A follow up to Part I of the Time Management series on building awareness of the time spent on various tasks during your work day. In Part II of this series, we share 5 tips that can help you better manage your time through the workday.
- Waking up earlier – Early risers tend to be more efficient and can get more done in the day. Besides, waking up an hour earlier each day gives you sufficient time to get ready for work and this can put you in a better frame of mind to tackle what’s ahead. Reaching your office in the early morning before the hustle and bustle begins will give you some quiet time to plan and map out key priorities for the day. For more on rising early, check out this Lifehacker blog post.
- Check emails on the commute to work – Get ahead of your inbox before you head to work – with an HP notebook that is built to work on the go, you can start to read emails and respond to requests before you even step into the office. With HP QuickWeb (available on most HP business notebooks), you can quickly connect to the Web and your emails within seconds of powering on the device. Take it one step further and color code your inbox to sieve through emails more quickly.
- Stay organized – Staying organized is one step towards better time management. With your files and documents in place, it is often much easier to look for information. This saves you from scrambling at the last moment to locate information or having to spend time searching for files.
- Shorter, more efficient meetings – Set an agenda before each meeting and prepare for your discussion – this will help you be more efficient and can help save your significant time in your work week. Set a hard stop timing for the meeting to end and establish this when sending your agenda over to make sure that the rest of your team members are on the same page as you.
- Block out instant messaging – IM, Facebook chat, Windows Communicator – while these are all great connectivity tools, they can also distract you at work and disrupt your concentration when you need to get things done. Blocking out IM tools for short periods of time when you need to finish important tasks will really help you be more productive.
We hope these tips have been helpful to you! For more info, click on over to Entrepreneur Magazine. It has a really comprehensive tip sheet on time management, specially catered to SMB owners.
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