TIME ENOUGH AT LAST?
How to get more done in less time
BY:MARY ELIZABETH TERZELLA
Balancing a career and caregiving can mean no R&R for you—unless you cut down on time-wasters and work smarter.
Here, strategies to get you out of the office earlier, so you can kick back and relax:
Set three top priorities for the day. Then you can focus your energy on must-do's—and will likely have time to complete them. "You'll leave the office feeling like you got important things done instead of fretting about the seven tasks you didn't cross off an overly long to-do list," says Donna Smallin, author of The One-Minute Organizer.
De-clutter your desktop. Stacks of papers and magazines can distract you from your work, so take 10 minutes to do a simple sort: toss everything you can, put papers to be filed in a basket or folder and place important memos in an "act now" file that you deal with ASAP. If time permits, rip out magazine articles of interest and put them in a "to read" file so you can trash the publications; if not, stash the magazines in a basket or bin.
Give yourself a deadline. "You want to file, not pile," says Smallin, so set aside time each day or week to winnow down papers to be filed. If you keep them in a folder in your drawer, post a time-to-file reminder on your calendar or computer.
Do one thing at a time. You may pride yourself on your ability to juggle several balls at once, but task switching will actually slow you down and the quality of your work will suffer. Research shows that multi-taskers take longer to complete tasks and make more mistakes.
Ignore the ring. Turn off the chime. If you compulsively check e-mail or pick up the phone at every bing or b-r-r-ring, you'll break your train of thought and get sidetracked by less-important demands. Instead, check messages once an hour and respond only to those that are urgent. Set aside blocks of time to answer the other calls and e-mails. That way, you'll leave yourself significant stretches to work without interruption—and you'll finish faster, says Smallin.