Time Management Skills of Successful People

Let’s start with a question: if we have 86,400 dollars every day, we can use them if we want to, otherwise, they will just be eliminated at the end of the day. What could be the prevalent thoughts about all this money? Of course, we should spend it wisely. Money in our account is of no use until we use it to satisfy our needs and enjoy luxuries. A similar case is with time. We are blessed with 86,400 seconds every day. 

We should use this time to complete our jobs. We can accomplish tasks that can benefit us in the future. We can improve and learn by using this time. On the other hand, this time can be consumed while watching TV, surfing the internet, and playing games-everything that doesn’t add value to our lives. Astute choice can only be to avail that time for betterment. 

All successful people have one thing in common: they possess the skill of time management. Every person has the equivalent number of hours in a day to achieve what he/she desires. Some people surpass others, while some can not even get their daily tasks accomplished. This is because of the attribute of time management. Practical time management can become a leading factor in our vitalities.

Get Up Early: Interestingly, the majority of successful people are getting up quite early, so they can increase working hours and use every moment for advancement in their work. Getting up early gives you more active time in the day and provides a positive outlook towards life, enhances energy, and helps to be more organized. Early risers bring tranquillity to their life that in turn makes them creative, organized, and productive. By getting up early, we can get time to declutter our day. There are numerous precedents for CEOs of large corporations being early risers, such as David Cush waking up at 4:15, Apple CEO Tim Cook waking up at 3: 45am and Bob Ferguson waking up at 5:am. It can be really frustrating to wake up at that time when we have to run for our job. It leaves our minds vague and cluttered with meaningful and meaningless thoughts and impressions. When we wake up early, we get sufficient time to manage our thoughts to decide what we should do during the day. It enhances peace of mind and makes us more organized so that we can make smart decisions about our time and use it effectively. Successful people conceive time as an asset and they master the art of managing it and rising early. Early rising, in combination with sufficient and deep sleep, has a positive influence on our fitness and improves our ability to work, hence paving the way for success.

Do what is actually important:  Successful people have a clear vision of what they actually acquire from their day. They are concise and clear about short-term and daily goals. They keep their focus on what is worthwhile, and they continuously track what could be valuable to them. In the best-selling book “The Ultimate Guide to Time Management” author Tony Robbins emphasizes learning the value of a task. If it replenishes our career, we should do that. Otherwise, we should focus on other valuable tasks. Time should be treated as money. It must be conserved and used only for significant work. A very famous and most used model to decide what should be done is Eisenhower’s matrix. Successful people use this popular matrix to prioritize their tasks so that they can be devoted to the most important ones. This matrix suggests that we should give first priority to the important and urgent tasks, then we should do important and not very urgent tasks after that we should delegate unimportant but urgent work, and finally, we should go for the least important and not urgent tasks, as not doing them will not harm us and completing them will not add any benefit. In accordance with the Pareto Principle also known as the 80/20 rule, 20 percent of actions yield 80 percent of results and 80 percent of actions intervene in 20 percent of the end result. Simply put, you should know which 20% will bring you the maximum value. The rest of the work is delegated to ensure accomplishment.

Time blocking: It is to get the calendar and fill it with the tasks you would like to perform at that particular time of the day. It is an excellent time management technique used by various successful people, including Elon Musk. It is said that if you allot more time to a simple task, it will expand according to a time range. That means a waste of time. We can use that time to do something profitable. Time blocking creates a clear focus. That means, at a particular time, we have a specific task to finish. It is an efficient way to achieve clarity in plans. It makes us focus on one task. It assists in attaining perfection in one task. Time blocking is regarded as the best method of time management as many triumphant people employ it and recognize it as very effective. Cal Newportis one of the adherents of time blocking. He spends a little time planning his day ahead. It stimulates the management of preferences and reduces procrastination. It is an efficient way to track goals and be mindful of time spent. It enhances dedication and cuts distraction, rendering us more organized and productive.

Deep Work: Although we think successful people have the best possible clear minds and they most likely do not get entangled in tasks, this is not true. People with amazing aptitudes get caught up in the humdrum of work, and this time management skill is used by them. That is deep work. They free up the aperture in their schedule to focus entirely on their fundamental work. During the time of deep work, they latch onto all possible kinds of distractions. They do not care what is happening around them until their commitment to the task is completed. They spend several uninterrupted hours on tasks they desire to accomplish without a phone, setting aside all other casualties. An eminent book by Cal Newport namely Deep Work is a good reference to this idea. We can find deep work slots in the schedules of many millionaires such as Warren Buffet and Bill Gates.

Say no and delegate: Successful people do not tire themselves out doing what they can not do. Instead, they are efficient in negating tasks as well. It is not that they can not do it, but they commit to those jobs they are perfect for. They know their value and do not do every task; they keep their preoccupation with their work according to their capacity and temperament. They delegate tasks that they would not do. Saying no to some jobs clears their minds and keeps them intact from an excessive workload. We should do what we are good at, not everything.

Proper Rest: Getting good sleep and enough rest time bestows more energy to get to work. Sleep: a time management strategy, regards sleep as an important factor in time management, and successful people are confident of this notion. Proper sleep is beneficial for the body and mind to work effectively. Getting a sound sleep for a good 7 to 8 hours improves time management skills and individual productivity. Sleep prepares our bodies and minds to work in surplus. Proper rest and sound sleep organize the mind and give it the possibility to organize time in a better and smarter way. Successful people have arrangements for their sleep to be comforting and favorably significant for better time management and a productive lifestyle.

Time is a resource that should be recognized as more important than money, as we can make money once we lose it but time never comes back. Time is not money, it is life. The effective management of this precious resource is mandatory. We should be concerned about how we are spending our day, which tasks we are doing and how they are impacting our life. The secret of the success and prosperity of a millionaire and billionaire is time management. We can manage our time as successful people have been doing to fulfill the desires in our lives to make our lives prosperous, productive, and worthy.