Deepak Mudgil Company Presentation

Planning, Prioritizing and Managing Time

At the end of the module you will –

Learn how to plan and prioritize your daily tasks

Understand the importance of time management

Learn to manage self to manage time

Know how organizing your surroundings saves time for you

Understand how to manage others to manage time

Plan, Prioritize and Manage

Planning: Sequencing actions and utilizing resources for achieving goals

Prioritizing: Listing group of actions in order of precedence or importance

Managing: Achieving your goals without commotion

Plan broadly, prioritize accurately, manage effectively keeping TIME in mind

The PPM Model

TimeTime

You

Prioritizing

Planning

Managing

Planning ‘SMART’

PlanningSetting goals

Developing an approach

Outlining tasks and schedules

Understanding resources required

Identifying helping/ hindering factors

Accomplishing goals

Why is Planning Crucial? Provides direction

Offers opportunities to analyze alternative courses of action

Reduces uncertainties

Minimizes impulsive and arbitrary decisions

Facilitates allocation of resources which increases efficiency

Integrates processes, systems and relevant factors

“Failing to plan is planning to fail”

How to Plan?

S M A R T

SMART: Specific What exactly needs to be achieved

Clear and unambiguous

Outputs or outcomes against which successful completion can be determined

Who, What, Where, When, Which, Why and How

S M A R T

SMART: Measurable An action plan is no good if it can’t be measured

Measuring the results/ output

Quantity and quality of work expected

Milestones to indicate progress

MS A R T

SMART: Achievable Being reasonable – ask yourself is my plan achievable or

I am planning unrealistically?

Pushes and stretches, but does not break

Is realistic and attainable

Don’t make "Can Barely Finish" plans, make completely achievable plans

Consider your current situation and then plan your activities

AS M R T

SMART: Relevant Meaningful/ important to you

Fits in the larger scheme of things you have in mind

Can be achieved with available resources, knowledge and time

You are willing and able to act

Is not unrealistic and unrelated

RS M A T

SMART: Time-bound Anchored on a time frame—otherwise there is no

urgency in accomplishing it

Every activity that you plan must be time-sensitive in nature

Not too much time, not too little time – enough to complete the task

Not having a time element attached to your plan breeds procrastination

Calculate the time to be taken to accomplish a task, precisely

Set deadlines and achieve your plans within the stipulated time

TS M A R

Action Plan IncludesHelping factors

• The enablers

• Ways to leverage those

Hindering factors

• The blocks

• Ways to manage around those

Resources required

Activity: Bridging the Towns

Prioritize

PrioritizingIs arranging your planned tasks

Is important as time is limited and demands are unlimited

Is Utilizing your time wisely

Frees you from less important tasks that can be attended to later

Helps drop useless tasks

80 % of time spent

20% of the results20% of the results

20% of time spent20% of time spent

Pareto 80:20 Rule

Urgent-Important Matrix

Urgent Less Urgent

Le

ss

Impo

rta

ntIm

port

an

t1st Priority 2nd Priority

4th Priority 3rd Priority

Urgent-Important MatrixTo determine important-urgent, answer ‘Because’ ‘By’

‘Why’….

• This task is important-urgent because….

• It needs to be done by…

• The reason why it is needed is…

Urgent tasks have inflexible immediate deadlines driven by others

Important tasks have flexible deadlines and are self accomplished

Importance of tasks determine how much time should be spent on them

Urgent-Important MatrixImportant/ Urgent Tasks

• Must be done first

• Unforeseen emergencies and deadlines

• Cushion time for such tasks when planning your day

Important/ Less Urgent Tasks

• Planned and thought through

• Information must be collected to enable performance

• Let it not turn into an ‘urgent’ task and thus a situation of crisis

Urgent-Important MatrixLess Important/ Urgent Tasks

• Urgent doesn’t mean ‘now’, they mean today at some point

• Ask questions to help prioritize and position the task during the day

• Put these tasks into your ‘to do’ list to remind you to do at an appropriate time

Less Important/ Less Urgent Tasks

• Can be carried over to the next day or to their deadline date

• Slate them to be completed when a suitable ‘hole in the day’ arises

Managing Time

Managing time is creatively utilizing time in the most effective and productive way possible

It is a non-renewable limited resource … you cannot ‘make’ time but surely can ‘find’ time

Absence of Time ManagementLast minute rushes to meet deadlines

Days which seem somehow to slip unproductively

Crises which loom unexpectedly from nowhere

Days full with action from dawn till dusk – ‘all time busy’

Stress and degradation of performance

Managing Time Helps in…Being more in control of what you do

Being more productive

Giving yourself more ‘quality time’

