Top Employee Time Management Tips
How much do you know about employee time management? Is it something you struggle with? Read on to learn everything that you need to know on the subject.
Unrecorded work activities account for more than 50 million hours in lost productivity per day. Time is such a crucial aspect of life that needs to be respected both at home and at the workplace.
Learning to master the art of employee time management can help your firm avoid issues like missed deadlines, increased overtime costs, and dissatisfied customers. In this post, we discuss what time management is, why it’s important, and a few employment time management tips to help you be more successful at work.
Keep reading for information you won’t want to miss.
What is Time Management and Why is it Important?
Time management is an important business skill that involves planning and controlling the amount of time spent on certain tasks to increase productivity, efficiency, and effectiveness.
It gives you control over your day and the crucial aspects of your work life. It involves planning, scheduling, and prioritizing repetitive tasks to get work done in less time.
Time management offers multiple benefits at the workplace, including:
- Completing work within the prescribed timeframe
- Increased focus and reduced procrastination
- Improved performance and efficiency
- Reduced stress and anxiety
- Opening doors to new business and career opportunities
Some Employee Management Tips to Implement Today
Want to increase productivity in your workplace? Consider the tips below:
How Do You Currently Spend Time?
Determining how you currently spend time is crucial, as it helps you identify areas of weakness. Spend a week diligently tracking daily activities. Take stock of the amount of time spent on unproductive activities and conversations.
This exercise can also help you determine what times of the day your team is most productive – and know when to have them work on the projects that require more focus and creativity.
Create a Daily Schedule
It’s easy to get overwhelmed, especially when there is too much to do with looming deadlines. Preparing an organized to-do list can help you ensure that important tasks aren’t left undone.
It helps you keep track of the important and urgent tasks, and what’s not yet done. With this information, you can allocate time and resources accordingly, and get work done efficiently.
A few things to keep in mind when preparing your daily work schedule include:
- Prepare a to-do list and delegate what you can
- Allocate time for every task
- Set deadlines for every task to keep you accountable
- Place your to-list in front and refer to it throughout the day
- An aesthetically beautiful to-do list might keep you motivated
- Stick to the schedule
Learn How to Prioritize
One of the best employee time management tips is learning to focus on the tasks crucial to moving forward. The Eisenhower Matrix is an excellent method for setting your priorities right. To get started, list all tasks that you have to complete within a certain timeframe, then classify them as follows;
- DO: Urgent and important tasks that need to be completed as soon as possible
- SCHEDULE: Important but not urgent tasks. Make a plan for when to work on them.
- DELEGATE: Urgent but not very important. Assign these tasks to someone else
- DELETE: Neither urgent nor important tasks. You can ignore them.
Tackle the Most Important Tasks in the Mornings
Productivity is more about completing important tasks each day and less about doing more work in less time. Handling the most important tasks in the morning allows you to be more productive because you’re full of energy and at peak performance.
This paves the way for increased efficiency and makes it easy to include unnecessary tasks, which are often included in your schedule in the afternoons.
It’s NOT a Good Idea to Multitask
This is probably the simplest employee time management advice you’ll ever get, and yet the most difficult to follow. Technology has made it easier to multitask and complete more tasks, but that’s not always the result.
Multitasking hinders one’s ability to concentrate on a project long enough to complete it before the deadline. It also compromises the quality of work and takes you from learning as you would when focusing 100% on one task. The tips below can help you avoid multitasking and use your time more efficiently:
- Minimize external distractions
- Don’t check your phone first thing in the morning
- Say no to additional tasks if you don’t have time to work on them
- Prioritize tasks in order of importance
Make Meetings Effective
As a team leader, you have a responsibility to your employees to help them show their value and be productive. This requires replacing time-and energy-draining gatherings with scheduled meetings.
You can try sticking to Jeff Bezo’s two-pizza rule, where meetings don’t last longer than the time it takes a group of people to eat two pizzas.
Here are more tips to help you hold productive meetings:
- Only schedule a meeting when you need to do an activity together or make an important decision
- Limit the number of participants to the people you need
- Make the meeting short and precise
- Avoid distractions and stick to the meeting agenda
- Create and send the agenda at least a day before the meeting
You can also engage your staff to know what they want during meetings.
Invest in a Time Tracking System
Many employers and managers struggle with implementing time tracking for projects. Investing in a time tracking system not only increases accountability in employees, but also helps you understand where resources are best utilized.
Time tracking tools for employees provide the bigger picture and automatically make a business more transparent. They improve operational efficiency since they provide a better understanding of billing with the billable utilization report. Last but not least, employers can track how the project budget gets burned.
Employee Time Management Equals a Successful Business
The above employee time management guide can help you foster a great work environment and grow your business. They will make your team more efficient, productive, and prevent the stress associated with rushing to do things last minute.
Don’t forget to encourage a proper balance. No matter how well your employees manage time, it won’t do your business any good if they’re always exhausted. Promote healthy work habits, such as regular rest breaks throughout the day. Get in touch with us to learn more.
