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TIME ROBBERS
There are many factors that act as retardants to effective and efficient time management.These factors are what I refer to as time robbers. One has to be watchful of this factors to prevent time wastage. They are treated exhaustively below and ways of checking them are also highlighted.
1. PROCRASTINATION: To procrastination is to delay or defer and a procrastinator is one who puts off till tomorrow, the things which should be done today. To put off till tomorrow what should be done today is a sign of laziness, a lack of courage and an efficient way of wasting precious time.
‘Do it now’ is the solution to procrastination. In the office environment, it is recommended that you handle each piece of paper only once. This implies that you take any action required immediately on a letter, memo, mail e.t.c at once.This helps to decongest your table fast.
2. INDISCRIMINATION: Ask yourself ‘If I do this, Will it make any difference? “If the answer is No difference”, then do not spend time doing it. It is, therefore, a waste of time.Learn to discriminate.
3. INDECISION: Decision making is a process in which we evaluate alternatives and then make a choice from them. Some people are afraid of taking decisions for fear of making mistakes. Such people waste their own time by being unable and/or unwilling to take decisions. August Kekule advised that ‘A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one would find faults with what he has done.
4. INTERRUPTIONS: Frequent interruptions in the performance of set duties lead to time wastage. A well planned and organized job could be executed poorly if interruptions are many. Interruptions can be in the form of frequent and unwarranted visits, phone calls, power failure, negative physical factors in the environment such as noise and people’s problem in the form of loud argument, laughing, criticizing, chatting and telling stories.
5. LACK OF AND INSUFFICIENT DELEGATION: The most commonly accepted definition of management is getting things done by and through other people. Most ineffective and inefficient supervisors and managers fail to delegate. Such a person develops the illusion of omniscience and contempt for his subordinates whom he believes are incapable of doing anything right. He therefore hordes all authority and refuses to delegate any responsibility.
Sooner or later, he finds himself swamped with too many things to be done. His span of control is already exceeded, he experiences work overload, consumes so much time to achieve so little both for himself and for the organization in terms of completed jobs.
Engaging oneself in functions that some other people should do guarantees an ineffective and inefficient use of time. Delegation of trivial or even important tasks enables the supervisor or first line manager to concentrate on major functions and results in efficient time management.
6. REVERSE DELEGATION: This is described as occurring when an employee or a subordinate brings to the supervisor or manager a decision to make which the employee should in fact, make. Delegation involves giving responsible and adequate authority to a subordinate to perform it. Sometimes, however, the subordinate gives his boss a partially completed job, expecting him to finish it. This induces the boss to waste his own time in doing a job that should be avoided in efficient time management.
7. CHATTING AND CONVERSATION: As the maxim goes, friends are thieves of time. Chatting with people or unnecessary conversations regarding personal affairs, national affairs or even international affairs during the working period is a big time waster. Such conversations neither lead to the achievement of personal goals nor organizational objectives.
8. REGRETS: Time spent in regretting past events are time wasted. Devoted precious time in wishing that yesterday was today and last year was this year, regretting that if only you had money last year, you would have bought a car or built a house this year, are all exercises in futility and a sin against effective use of time.
As Alexander Woollcott said, many of us spend half our time wishing for things we could have, if we did not spend half our time wishing. Therefore, good time management should be in the full realization that today is all we have to work with and the past is irretrievably gone while the future is only a concept and an uncontrollable variable.
9. UNNECESSARY OR PROLONGED GROUP MEETINGS: Holding group meetings frequently for the sake of it and with no clear objectives or plans for discussion, wastes the time of the supervisor and manager, the time subordinates and the entire organization. Assuming the meeting lasts for one hour and there are ten people in attendance, the total time wasted is ten hours.
10. OVERSOCIALIZING: People oversocialize at work both with fellow workers and external customers. It is common for employees to spend their official hours organizing birthday parties, naming ceremonies and funerals. They also relate in rather and unnecessarily informal manners. They mix domestic issues with official matters with relative ease. Oversocialisation is an obvious means of time wastage and it should be controlled.
The secret of getting things done is doing them now. One minute lost is one minute lost forever since time is irreplaceable. Therefore we should identify our specific goals and objectives, prioritize them, establish deadlines, delegate functions which other people can perform, work in blocks of time, avoid interruptions and reverse delegation that occasionally question our use of time and be sure we are doing the right thing at the right time. We should appreciate the need to differentiate matters of urgent from those that are important, avoid indecision and procrastination, plan our life and our time and finally remember what the anonymous philosopher said “Yesterday is a cancelled cheque. Tomorrow is a promissory note. Today is ready cash. Use it”
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Source by Omo Aiwerioghene Agbonile
