Recipe for Success Wednesday: How Good Is Your Time Management?

Recipe for Success Wednesday: How Good Is Your Time Management?

Ever feel like there is just no time. You are busy but are you productive? So often busy people are not great time managers. I hate being busy, but I love being productive. Recently, I personally had to face this challenge. My workout routine had really gone flat and lets just say I was not thrilled with the side effects, especially after Christmas. While I was on track to hit professional goals, personal goals had severely fell to the wayside. My excuse like everyone was TIME. How could I find time to work out?

Well after slapping myself across the face I had to talk to myself. We have to understand when I said I was too busy to work out, I was really saying it was not a priority for me. Busy is a shield we hide behind but the reality is for the last 7 months I was starting a new business. That became the entire priority for me, not my health. If you have personal and professional items you want to tackle, you can accomplish all of your goals.  It just takes great time management. All time management takes is a plan and discipline. If you don’t have these two attributes you won’t succeed.

Here are the steps to take to tackle your goal via time management:

1. Identify what you want to achieve, you have to put a date and measurement to it. For me, I want to be at my target weight and be able to do 10 pull-ups by June 1st.
2. Identify why you want to achieve this. In order to stay with your goal, you need to stay focused on the outcome. For me, its health and I’ve never been able to do pull-ups!
3. Identify what your driving force is, who other than yourself are you doing this for? For me, it is my husband and my clients.  A healthier me means I’m a better person to them.
4. Identify all your goals. Commonly we need to also obtain financial, physical, family and personal goals. You don’t need to pick one at a time, in fact, most of the time they can all play into each other.
5. Tell people, lots and lots of people. The more you talk about your goals the easier it is to eat a salad and not wine for lunch!
6. Tell 3 special people. These special people are here to be your support system. They don’t judge, they support you. If you are off track or need support you call them. So many people would love to help people in this way.
7. Identify what you are willing to be good at rather than great at. This is probably the most important step. I want to say something very controversial here. You can be a good parent, because in the long run if you hit your physical, personal, financial and professional goals you are able to be great. We often think we have to be perfect. We don’t, we need to be awesome. Kids would rather see you happy and healthy rather than stressed, tired and crabby. Make a list of what you are going to let go of. For me it was rebudgeting for a house cleaner, putting my husband in charge of dinner some nights (which can be interesting) and getting up earlier to get started.
8. Plan your week, every week! You need to be efficient with your time. It’s amazing but time is like a Koi fish. It grows to the size you allow it. The same task can take 20 minutes or 1 hour if you let it. Put your goals into your week each and every week. Plan for emergencies and disasters. Make it a priority. For example, if you want to hit selling 50 policies per month, then spend 2 nights calling prospects after hours. When you plan for it you can make it happen. Think about it, if you can make happy hour happen, you make this happen. Plan the following:
   1. Meals
   2. Transportation for kids
   3. Clothing (yes plan your outfits)
   4. Wake up time and bedtime
   5. Quality time with your kids
   6. One quality engagement with a friend
   7. Date night with yourself, we all need time alone
   8. Time with your spouse
9. What is your reward/punishment? For me, if I don’t work out for 7 hours per week I have to make it up on the weekend.
10. Plan your reward when you hit your goal. This helps keep you focused.

Here is the thing, we can make time for anything and everything when it’s a priority. Be honest with yourself.

What are your priorities?  

Now organize your time around it.