Avoiding stress and last minute pressures

Not being always overloaded

A Good Time Manager…Identifies productivity cycles

Maintains and follows a daily plan

Uses technology to reduce time wastage

Manages interruptions

Increases productivity from meetings

Avoids overloads

Maintains a healthy work-life balance

Time StealersInterruptions

Procrastination

Acting with incomplete information

Inadequate knowledge

Inability to say ‘No’

Lack of planning

Personal disorganization

Exercise: Time Thieves

Becoming a Good Time Manager

To manage your time effectively you need to –

Manage self

Manage your surroundings

Manage others

Managing Self to Manage Time

Managing Self Take total responsibility of managing time for yourself

Manage time yourself by –

• Beating procrastination

• Managing interruptions

• Learning to say “No”

• Having clarity about your tasks

• Using Planner

Beating ProcrastinationIt is when you put off tasks that should be done in the

present

It is living in the future -- an eternal postponing “Manyana Syndrome”

Why do you procrastinate?

• Inability to concentrate

• Fear of imperfection

• Priority confusion

• Laziness

• Not motivated enough

Beating ProcrastinationAccept that you are procrastinating

Visualize the end from the beginning

Find ways to like your task

Breaking the task into smaller parts and doing it one step at a time

Rewarding yourself at the beginning, in the middle and at the end of your job

Creative action

Managing InterruptionsRecognize office interruptions –

• Boss/ subordinates/ colleagues

• Clients/ customers

• Telephone/ mobile

• E-mails

Managing InterruptionsWhen you’re interrupted, ask yourself : ‘What’s more

important, the interruption or what I’m working on?’

Be assertive

Continue to look busy

Try to keep the interruption short

Plan a quiet hour

Invent a deadline

Saying “NO”Don’t say ‘yes’ to regret it later when you should have

said ‘no’

Refrain from being a people pleaser

Remind yourself “You can’t do everything”

Don’t undertake things you can’t complete

Be direct

Remain calm

Maintain eye contact

You say ‘no’ to a request, not to a person

Task ClarityHave absolute clarity about the task you need to

complete

Ambiguity is the enemy of time

Develop understanding of your role in the organization

Listen carefully to each instruction given

Ask clarifying questions

Using Daily Planner

Block out times on the daily planner for each of the

major activities

Start with recurring activities that occur at a fixed time

Then block out time for activities that you want to do

on a regular basis

Allot ample time for each activity, especially high

priority activities

Take into account when you are most effective

Plan for morning people and night owls

Exercise: My Daily Planner

Managing the Surroundings to Manage Time

Managing the SurroundingsWork environment may act as a hurdle towards time

management

Unorganized surroundings acts as a time-thief

Managing surroundings efficiently helps save time

Manage your surroundings by

• Organizing your workplace

• Managing workplace communication

• Planning your travel

Organizing Your Workplace: Desk

Make sure to have important accessories close at hand

Treat your desk as a platform, not a shelf

Clear your desk of papers you are not currently working with

Resist the temptation to leave your current work on the desk

Once you’ve finished a task, put all the papers away in a drawer, file or folder

Organize your filing

Workplace Communication: Phones

If you’re required to hold, ask for how long

Have a system for dealing with all incoming calls

Use voicemail

Know before you make your call, what to say -and get to

the point

Avoid weather reports

Limit social chat to nil

Workplace Communication: EmailDevelop a routine for replying to your mail

Categorize your Inbox

Scan headers and decide immediately which message

to delete

Avoid reading forwards not relevant to your work

Inform the sender if your are busy and cannot act on an

email immediately

Create templates of frequently sent emails

Use email reminders

Workplace Communication: Meetings

Every time you are invited for a meeting, ask these

questions –

• What can you contribute? What can you get from it?

Before going for the meeting, ask these questions -

• Are you well prepared? Are you well informed?

• Is your presence going to make a difference?

Get the best out of your time spent in the meeting

• Prepare on all the points of the agenda that concern you

• Present/ discuss your points with the aim to reach a

desired goal

Workplace Travels

Map your travel – prepare a sequential list of to do’s of

your travel

Have clarity about the addresses, person you need to

meet and their contact details

Stipulate the time you will require to reach your

destination, in advance

Start early, be punctual

Utilize your time when on the move

Never assume anything

Managing Others to Manage Time

Managing Others to Manage time You don’t work alone all the time

At work, your output is other’s input and vice versa

You need to manage others to save your time and increase your productivity

Indentify people who steal your time and handle them efficiently

People Who Steal Your Time

The Apocalyptic

The Over-Committers

The Laid-Backs

The Chatter-Boxes

The Perfectionists

Your BossHow bosses can steal your time –

Hard to get hold of

Slow to respond to requests

Vague in their communication

Making unrealistic demands

Not telling you what’s going on

Being inconsistent

Your Team Time wasters in teams –

Conflicts

Unproductive discussions

Ambiguous instructions

Unnecessary meetings

Time politics

Improper delegation

Recap

&

Plan of Action

Deepak Mudgil 61

Thank You