1. The document discusses time management and argues that it has more to do with priorities than time itself. It defines time management and discusses different interpretations. 2. It argues that true time management is about managing priorities, available energy, resources, and processes for tasks rather than focusing solely on time. Prioritizing tasks and organizing them according to importance is more important than trying to complete them faster. 3. There are many different time management systems and approaches that can be used, but the key is selecting one that fits your life goals and plans, is compatible with your daily activities, and allows you to invest extra time gained into meaningful pursuits.

1. Takis Athanassiou
A Time Management Approach
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2. Expand Your Time Margins

3. Expand Your Time Margins
Time management does has nothing to do with time! But it has a lot of doing with priorities.
But, how we define time management, today, and what different our interpretation has
towards, similar, other “explanations“?
It is only a matter of interpretation or a matter of the focus, that lead us in a different approach
today.
And if so, why we need something “different“?
First things first, though. Time management, in general, is defined, as:
the act or process of planning and exercising conscious control over the amount of time spent on specific activities,
especially to increase effectiveness, efficiency or productivity. Time management may be aided by a range of skills,
tools, and techniques used to manage time when accomplishing specific tasks, projects and goals complying with a due
date. Initially, time management referred to just business or work activities, but eventually the term broadened to
include personal activities as well. A time management system is a designed combination of processes, tools,
techniques, and methods. Usually time management is a necessity in any project development as it determines the
project completion time and scope.(From Wikipedia: Time management)
This definition provides a context of reference for defining time management in different
situations, something which leads to various discussions. For instance, the how the personal time
management can fit within business activities and how eventually today, we could achieve a
balance between personal and work life. But these discussions are, still, a matter of
interpretation!

4. Expand Your Time Margins
The management clause in time management phrase, lead us though, to falsely believe that by
managing a slice of time, actually we can be more productive. Nothing less more elusive, than
that.
Productivity commonly related to “measure of the efficiency of production“. (From Wikipedia:
Productivity). Therefore we talk about how we can be more efficient in a given task (in terms of
quality, amount, volume, process, optimizations, etc), rather that more faster in doing it (a
common misconception)!
The art of time management referred more to the management of the priorities, of the available
energy, of the processes used, of the resources allocated for this or that task, and eventually
about the time we have for carry out a given task / activity (if there are time restrictions or any
other time limitations management has to cope with) etc.
Almost never we don’t talk about time management and the time per se, outside of the context
of a given task(s) or activity(s).
In such a way, we are able, to manage what have to be done, based on what our purpose,
vision, goal, scope! We manage all these in the framework of certain organizational or
personal restrictions that, at first, appear that they dictate the urgent and set our priorities.
As Stephen Covey suggested in the past, we should define and manage what we consider as
urgent and what as important (but not exactly in that order and not in same manner!).
Is this enough for gaining efficiency in the execution of a task? Yes, some time is. For when we
define something (according to ourselves, our beliefs, our convictions, etc) we bound it (tie it)
with our strata of knowledge, skills, beliefs, attitudes, and thus we recognize it and identify it as
part of our normal, everyday, action.

5. Expand Your Time Margins
In such a way we organize an activity and proceed it in a way that is accustom to us, without
following outside or from 3rd party “demands“! In layman’s terms this is means that we attach it a
tag of priority (A,B,C, or 1,2, 3, etc) and we put it in our own and personalized task list (you see how
easily an event and our current or future response become a task! For instance something have to
be done, in a future time we would decide/define and we list it among our other things to be done
in its proper position. So we prioritize it!).
In such a manner the focus is shifting to the personal accountability, a realm in which we decide for
what exactly we are responsible of and how we handle it. In such a way neither the limited time,
the few available resources or your boss’s priorities imposes you something. On the contrary is
something YOU assume the responsibility of doing it. You own it!
Following the above mentioned, path of logic, we can see that there is a clear path interlinking
the time management to priorities.
Moreover, it seems, that time management may be more efficient if we make a more
conscious use of defining and managing the priorities, bound to an activity.
Let’s see the steps again:
1. You usually receive a work or personal related stimulus (something should be managed!)
2. you take ownership (either of your own volition or because you have to do it due to your
position in the organization of a company, etc) of the handling (managing!) of the task
related to the stimulus received
3. You identify it
4. You select your response toward that task/event/stimulus (you may, for instance, ignore it,
file it, ignore it or do something with this stimulus: call, computer entry, appointment setting,
meeting, etc – all from Getting Things Done System)

