Saturday, November 17, 2012
Time Management is a Personal Problem…
lifehack.org: And it’s not one that your work cares about.
What? Of course my employer cares about how efficient I am!
Well maybe – but it depends on your job. With ‘information jobs’ and so on (by which I more or less mean anything not utterly mechanical) the thing your employer cares about is you getting the job done. They don’t care how many hours into your weekend you work, just that the report is done by the following Monday.
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14 comments:
Totally agree!! Time management is a PERSONAL PROBLEM, which could be solved only by ourselfs. i still remember the first day of my college, during the tour around our campus, my advisor told me that all the people who think their time is not enough to finish every thing, they are just don't know how to manage their time. totally. people here, as well as people in my college, they are the best of the best, we have the amazing speed to deal with problems and do different kinds of stuff. the mission we get now is really not a heavy baggage. all we need to do is manage our time in an efficient way and make every second counts. and i don't think this is something other people can do for us, only we can save ourselfs. well, it is hard, but i think this is the only way to succeed and make our life easier and efficientive.
The flip side of this coin is making sure that there is sufficient time to be managed. Employers sometimes ask too much of the employees and that is how people get burned out. Being efficient with time also includes getting enough sleep and striking the correct balance between life and work. If you overwork yourself there is a point of diminishing returns where you can not manage your time because you have diminishing returns on your time at work. In the Theatrical world we seem to be very good at thinking that we have a time management problem when instead we have worked ourselves to the point that we can no longer be efficient. Another part of this equation that I did not see brought up is where you work and how to limit distractions and get the highest efficiency which is a highly individual thing. Find what works and where you can motivate yourself to do the work that needs to be done and do not feel bad about standing up for yourself and letting people know that you do not have the linear time to accomplish the task with the tooling and skills at your disposal.
I agree that time management is a personal problem. People will all deal with time management in a different way, but in the end... it is up to that person to decide whether or not they want to use their time wisely. But...not even just use it wisely...Use time correctly in a way that it will be most beneficial to you. I'm pretty lucky that time management skills are something that I have learned quickly in college and throughout schooling, but, I now realize that it is a hard thing to learn! There will always be something that I'd rather be doing...and I have found that sometimes its better to take the time to do that "something else" and to take a break from work. I guess time management is not something you can teach. You need to be able to learn it yourself. Learn what works best for you and how you function.
I hate to repeat all of what has been already said, but I would also have to agree! Time-management requires a lot of soul searching, to which YOU can only be responsible for (as in, you are the sole person (or "soul", bad pun!) who can control your personal situation. No articles can answer your own questions for you- its difficult to address and know how to solve organization questions, its something I'm still trying to figure out! All I know is that every person is different, and all you can do is try to apply the tips that are suited most for you, try new things, but try NOT to be discouraged if those things fail, get right back up and discover what you could have done better, or just differently the first time. Knowing how to be the best you can is something very difficult, and the closest we can be to discovering what that is just takes a lot of practice, determination, but also understanding of yourself. I hope everyone takes a little time to just take care of themselves and their needs, see what work best for them, and just listen to your gut! Its difficult, but being a friend to yourself in just understanding yourself is the first step, one that might even come with challenges, but is something I'm trying to learn too. Sometimes "being the first penguin" has to start with knowing who you are, penguin or human, or anything in between or not!
I definitely agree with the author of this article. Before coming to CMU, I was told my various students and professors here that one of the biggest things you learn as a freshman is how to manage your time, and it's completely true. At CMU, I've found this statement to be true: Either you manage your time, or you don't sleep. With that said, I still believe that time management is a personal issue. For starters, everyone works differently. For example, some people can finish a drafting assignment in 2 hours whereas it takes other 10+ hours. For those two people, they will have very different priorities with managing their time. It is important for someone to know their strengths and weaknesses, and to evaluate their priorities, and manage their time from there. I'm thankful for learning as much as I have during this first semester here at CMU, about time management and beyond!
Ah, time management. A topic Joe Pino dedicated an entire class period of metaskills to. A problem countless generations have suffered from, and yet one that we still have no definite solution to. There are so many different theories and ideas on how to make people accomplish things more efficiently - this flowchart idea is just one of many in this category, each with varying degrees of success. But do any of them truly work? Of course not. Because human beings are not robots. We all work differently, have different habits, get distracted by different things. So time management becomes a game of trial and error; each person must attempt to find the ideal form of time management for themselves as individuals, the form that targets their weaknesses and finds ways around them.
