively, the quality of those results is also likely to be better, as every staff member can focus better on the job at hand instead of worrying about running out of time.
Pleasant working environment
Worrying about time pressure creates stress. And when everyone is stressed, tensions can rise and tempers can flare. So, when you remove time pressure and help your staff manage their time, this will boost collaboration within the team and contribute to a pleasant atmosphere in your workplace.
Related: How to Manage Employees
Ten practical time management tips
Let’s look at ten hands-on strategies that will help you teach your staff how to manage time more effectively:
1) Plan
As with most things, a haphazard approach is more likely to cost you precious time. It’s well worth spending some time to create a plan of actions and deliverables you want to achieve, and by when, and set up a list with important deadlines for internal and external stakeholders.
You may want to make this a shared document that all staff can easily access and update to make sure everyone is on the same page and knows exactly at what stage everyone else is in their work.
2) Prioritise
Naturally, not all jobs are equally important. Some tasks are more urgent than others. Determine what can wait and what needs to be tackled as a matter of urgency. And make sure you clearly communicate this to your staff!
You can also encourage each employee to make a list of what they need to complete by a certain deadline, and therefore create their own priority list each day. If this is a standard practice in your workplace, all staff will quickly get used to it and end up working more efficiently.
3) Delegate
Take stock of who on your team is especially skilled in what area, and delegate tasks to them accordingly to play to their strengths. This will make everyone more effective and get things done quicker.
Also encourage a cooperative culture in which your employees feel comfortable asking for help and delegating tasks to others if they feel they are struggling or cannot finish in the required timeframe.
4) Eat that frog
Don’t worry; you won’t be asking your staff to consume an actual frog! ‘Eat that frog’ is a concept that encourages people to tackle the most dreaded or difficult task first. We’re often tempted to put off tasks that seem overwhelming or unpleasant, but by ‘eating that frog’, the important work will get done first before moving on to the next, perhaps more enjoyable task.
5) Pomodoro Method
The Pomodoro Method is a popular technique for managing time that incorporates regular breaks into the working day. A timer goes off at set intervals to remind the worker when it’s time for the designated break.
For example, your employees might want to dedicate 25 minutes to focused working and then schedule a five-minute break for every 25 minutes worked. Others might prefer to work for a 50-minute period and then take a 10-minute break.
The great thing is that the Pomodoro Method can be customised to suit each person’s preferences. Applying it will give your staff a sense of control over their time and not only lead to highly productive bursts of work but also ensure regular breaks to enable them to stretch and re-energise.
6) Encourage active breaks
Speaking of breaks, it’s crucial that you remind your staff to consciously take regular breaks throughout the day. Spending the entire day at a desk and even gobbling down lunch without getting up and moving around or getting fresh air is very counterproductive. After a while, concentration will suffer and the work will likely contain some errors that would have been avoided after a refreshing break.
Don’t encourage a culture where staff spend their breaks and lunchtime at their desk, thinking they’re being productive. Perhaps set up a ping-pong table or basketball hoop to encourage everyone to get up and be active for a few minutes before getting stuck back into their work.
7) Remove distractions
Distractions are always an issue, but there are some simple ways to remove as many as possible in your organisation. For one, make your working environment as calm and focused as possible. Remove any TVs or other public screens with distracting content (such as a news channel playing all day long), and think twice if you want to allow the radio or other music to be played in your offices.
Unnecessary meetings can also be incredibly distracting if they disrupt an employee’s workflow. So, if you schedule team meetings, make sure they are as short and productive as possible.
8) Discourage multitasking
It’s true; we often think that multitasking is a fantastic way to get more done more quickly. But it turns out that that’s a fallacy, and doing more than one task at the same time actually slows us down. Research has shown that our brain can only handle one thing at a time, and when we try to do more, we lose focus. Share those studies with your staff and encourage them to avoid multitasking wherever possible.
9) Track time
Our perception of how we spend our time can often differ quite significantly from reality. We may think we’re especially productive but have actually not achieved all that much on our to-do list. Time trackers are a helpful tool that can help everyone, managers or staff, to avoid falling into this trap.
Time trackers can be downloaded onto computers and help workers track every activity, including lunch breaks, phone calls and meetings, to get a clear overview of how much time is spent working effectively and identify where there is potentially wasted time. The data gathered through a time tracker can help employers motivate staff by offering rewards if time-wasting activities are cut down.
10) Positive reinforcement
If you feel your employees are managing their time particularly well, tell them! Positive reinforcement is always a good idea. Staff who feel recognised and appreciated will be more likely to continue performing well. So, if you praise certain time management strategies, your team will feel encouraged to carry on implementing them and keep performing well.
Try implementing some or all of these strategies and monitor how much your staff’s performance will improve.
Related: Tell your staff how they are doing through a dedicated Employee Evaluation Form.
Which of these ten tips for time management will you implement first? Start with one or two, or go all in and introduce them all. Your staff will thank you – and your customers and stakeholders too! You’ll reap the benefits in no time.
