Once again we can smell the evergreen in the air and the pace of life seems to pick up as we head into the holiday season. For some there will be snow on the ground soon, if not already, and the stores are starting to decorate for the Christmas season. What a great time of year it is when we can reflect on the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ. We need to remember 1 John 1:7 which says, “Walk in the light as He is in the light…” Often times you feel like you can’t walk because in order to prepare for the holiday, you have to run around and try to get even more done this year than you did last year.
Maybe, you have one more person to buy for, or you are having the Christmas dinner at your house this year, or you just don’t have the drive to get out in the cold and put up a Christmas display. Like it or not, it will soon be time for things to get a little more hectic for many of us, and that is when it becomes important to practice very strong Time Management skills.
It is time to look at some of the best advice on the subject. There are good strong resources like Smart Sales Solutions, Harvard Business Review, Entrepreneur.com, and Life Hacker. When pulling from all these resources, I have come up with “7 Tips to Improve Time Management Through the Holidays.” When mixing work and personal life, the following tips will work to help you in that time slot between Thanksgiving and the New Year.
- Stop Multitasking. Written from the Harvard Review blog. Peter Bergman reports multitasking is really not worth the time! Sound familiar? Well jumping from task to task can actually cause you to waste time and by multitasking you can lower your production by as much as 40%. It is proven that multitasking can lower your ability to think clean about the larger task and in the long run can affect your ability to focus on the bigger more important task. So remember if you want to get all that is needed to be done before Christmas, avoid jumping from task to task and stick to one thing at a time.
- Look at your task and start by prioritizing. If you look at your list and appears that there is more to do than any human being could possibly do, then something has to give. Stop trying to fit more items on the calendar. A better way to manage time may be to start cutting from the bottom taking things off the list. You know you want to do it all, but there are only 24 hours in the day. So if those things lagging at the bottom of the list won’t hurt to miss, it may be time to let them go.
- Make sure you have time for yourself, “ME” time. Take a well deserved break from it all. Then sit back and take a laser focus gaze on a key project. You need the time to do exactly what you want to do and you deserve it. Take from what you learn from the Smart Sales Solution, that it is okay to put up your “Busy” sign, re-write your “away” message, or put on some headphones to spread the word to others that now is not a good time to be disturbed. You may need to temporarily unplug yourself from social medias, IM, phone and the internet. Doing these things may help you to get the most out of your time.
- Prepare yourself for delays and downtime. Have you ever been stuck in a doctor’s reception area, had a computer freeze up, been on telephone hold for a long time, or have an appointment arrive late? You will always have times like these; you may have to move your schedule around. This is not multitasking, it is just being flexible. Having your to-do list with you at all times will allow you to add those mundane chores to the list for such occasions. Even using that time for a 5 minute break is worthwhile, because taking time out for a short rest helps re-focus and get more out of your remaining hours.
- Schedule a Daily “To-Do” list and prioritize your task. It is important to be flexible at work and at play, but if there is no plan in place, then there is nothing to be flexible with. Moving around things is much different than just shooting from the hip. Smart Sales Solutions advises that you write the things down that you have to do. Then for each one taking a moment to consider what priority of task it is. Describing the steps involves, deciding the time to complete it and determining its importance relative to the other items on the docket. Prioritizing the things that you need to accomplish will ensure that your precious time is well spent. Remember you have the same amount of time that all the other busy holiday survivors have around you. The only difference is you choose to use yours wisely.
- Leave extra time. Speaking of scheduling and prioritizing, Smart Sales Solutions suggests that sometimes adding a little padding to your calendar is necessary, especially during the Christmas season. Whether it is an office Christmas gathering, getting through a busy airport, waiting to see Santa at the mall, baking all 8 dozen cookies you promised for the “cookie exchange” or getting to all your appointments on time. Don’t fuss about it, some thing’s just take longer than expected. So instead of robbing time from one thing and trying to fit it into another, why not plan a head for a few extra minutes to get through the family Christmas photo, or address all the Christmas cards to your past clients, sphere of influence, or friends and family. Or there is always the alternative, which brings us to the last item on the list and to the subject of our Last Blog.
- Practice saying “No” in a nice way! Ann Holloman advised in her last blog, that honesty really is the best policy so if you are too busy to accept an invitation or request, explain that you would like to say “Yes,” but just can’t right now, so the answer must be “No.” And instead of just giving them a hard “NO” offer to schedule a time that works for both of you in the future. This is a considerate way to let them know that it is not personal, and that you really want to spend time with them.
A lot of what has been said makes up the bigger picture, and does not deal with all the simple things in life that will make Holiday Time Management easier. Buying a planner or downloading a new time management app to your Smartphone would help. But remember, that doesn’t mean the steps are large and impossible. Focusing on a single idea or task at a time and repeating each new habit will go a long way towards improving the way you choose to manage your time. Before you know it Christmas will be here and gone, and you will have learned a very important lesson towards building your success in 2014.
Having a safe and joyous holiday season is really what it is all about. However, the true meaning is found in Luke 2:11 which says, “Today your Savior was born in David’s town, He is Christ the Lord.”
