Do You Have The Time?

Do You Have The Time?
By Arthur Cooper
(c) Copyright 2003

How often do we hear the complaint in the workplace
“I haven’t got time” ?

“I haven’t got time to explain it to you. You will have to work
it out for yourself.”

“I haven’t got time to discuss that. You will just have to
accept my word for it.”

“I didn’t have time to prepare for this meeting.”

“I can’t stop for lunch. I have too much to do.”

“ I never take all my vacation. I have too much work on.”

You must have heard every one of these statements at some time
or another. You have probably made some of them yourself. And
every one of them is a result of failure on someone’s part to
organise their time or the time of their staff correctly.

Time is a resource like any other and it must be managed. If it
is wasted, it is gone forever. Once it has been used, it cannot
be re-used. It is finite and limited. You cannot make more of
it, but you can use it better.

But let’s start by being realistic. In any business there will
be times of overload. Activity within businesses is determined
by the customer and customers are not all predictable. You
cannot always plan ahead and anticipate every single
fluctuation of workload. So times of stress and overwork will
occur from time to time. This is normal. This is acceptable.

What is unacceptable is a general and sustained atmosphere of
frenzy and crisis and lack of time to do things properly. So if
you hear yourself or your colleagues or your staff repeatedly
making the sort of complaint illustrated at the start of this
article, you must, you absolutely must do something about it.

Let’s look again at these statements. You will see that they
fall into three main types.

No time to co-operate.
No time to prepare.
No time for rest.

Considering each in turn:

No time to co-operate.

The first two statements more or less say “I haven’t got time to
help you because I have too much to do myself”. This is an
absolute killer of team spirit and co-operative working. A new
member joining a team will naturally enough ask how certain
things are done. He will ask once, twice, three times maybe.
But after repeated brush-offs he will stop asking. The result
will be at best a long protracted learning period of low work
output, and at worst work that is of a poor standard or even
faulty.

A team by its nature is not a group of isolated individuals. It
is, or should be, an integrated group together producing more
than the sum of each individual working on his own. If you are
managing the team it is your vital responsibility to allocate
the tasks and the rewards in such a way as to foster
co-operation. And above all make sure that they have the time
to co-operate. You will get more out of your team in the long
run by not overloading them.

No time to prepare.

This is demonstrated by the statement “I didn’t have time to
prepare for the meeting”. It is a feeble excuse and completely
unacceptable. Unless summoned at the last minute by someone
whose authority cannot be defied, no-one has the right to
arrive at a meeting unprepared. It inevitably wastes time in
the meeting, which means the time of everyone present. It shows
a lack of respect and concern for the others at the meeting. It
shows that you don’t care.

You must make time to arrive prepared for all meetings, whatever
the type or subject. Whether it is a large formal meeting
called to discuss a major topic, or a one-to one meeting with
your boss or a member of your staff. Time spent in preparation
is repaid later in time saved, knowledge and authority
demonstrated, and increased likelihood of getting your
hoped-for result.

And what goes for meetings goes for whatever job you have to do.
Preparation always pays off. Make the time to prepare.

No time for rest.

The last two statements at the beginning of this article
illustrate this. There is something seriously wrong when staff
of a company consistently and regularly feel they have to work
their breaks, or when a manager cannot take his vacations year
after year. No-one can work continuously and unremittingly at
their top efficiency. Inevitably productivity will drop. It is
therefore in everyone’s interest that proper rests are taken.
It is in the interest of the individual, of his colleagues, and
his company.

So how to ensure that this is done? Give the vacations a level
of priority in your planning. Stick to the planning. Don’t
imagine that you are indispensable. You will be wrong. You will
be surprised perhaps ( even disappointed ) to discover that the
company continues to exist and function during your absence. Do
the same for your team. Make sure that they are rested and
refreshed for peak performance.

And now, in conclusion, just a few general rules for making the
most of your time.

Don’t put off unpleasant tasks.

Don’t put them to one side because they are unpleasant. Do tasks
in the order dictated by the importance of the result. Do
unpleasant tasks early in the day to provide an incentive to
finish them before moving on to something more attractive.

Chop up big tasks into small manageable ones.

A huge task lasting several days or weeks can be depressingly
daunting. Divide it up into smaller sub-tasks of short duration
( a few hours, say ). Each time you finish one of the sub-tasks
you will get a boost and a feeling of satisfaction. The overall
huge task will be whittled away steadily and with relative ease.

Allocate time for specific minor tasks (phoning, messages, etc.)

These are the sort of things that can eat away at your day until
you do little else. Give yourself a strictly limited time at
the same time every day to deal with your mail, for example.
Stick to the time, and stop when time is up. Then get on with
something more productive. Apply this to anything that for you
is routine, necessary, but not the principal object of your
work.

Keep an organised desk.

This avoids the paper shuffling familiar to many people as they
search amongst the documents strewn all over their desks, and
it allows you to concentrate in a more effective way on what
you are doing.

Try to keep on the desk at any one time just those papers
relevant to the task on which you are working. Don’t let your
eyes be distracted by piles of papers related to some other
unfinished job. It will only make you think of the other job
instead of the one in hand. Don’t let your desk become your
filing cabinet.

If you really have to keep papers for several separate jobs on
the desk together at the same time (maybe you are expecting a
phone call concerning one of them), then put them neatly to one
side away from your immediate line of sight.

Remember. Time that has gone has gone forever. Make the most of
what you have got.