6. Expand Your Time Margins
5. You categorize it according to your production/time management/ process system you use
6. You record it in your action list
7. You prioritize it
8. You execute it according to your system of doing things
9. You remove it from you list when competed
10.You move to next task
All the above process, is certainly a management process, but a process having to do with priorities,
rather than the time of execution (the time many times, may be irrelevant, if not a problematic
factor in the implementation, especially when the prioritization have not been a correct one!).
When you remove yourself from subscribing in the time handling scheme and follow the priority one,
your execution flow would be move along further and more flawless.

7. Expand Your Time Margins

8. Expand Your Time Margins
Time management is one of the basic skills of our culture! Time is one of the most scarce
commodities in your life. It never seems enough, yet, once it passed, you can never re-claim it (or
can you?)!
For this reason, you should always manage it wisely and monitoring (if not safe guarding[!]) it
closely under the view of your goals and objectives.
Time is a strategic resource in your life. One of the most basic lesson, I have learned, when I
started my professional life, is to have goals and suitable tools for measure your progress.
Relating to the resource called, time, it is always legitimate to ask the question: “time for what“?
This is a tricky question and most of the times, triggers a batch of more relevant questions about,
time:
 Why I (you/he/she) needs more time?
 What he/she would do with the extra time or the time he/she gained?
 How you can do more things in a certain period?
 How to gain more time, doing things you like and not things you dislike?
 How to make a better life-work balance?
 How to limit the time spend in non-productive activities?
 How to invest more time in the areas of our personal and professional life that promote our
goals & dreams?
 How to automate the less interested areas of our work, to focus on the important ones?
 How to prioritize, without feeling guilty of stealing time from someone else (our significant other,
our family, our friends, etc)
 How to lead a life without time frictions or bottlenecks?
 …

9. Expand Your Time Margins
Well, the answer is not an easy one and certainly there is no a single answer, time management
system, method, technique, tool, or something else, that can effectively answer that need! But
there are clues that can lead anyone to the desired direction.
There are around, many approaches about time & effort management, all of which can be
utilized by someone needs a better way of managing his or hers, time.
Some of the most widely used include:
 The Getting Things Done System,
 The Autofocus Time Management System & Productivity Method,
 The Zen to Done method, and
 The Now Habit approach
to name only a few!
All these approaches can be used with great success, by somebody, who is willing to invest in
such tools and aiming at managing more effectively his or her time! But for me, before you select
any of these systems or the tools that support such approaches, you need to answer five (5) basic
question, first.
Namely:
 Are you ready to invest time in order to gain time? Before you gain some more time, or create
more margins in your everyday life you need, first, to invest resources and time in order to
customize the system you are going to select to your specific requirements and life conditions.
That, most of the times, is not ease and, off course, takes time!
 Your time management approach is compatible with your life plan and your life’s strategic
resources? Since time is one of the most valuable resources is your life, you need to select an
approach that is fitted to the general goals of your life. It does not make any sense to select an
approach, that would not provide the intended results, isn’t it?

10. Expand Your Time Margins
 Do you know how to use the extra time, you are going to gain? It is an important question, a
one, cannot be answered frivolously! It needs focus thinking, because the time gaining would
always be a gain in strategic resources, needed for promote our objectives in life. If you going
to put yourself in trouble by adopting a time management system and invest time in tweaking
it, customize it in your needs and enhance it, just for gaining some time in front of a TV, for
instance, instead having quality time with your family, perhaps, the effort does not worth it!
 What is Time Management for YOU, and how you going to fit it in your daily activities? It is
important to adopt and employ a time management approach that would fit smoothly in your
life and daily activities! It would be totally counterproductive to use a system that you would
spend more time for its maintenance rather than for its utility and the time it can gain you!
 How you going to measure if your time management approach is effective or not? It is always
important to have the right metrics in order to monitor your progress and the time you have
gain in the process. Without the proper measurements, it would be impossible to evaluate the
one system, against the other, and quite impossible to have a solid, logical, base for the
adoption of one system against the other.