Hence the difference between working a job that is freelance versus being an employee. The expectations of the employer on time spent, or if they are only interested in the product. You need to manage those expectations of what the product is, otherwise your time spent will be inconsistent with your compensation. Protect yourself! Yes, you should be responsible for your own time management at that point, but you also need to protect yourself from having to work more than is possible or reasonable.
Time management is something that every struggles and especially what drama students are going through. Especially for me, I still have some problems with managing my time to do my work. Like how Joe Pino mentioned in his class, Time management is something that one can control. So, it is definitely a personal problem. I think if it keeps to distract from putting decent amount of time with efforts, this will be a serious problem in the past too. So, regardless of work amount, the person is the charge of managing time to finish the work done before dealine. I also keep reminding myself that I have to fix my habit of procrastination because when I grow up and get a job, there will be no second chance to make up the late work.
Anyone who attends CMU will learn about time management soon enough. If you are lucky enough to come here with that skill already under your belt, then you are little ahead of the game. For most of us, we didn't understand the real meaning of time management until we got here and lived the life of a student in the drama department. Like the article said, it's a personal problem. Everyone is different in how they manage their time. Sleepless nights are part of the deal, but hopefully not on a regular basis. I have learned a lot on how to manage my time. For me personally, I stopped working my two jobs so I could have more time to manage in the first place. Yes, I'm poor, but it has worked out better for me this semester. I think we all continue learning time management skills in relation to the job we are doing at the time. It's a work in progress for all of us......... and probably forever.
I think that Time Management is something that students in every educational institution should be forced to take a class in. I know that in our program we take "Metaskills" which is incredibly useful, but most people do not take it seriously because it does not require homework and seems like a class of fun facts. It is important for a program that is so demanding to give information about how to manage your time efficiently to make sure that we are prepared by graduation and know how to handle a large work load without it ruining our personal lives. This article doesn't give the most useful information on how to solve this personal issue, though, although the chart it suggests sounds like a good start.
I completely agree that time management is a personal problem. There are quite a few ways to better time manage but i dont really get the flow chart. I feel like that would just be a big waste of time, and one of those things that helps you procrastinate other work by making you sort of feel like you are being productive.
I also think it would be a smart move on the part of the companies to either offer time management classes or for employes to be able to go to their bosses and ask for help on how to time manage. It would benefit both parties because usually people who get their work done in a timely manor get better work done and have time do perhaps do slightly more work and they will be happier which makes for a better work environment for everyone.
Time management is obviously something that many people struggle with and something that could be worked on by a great many of us here at CMU. However, I question the usefulness of this article. Yes, time management is a personal problem and you need to figure it out yourself, but I question his flow chart idea. Sure, he prefaces it with an apology for being so general, but even so, I agree with what someone above said: it seems like a way to do more work without doing any work. The two questions he ends with (Could I make this more efficient or effective?) are incredibly important to ask ourselves when we're doing something, but making a flow chart of every work flow we have going on at any one time, and then looking at all of the steps to try to identify inefficiencies doesn't seem like a cost-effective way to spend your time., especially if you have 4 or 5 (or more) work flows going at once.
I definitely agree that time management is a personal problem. The whole idea of a company hiring you is that you are able to fit to their schedule. I like the idea of the flow chart, though I personally work better with a list. The chart is a good idea because it shows the progression of a process and allows one to see how well they are doing on one task as compared to another, letting them see which ones are done for the time being and which ones need help. Efficiency is a great point too. I feel I often find myself switching methods in the middle of a task and asking myself those questions could be a great reminder of efficiency.
I think this article brings up a good point time management is completely personal. If you have a large variety of tasks you have to decide how and when you are going to do them. You have a deadline and you have to use whatever means to get this done by this deadline. Employers don't care how many hours it takes or if you take a break every five minutes if it gets done. I think also it goes to show how much someone can do in their personal life. I find myself using time management if I have a lot of things to do be it a return or laundry I am strangely much more motivated to get stuff done. That's because it is your time. But if you treat everything with this importance both work and personal you find you will have a LOT more time.
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