Do you ever sit at your desk at the end of the day and think – firstly, where did the day go and two? and second you didn't get half of what you wanted to do, done!  If you're looking for Time Management Strategies to get the most out of your day then here are three to get your started.

Time Management Strategy 1// Define your Direction

I've always thought that productivity has a basic requirement – direction.  If you understand where you are going with your business, career or anything, then you can make sure you have a clear plan to get there.   Most of the time we work IN our business and plod away wondering why we don't seem to have a clear idea of what we're doing day-to-day.  Taking time to work ON your business and really define what you want to achieve this month or even this week will really help with ensuring your work on things that will move your business forward.

By working ON your business you can look at what tasks you need to complete over the next week or month to reach your financial goals or complete a specific project in your business. Taking this time to really define what you want to achieve will help you be focused, manage your time and be productive.

 

Time Management Strategy 2// Break down key activities

Now that you know where you are going you can start to really identify the keys tasks, what's involved, how long each element will take and what the output will need to look like.  If you can start to break things down in detail then your To Do list becomes easier to write and manage.  You know what you need to do at what time and it also means you can manage your workload in a realistic way.  If you find that you want to do more than you can handle then you can outsource if needed otherwise it allows you to see that you may have to shift some deadlines to keep your sanity.

 

Time Management Strategy 3// Schedule your day and stick to your own time frames

When you have your To Do list sorted, you know what needs to be done, it's time to start to schedule that time into your diary.  Some days can be more relaxed than others but there are key points to note here:

• Schedule your diary as if you have an appoint and you've just booked a meeting with yourself for an hour to complete copy that you need to for you website, then another hour or two to get training completed and in the afternoon another hour for blogging etc.
• This time is non negotiable unless client paid work takes priority.  By having this rule for yourself, trust me, you'll get a huge amount of work completed!
• If you need to block social media sites then you can use sites such as www.anti-social.cc, getcoldturkey.com or sourceforge.net to name a few.  These allow you to set the times that you want to block social access.  The clearer my day, the easier it is to stay off social.  Going in 3 times a day is enough to manage business activity.

Next time you feel yourself losing time and sanity walk through this check list and it should steer you on the right path, it hasn't failed me yet!

What are your time management tips and strategies?  Leave them in the comments below as I'm always keen to build my productivity tools.