Time Management: an essential yet overlooked skill in Leadership. As challenging as it may be with constant distractions all around, stepping up time management skills will make one competitive and take one far ahead in all spheres of business and life.           

Why time management? 

Juggling multiple tasks is common. Irrespective of whether you’re an aspiring leader or a veteran, you’ll always have a million things on your plate in a 24-hour time frame. Procrastination and Laziness sets in, pending tasks are rolled over to the next day and an end to this cycle is almost impossible to find. 

A leader being a role model for several others must swear by strong time management and organizational skills. This includes tasks are being aware of the vision, setting realistic and specific goals, prioritizing and possessing the discipline to follow the path they’ve chalked out. 

However simply being busy doesn’t necessarily mean you’re adding value to the company or yourself. There’s a stark difference between working smart and working hard. Engaging in nugatory or time-wasting activities will benefit nobody. And this is where your skills will come into play.

 

So, here are some tips to manage your time efficiently. 


Set Goals  

Calibrating individual, team and organizational goals specifies the direction the company needs to work in, in order to achieve their end vision. It becomes simpler to treat activities according to their relative significance, compartmentalize and plan one’s day.  

Goals are ideally acronymic to be SMART i.e., Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-bound. With regards to managing time, these goals  delineate work to be done, the period in which it has to be accomplished, and in this process, the resources that can be maximized to realize results in the shortest time.

 Whether linked to your organizations goal or not, personal goals shouldn’t also be disregarded. A passionate and empathetic leader should use the goal setting exercise to develop an overall project plan. The breakdown of work helps to create a structured outline of all the major and minor activities and even helps to allocates resources. The visual project plans help to provide an instant focus for the team members on current and future priorities.

Maintaining a To-Do List

Leaders are often sceptical about keeping a to-do list as it comes across as something only students do. Yet, you’ll hear them complain how they got busy doing something else or it slipped their mind. Thus, leader or not, there is a limitation to how much your mind can retain. 

Barbara Corcoran, an investor on “Shark Tank” lays emphasis on how she to do list helps her to identify and prioritize her tasks in a day. Jim McCann, author of Talk Is (Not) Cheap: The Art of Conversation Leadership, says he keeps a list of “Things I Have to Do Today”. 

This sort of a list gives a physical evidence of tasks to be accomplished each day. It also helps them sort of activities that are of high priority versus activities that are not. Thanks to technology, you can take your to-do list on the go. Various apps like Todoist, Wunderlist, Pocket List, Calvetica helps you mobilize your action points. You don’t want to be a leader who forgets a task because you didn’t make a note of it.

 

Delegating of Work to your Subordinates 

They say, any man who insists to on maintain control and authority is actually insecure and fails to even meet the definition of a leader. And if they feel uncomfortable in delegating routine and manual tasks they are simply adding more to their plate. 

Thus a good leader does not do everything on his own; rather he acts as an enabler by marshalling all of the elements on a pathway to success. He’s an executive and someone who manages time, resources, and people to free up his time to focus on other important things. Delegating tasks routinely instils confidence, trust, boosts employee morale and gives rise to innovation. It’s a perfect way to make your subordinates responsible and accountable.

  

Taking Breaks

 Leaders have so much to do throughout a day; they overlook the need of taking a break once a while. Going from one meeting to another without a time-off and an information overload hinders productivity and makes one extremely stressed out. Mini breaks helps ones look at a problem from a distance with a peaceful state of mind and magnifies one’s ability to brainstorm creative solutions for the same.

 

You could be a veteran leader or simply a novice but time management, punctuality and effective leadership will never seize to haunt you. Develop it, imbibe it and Master it because these traits could take you go miles ahead and greatly impact your leadership style. Best of luck! 

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