Schedule Your Priorities

by Bill Granda

Since 1991, as consultant, business coach, and advisor with Paradigm Associates, Bill Granda has been helping businesses and individuals improve their ability to overcome obstacles and get results. He engages with key players and teams, particularly those in or approaching important transitions, to develop and execute practical business and transition strategies. Clients have found him especially helpful when they recognize they have to do something different, but don't know exactly what that is, or they know what is needed but aren't sure how to best get it done. Many of his clients are closely-held and family businesses, non-profits, and professional firm owners who put a premium on professional competence and really helping their clients.

I will admit I grew up in Pennsylvania Dutch (really German) country. "Dumb Dutchman" was a phrase often heard. But those pretzel benders weren't always so dumb. It's just that their "pearls of wisdom" were often cloaked as simple-mindedness. One I still remember was, "The hurrieder I go, the behinder I get."

Sound familiar, o ye who never find enough hours in the day? Well, if that's what's ailin' ya, Bunky, here are some thoughts that can help.

It's all in your head.

Year's ago a client, writing to thank me for helping his management team, said, "Yes, time management is really more of a goal setting and values clarification problem than it is a time problem. We just needed to work through the process to discover it for ourselves."

What they discovered was that they couldn't prioritize their schedules without first figuring out what their priorities were. Stephen Covey expressed it in terms of a compass being a better tool for time management than a watch. In other words they shifted their paradigm from trying to cram more activities into less time to just doing the things that were really important to do. They concentrated on the few activities that contributed the greatest value.

Push it to your arms and legs

Here are some ideas to give arms and legs to your priorities:

• Distinguish between urgent and important. Think more of investing your time rather than spending it. Move toward doing more and more of the things that are important but not urgent, things like planning, prevention, building relationships, clarifying goals.
• Schedule your priorities rather than trying to prioritize your schedule. Put nothing on your calendar that you haven't decided is important. But do put on those things that are. Schedule appointments with yourself and keep them as religiously as an appointment with someone else.
• Block out or set aside regular times or even days for recurring high-value activities. For instance Monday might be designated for marketing and sales activities; Tuesday - Thursday for meetings with clients or other important contacts; Friday for planning the following week and administrative activities. Kind of like the old song, "Monday's the day we wash our clothes. Tuesday's the day we iron our clothes, etc."
• Block out large chunks of time to work on tasks so you can work to completion without interruption. Doing a little of this, then a little of that, bouncing from one thing to another is a huge time waster, given all the time taken to get back to where you left off.
• Set deadlines to force yourself to complete tasks far sooner than you might have otherwise. They say work expands to fill the time allotted. It also contracts to fill the time allotted. Use that knowledge to your benefit.

Replace old habits with new

Like most things we do, time management, or lack of it, is a habit. We do it most of the time without conscious thought. Developing more effective, satisfactory time management habits initially takes consistent, conscious effort. But like an athlete or performing artist, practice, practice, practice means that by show time you've mastered the new habit or behavior.

You don't have to rebuild Rome in a day. Start out in one area where you are being held back by poor time management. Work on that area until you've mastered it. For example pick one of the ideas in the above bullets and work on it. When you've got it down pat, move to another.

Finally, work on your beliefs. You must truly believe you will become great at time management. Then promise yourself that you will and start on it immediately.