Doing More With Your 24

We all have far more work on our plates than we can reasonably get done in an 8-10 hour day, and the disparity between requests and time doesn’t stop when we leave the office. When we get home, requests from our kids, our “honey do” list, household chores and more all compete for our time.

The concept of working smarter, not harder, is nothing new. But despite the fact that we all know how important this is in our lives, I still find it extremely valuable to read fresh perspectives and strategies for executing this, in both my personal and professional life.

The folks at Nightingale-Conant today published a great set of strategies that remind us how to be more productive in the time we have.

Their primary takeaways:

1) Run the day, or it will run you. Part of the key to time management is staying in charge. Some will be masters of their time, and some will be servants. Enterprising people become the masters of their time.

2) Don’t mistake activity for productivity. To be successful, you must be busy being productive. Some people are going, going, going, but they’re doing figure eights. They’re not making much progress. Don’t mistake activity for productivity, movement for achievement. Evaluate the hours in your days, and see if there is wasted time that you could manage better.

3) Focus. You’ve got to zero in on the job at hand and, like an ant, let nothing stand in your way and let nothing distract you from the task. Assuming this is a major activity in pursuit of the highest-leverage opportunity available, there should be nothing more valuable to invest your time in.

Read the full article here.

Also, check out a few earlier posts on some best practices for getting organized.