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12. Expand Your Time Margins
Time management is an essential skill today. A skill that permits you to do (or not do) certain
required or intended things. But time is a very scarce resource and for that reason, time
management should be an effective one! So how you can do that?
Actually it is simple! If you know how and if you can answer some very basic questions.
Time management is a necessity for you, to do what have to be done. Basically is:
necessary because (1) available time is limited, (2) time cannot be stored: if unused it is lost forever, (3)
one’s goals are usually multiple, sometimes conflict, and not all goals are of equal priority, (4) goals cannot
be accomplished without the application of effort, which requires the use of time. (From Wikipedia: Time
management)
But the time management is not an unilateral entity and certainly is not only related to the
management of time. It is much more, and usually incorporates some very personal core values
and principles, since time is the one resource you cannot reclaim after you have spent it.
Therefore the simple act of the management of time has to do with who you are, what you
believe and above all how you want to live.
This is the reason, why the time management is related to:
1. (personal and/or professional) Vision and core principles and values. The simple act of taking
time (!) to maximizing the output of your spend time in a given activity (an other definition for
the productivity!) proves the significance of such an activity. More over the effort, the energy
the deliberation you provide, in order to do the things more efficient, in more speed and
accuracy, in larger volumes, and the literature you monitor (including this post!) for maximizing
the work – life balance, indicate, the how you want to spend your personal and professional
time, as well as many aspects of your character.

13. Expand Your Time Margins
2. Decision – Making process. The how and where you spent you time relates to your priorities
and objectives, either in personal or professional life. You might choose to maximize your free
time against your working time and in order to do so you need perhaps to do these action, to
avoid those activities, to delegate other, etc. In any case you need to employ a coherent
time strategy for managing your time and be more productive!
3. Personal manifestation of the time management principles you use. You will be characterized,
partly(!), by your execution capabilities and your ability to keep up your commitments, both of
which are related to your time management capabilities. So it is important to develop and
exercise excellent time management capabilities!
4. Command – Execution. As, in point 3, your ability to command your time and resources and
executed upon (or under) these constrains is capable to promote you further or set serious
barriers in your future objectives and course of actions.
In order to perform effective time management you need to use various strategies and
techniques that would bring you closely to the achievement of your objectives. These may be:
 Deep understanding of your capabilities and objectives,
 Development of a coherent strategy for handling the time either on personal or professional
level,
 Planning of your future course of actions based on the understating of your self, and of your
available resources,
 Assumption of the responsibility and accountability for the delivery of the intended future
outputs to you and to the others,
 Understanding of the time an activity needs to be done and commitment on its completion,

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 Acknowledgement, design, planning, evaluation and (if needed) modification of:
 when you can do a certain activity or task?
 what have you to do?
 how you can do it?
 how can you build and align the required time slots with the intended objectives?
 what are the minimum set of conditions needed for you to deliver a fundamental
change in your everyday actions?
 how you can get equipped with the proper habits, mental attitudes, tools, skills and
knowledge in order to develop and deploy the right capabilities in relation to a more
effective time management?
The answer to these questions, is, of course, a personal choice and depends on deep reflection
of your personal “wants”, ambitions and deliberations. But these answers, not only would
characterize your time management style, but would probably make a huge difference in your
capability of being productive, or not!

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Takis Athanassiou is an e-Business and e-Learning Consultant. He has been working for over 20
years in IT sector, as Project Manager, Team Leader and Director in Greek SMEs, focused
mainly in areas of IT services, e-Learning and consulting.
CONTACT
You can contact Takis Athanassiou, using the following addresses:
takis@takisathanassiou.com
http://takisathanassiou.com/
http://www.linkedin.com/in/tathan
http://plus.google.com/107514131185343795708/posts
http://facebook.com/takis.athanassiou
http://twitter.com/tathan
Today he is active in the areas of business consulting, e-Learning and social media, while he is writing,
blogging and discussing about, business, e-Learning, leadership, productivity, personal development,
social media and tools that facilitate and support the flawless execution in everyday business and personal
life.