Mc connell pp_ch37

Umiker's Management Skills for the New Health Care Supervisor, Fifth Edition Charles McConnell

Chapter 37 Time Management

Time Management Programs
Time management programs succeed only if one commits to reaching a goal and sticks to that commitment. Experts can tell you how to save time, but you must supply the necessary discipline and give up some activities.

Time Waster: “Management by Crisis”
Supervisors who practice management by crisis have major time problems. They react rather than anticipate and plan. They spend excess time running around trying to resolve crises instead of preventing them.

Time Waster: Perfectionism
Perfectionists are not satisfied with excellence; they strive for perfection. They check and double-check everything. They invariably obtain more data and opinions than they need.

Time Waster: Failure to Delegate
Managers who do not delegate are always running out of time because they try to do things that others could do for them in addition to the things that only they can do.

Time Waster: Passivity
Passive individuals have the same time problems as those who fail to delegate. They can’t turn down requests that consume their time, they struggle to keep up with their own work while allowing themselves to constantly diverted.

Your Work Station
The best place to start a time management program is your personal work area where you can see results quickly. To avoid distractions, move your desk so that it does not face the door, or keep your door closed. Arrange filing cabinets and other furnishings to provide ready access to documents.

Paper Flow
Try to handle each incoming item only once. Practice the 3D idea: Do, Delegate, or Discard. When you hesitate to discard, ask yourself “What is the worst thing that could happen if I do not have this?”

Information Overload
The only sure-fire way to avoid information overload is to daily separate the relevant from the non-relevant, act at once on what requires action, and do not let the pile get ahead of you.

Planning and Scheduling
Establish goals, priorities, schedules, and deadlines for all major undertakings. The more time you spend preparing for meetings, the less time is wasted at those meetings.

Use “To-Do” Lists
Enter tasks on a “to-do” list. Number the actions in order of importance and urgency, and go to work first on the most important item. Do not expect to accomplish everything on your list every day. Remake or update the list daily.

Delegation
The greatest supervisory time saver of all is delegation. Every hour that someone else does something that you previously did is an hour of your time that is saved. Delegation is fundamental to any supervisor’s long-run success.

Minimize Procrastination
Use prioritized task lists
Start the day with the high-priority or unpleasant tasks
Avoid the temptation to stall
Do not get involved with trivia

Block out enough time to complete time-consuming tasks
Subdivide a large task into smaller pieces
Convince yourself that what you are facing truly need doing
Challenge your excuses

Do not reward procrastination. Do not allow yourself to engage in pleasant activities while you delay action.
Set a timer for 5 minutes, and force yourself to start when it goes off.

Principal Times Wasters
Doing things you don’t need to do personally
Inefficient planning, organizing, and scheduling
Unnecessary or poorly run meetings.
Interruptions, particularly drop-in visitors, emergencies, telephone calls, etc.

Learn to Say “No”
To avoid over-commitment of your time and other resources, learn to say “no” diplomatically but emphatically

Visitor Control
Train and empower your staff so they have less need to consult with you or to get your permission on routine matters.
Train your staff to help visitors when you are not immediately available.

Visitor Control
Meet people in their territory rather than in yours
Shut your door when you really need privacy
Intercept visitors outside your office. Once people get into your office, transaction time increases.

Visitor Control
Remain standing and do not invite the visitor to be seated.
Use verbal and nonverbal language to signal that you wish to end the meeting.

Group Meetings
Try to limit group meetings to 45 minutes. People start becoming restless after that. If you must go on for a longer time, call a short break.

Time Poorly Spent
Tolerating abuses of your open-door policy.
Overuse of memos, reports, and email messages.
Unnecessary or poorly run meetings.
Lack of assigning and delegating.
Excessive socializing.

Time Poorly Spent
Doing other people’s work and solving their problems.
Accepting unimportant assignments.
Lack of planning, usually resulting in a management-by-crisis approach.
Inadequate paper flow and storage.
Procrastination, always a thief of time.

Forms of “Time Theft”
Taking unjustified sick days.
Arriving late or leaving early
Taking long breaks or extended meal periods.
Leaving one’s post for personal trips

Forms of “Time Theft”
Performing personal tasks on the job
Socializing excessively
Interrupting others needlessly
Wandering about the facility when supposedly working

Mc connell pp_ch37

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