Skill Hacking Blog #7
To further my improvement of self-management, I went to the Lockwood Library to check out a book that had to do with my topic. I found a few that I thought would help me in my research but the one that I felt helped the best was a book titled, “Improving Total Productivity” by Paul Mali. This book describes different ways in which you can improve the way you work to increase productivity by managing time, organizing effectively, increasing motivation, etc. This book had good insights on to manage yourself and the workplace to improve overall productivity.
The chapter I focused the most on is Chapter 11: Managing time for improving productivity. This chapter describes how important managing your time is. “Stresses emerge as moving deadlines, unavailable personnel at a given time, shifting priorities, lack of resources when needed, decision crises, product and service stock outs, and the relentless rise in costs as time ticks on” (page 335). Mali is explaining that as there is less time to complete tasks, stress increases and it gets worse when there are limited resources you can use to accomplish the task. One way the book suggests on how to be the most productive you can, is to organize your time. He explains a “Productivity calendar” (page 336) which not only helps with managing the activities but also managing priorities. “Using the productivity calendar, block out committed time”; this suggests that if there are already activities that are set in stone, then work around them and make sure it is known that they are there. “Write monthly targets with deadlines”; write down all of the tasks that are to be done within the month, and assign priorities to them to know which ones are more dire than the others. “Evaluate monthly results”; at the end of the month, look back at the calendar to see what you have accomplished and how you can improve for next time.
This advice has made it easy to keep track of the responsibilities that have to be taken care of. Using the calendar, you can see when the deadlines are approaching and can manage your time around them. This book gave great information that I will be taking into account when I have to manage my time.
