Time Management
It might feel as if there is simply not enough time in a day to do all you need to get done. How can you keep yourself sane when you're overloaded with courses, research, teaching, and a life? Effective time management can help you tremendously. By setting up priorities and determining how much time to devote to each activity, you will feel more in control, less stressed and will ultimately get more things done.
Here are some tips:
Prioritize your tasks. Take a look over all there is on your plate and decide what's most important. For each task, assess whether it is urgent and whether this task is in any way vital to your professional or personal well-being. Based on these criteria, classify each task in one of the following categories (presented in Boss JM & Eckert SH ‘Where'd my day go?' – NextWave – 4/9/04): Urgent? Vital to Success?
Break large assignments and tasks into their component parts (Mountain with Stairs). For example, break a term paper into many smaller and more manageable tasks such as finding a topic, conducting literature searches, gathering articles and books, reading and taking notes, writing an outline, writing the first draft, and revising.
Do an honest assessment of the amount of time you waste. How much internet surfing and emailing do you do per day? How many talks unrelated to your research do you attend? Do you take on tasks that do not have any impact on your personal and professional success? Having an idea about how much time you spend in non-priority activities will help you manage your time more efficiently, and resist temptation.
Say "No." Sometimes we take on too much. Whether it is extra courses, job responsibilities, or extracurricular activities, consider how important each is to you before agreeing.
Go with your flow. Think about your biological peaks and lows. Are you a morning person? Or are you at your best at night? Plan your day accordingly. Save your most difficult work for the times when you're at your best. Assess what is the typical time of a session for you (i.e. the amount of time during which you can maintain optimal concentration) and schedule your tasks as sessions instead of number of hours.
Set goals and deadlines for yourself. For example, set realistic deadlines for each stage of completing a major assignment (e.g., term paper).
Stick to your schedule. Use a school planner, calendar or Outlook to stick to your schedule and to enable you to reassess when needed. Use different colors for the different aspects of your life, or to indicate priority. These simple steps will enable you to optimally deal with possible time conflicts among tasks and among your different obligations.
Set up time to organize and evaluate your time management plan. Take a few minutes every day (or week) to examine your calendar, note your upcoming assignments, and readjust the priority of a task or the time to be devoted to. These simple steps will go a long way in enabling you to stick to your schedule.
Reward yourself. Being more productive might feel very good already, but having extra time for rewards (ex: extra email time, seeing friends, catching a movie, etc) will help you stick to your schedule, and will certainly help you feel more confident and more in control.
Be flexible. While daily to-do lists are wonderful for helping you to organize and prioritize your life, remember that there will always be interruptions and distractions. Try to allow extra time for them, or reorganize your time if you are unable to stick to your original schedule due to an emergency.
Make use of wasted time. Have you ever noticed how much time you spend commuting, standing in lines, and waiting (for doctors, advisors, etc.)? Carry pocket work to make use of that time that would otherwise be wasted. Carry a short reading assignment or flash cards for studying. Or use the time to write in your planner and organize yourself. Ten minutes here, fifteen minutes later, it all adds up and you'll find that you can get more done.