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Scheduling

Written by: Zig Ziglar

Article Overview: It’s been said, “You can always get more stuff, but you can never get more time!” There will always be more to do than you can accomplish in a day and more people needing more of you than you are willing to give! It’s enough to make you want to pull your hair out! But don’t - instead think about the power of planning.

Scheduling

It’s been said, “You can always get more stuff, but you can never get more time!” There will always be more to do than you can accomplish in a day and more people needing more of you than you are willing to give! It’s enough to make you want to pull your hair out! But don’t - instead think about the power of planning. Let’s look more in depth at how to productively schedule your time. Take some time every work day and have a standing appointment with yourself. That is the time to input your daily expenses and sales information, make calls to schedule future appointments, or begin the task of going through the 50 e-mails you need to read, for example. Some time set aside every day will help you chunk tasks into a doable size instead of feeling overloaded at the end of the week. This daily appointment should also include time to plan your day. When should this time occur? Think about when you are at your peak. Do you start the day with lots of energy and end the day dragging? You need to make an appointment with yourself the first hour of the work day. Do you start out slow and groggy and end the day raring to go? Then you need to schedule your time in the afternoon. This same idea of making an appointment with yourself applies to your personal life as well. If, for example, you never seem to find the time to go to the gym - actually put it in your calendar system (such as Outlook) as an appointment. That way you have reserved that time and it will remind and motivate you to go.

Throughout the day be aware of “found” time. You can accomplish a lot in 10 minutes. Did you get to your appointment early? Return two phone calls before you walk in. Did you plan on a task taking two hours and you finished in an hour and forty-five minutes? Rip through some e-mails or begin a task that you have been putting off (it’s OK if you can’t complete it right now). Don’t shortchange yourself - you can cross off one or two things on your list with this “found” time. Consistently making a to-do list, prioritizing how and where you should spend your time, and working this into the schedule of your day are the backbone to productively managing your time.

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Article Tags: appointment, appointments, calendar system, chunk, five minutes, personal life



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