Managing Our Time vs Managing our Priorities!

By Jim Beamesderfer, JB Strategic Solutions
How many times have you thought to yourself – “I wish I had more time!” We have all done it, I am sure. Well, we cannot create more time, but we can manage our time, which is really that we can manage our priorities. In John Maxwell’s book, “Today Matters,” he covers the “Daily Dozen” as he calls them – twelve daily practices to guarantee tomorrow’s success. One of those is PRIORITIES. Prioritize your life by giving focus and energy to those things that yield the highest return. 

As much as possible, stay in the “strength zone” – the things you do well and ensure employee work assignments are aligned to what the employees do well.

Questions to ask yourself include:

• What is important today at work? WHY?
• What work items are important for you to personally focus on today?
• What is important for your teams, your subordinates to focus on?
• What activities, projects, or work tasks might need to be removed from your or your team’s schedule in order to make time for your top priorities?

As a leader, you need to prioritize and as necessary due to shifts in business priorities, staff availability, and other factors, sometimes reprioritize projects, tasks and work in general – and communicate same to your teams. It is a leaders role to ensure the team is working on the right stuff – focusing on the correct priorities of work.

But, it’s not all about work! We all hope to achieve some form of work-life balance, but do we really ever achieve it? What is important today at home? WHY? What is important to each family member?

As you think about your schedule, whether it is the evening before or the morning of, ask yourself this simple question. What do I need to rearrange on my schedule today to focus on these important priorities?

As you consider and review your priorities at work and home, remember to ask yourself (and answer!) – WHY? This helps validate the priority you have assigned and puts into perspective how you will spend your time each day!

You can’t create more time, but YOU can choose how you spend your time, you choose what you spend your time doing each day – focus on the priorities that are important in your life and you will be well on your way to getting the most out of each and every day and achieving success!