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    100 Things You Need to Know: Time Management: For Students and New Professionals
    100 Things You Need to Know: Time Management: For Students and New Professionals
    100 Things You Need to Know: Time Management: For Students and New Professionals
    Ebook126 pages1 hour

    100 Things You Need to Know: Time Management: For Students and New Professionals

    By Mary Crane

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    About this ebook

    The moment you start work, time management skills become critical to your success. Unfortunately, your formal education has done little to prepare you for this challenge. Remember following a semester syllabus? Those days have ended. Now “completely unpredictable” best describes your typical workday. You constantly confront changing priorities, loads of disruptions, and multiple supervisors, all of whom impose a deadline of “yesterday.”

    If you now find yourself seriously pressed for time, you've come to the right resource. Mary Crane has developed a list of the 100 most important things you need to know to manage your time effectively in easy to absorb, almost tweetable chunks.

    You can't know everything. But tackle the "100 Things You Need to Know" about time management, and you'll make the best use of your time at home and work.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBookBaby
    Release dateMar 31, 2015
    ISBN9780989066471
    100 Things You Need to Know: Time Management: For Students and New Professionals

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      Book preview

      100 Things You Need to Know - Mary Crane

      projects.

      Chapter 1

      Know When You Work Best

      Plenty of people will tell you there is one right way to manage your time. I’m not one of them. Individuals are far too unique for me to believe that a single time management system works for everyone.

      Still, I do believe that people are most successful when they play to their individual strengths. In the context of time management, this means you must understand your own circadian rhythm. Once you’ve identified your peak performance hours, you can start to tackle your most difficult tasks during those periods.

      In addition to knowing when you work best, you must understand how you currently allocate your time at work. Most likely, your days are filled with three major types of activities: important assignments that can propel your career forward; predictable, routine tasks; and uncontrollable, nonroutine activities (aka last-minute emergencies). People who succeed maximize the hours and minutes they devote to career-enhancing activities.

      It may seem counterintuitive, but to really get ahead, sometimes you need to stop working altogether. Research has identified restorative sleep as the number one factor in brain health and resilience. Want to be a superachiever? Then, know when to work hard…and when to give it a break.

      1. Know your circadian rhythm

      Each of us possesses a biological clock that affects our mental and physical behavior. A function of the brain’s hypothalamus, it responds to darkness by releasing melatonin. Want to know what causes you to start to feel drowsy once the sun begins to set? That’s melatonin at work. The same hormone causes your body temperature and blood pressure to increase during daylight hours.

      Your circadian rhythm drives your internal clock, the built-in day that adjusts to your whereabouts. This explains why you awake at approximately the same time each day, with or without an alarm clock. It also explains the late-afternoon slump you may experience daily, the one that no double espresso can alleviate. If you frequently hop time zones, it’s the disruption of your circadian rhythm that explains the sluggishness you feel until your internal body clock resets.

      Successful professionals align their work schedules with their circadian rhythms. Doing so enhances their productivity and efficiency. It also produces a positive mental state akin to flow—a feeling that mind and body operate with clarity and focus.

      Beyond optimum work performance, you should synchronize your work habits with your circadian rhythm for one additional important reason: scientists now believe that major disruptions in one’s circadian rhythm can contribute to significant health problems, including obesity, diabetes, depression, and even dementia.

      2. Early Bird, Hummingbird, or Night Owl

      Your chronotype—Early Bird, Hummingbird, or Night Owl—is affected by a variety of factors, including your genetic makeup and the amount of light to which you are exposed on a day-to-day basis.

      As their name implies, Early Birds naturally awaken by 5:00 to 6:30 each morning and feel ready to start work immediately. They are most productive during the first half of their day. Throughout most afternoons, their mental sharpness declines. (Early Birds can boost their afternoon energy by taking a short walk or otherwise exposing themselves to afternoon sunlight.) If given an option to meet over dinner or lunch, they’ll choose lunch. In general, they prefer to avoid late-evening activities.

      Some studies estimate that between 70 to 80 percent of the population are flexible Hummingbirds. They have no strong time preference and adjust easily to working early in the morning or later in the evening.

      Night Owls, by contrast, express a preference for early evenings over mornings. While Early Birds experience a gradual depletion of their energy throughout the day, Night Owls seemingly become more alert and energized with each passing hour. They can boost their morning productivity via exposure to morning sunlight. Night Owls thrive on evening entertaining. But if they work at an office or with a supervisor who expects juniors to be at their desk and working by 9:00 a.m., Night Owls should avoid staying out late, even on the weekends.

      3. Tackle priority tasks at your peak times

      Your circadian rhythm controls the periods in a day during which you will operate at peak mental, physical, and emotional performance. During peak performance times, your brain will be most alert and you will experience a heightened ability to concentrate. Additionally, your working memory—a group of mental processes that help you plan, problem solve, organize, and pay attention—operates best during these peak performance times.

      Most people have two peak-performance periods each day: one in the morning and a second one approximately 10 to 12 hours later. Take advantage of your circadian rhythm and schedule priority tasks during those time periods.

      So, for example, Early Birds will likely experience their first peak-performance period sometime between 5:00 and 10:00 a.m. Early Birds should arrive at work early in the day and address any emergencies quickly. As soon as possible, they should silence their phone and turn off their computer’s automatic email notification system. During the next 90 minutes to two hours, they should focus all their efforts on their toughest assignment. Early Birds are best served by addressing routine matters right before or after lunch. Then, they can ramp up for their afternoon peak.

      Night Owls, on the other hand, might want to arrive at work as late as is acceptable to their supervisors. On arriving, Night Owls can warm up to work by addressing routine matters first. As the day progresses, they will gain focus, and performance will likely first peak during the late-morning hours. That’s when Night Owls should tackle their priority projects. Many Night Owls insist that their second peak of the day, which generally occurs during the evening hours, is especially productive.

      4. Address routine work proactively

      Here’s the biggest challenge both new and established professionals face: they must address a mountain of routine work (filling out timesheets, submitting expenses, completing reports) in a timely manner while simultaneously addressing a constant onslaught of internal and external client demands that often cause workload spikes.

      Frankly, you should feel thrilled every time you receive a new demand that causes a workload spike, since each one gives you the opportunity to gain respect and traction with your employer. Yet constant spikes can ruin overall productivity, especially when addressing an emergency causes routine matters to slide.

      Once you understand when you work best, schedule tasks that require your greatest mental effort during your peak periods. Then become proactive and address routine matters during your off-peak periods.

      5. Survive afternoon slumps

      Because of their circadian rhythms, Early Birds tend to suffer afternoon slumps. Yet, even a hardcore Night Owl might feel unfocused after a poorly chosen lunch. Eating

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