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How To Keep Track Of Your Time
By Chief Procrastinator | October 22, 2009
In order to manage time effectively, you need to determine where your time actually gets spent. One helpful way of determining your actual usage of time is to track your time. This is one of the most essential part of effective time management. and is is one of the necessary time management techniques that you should put to use. The approach here is like planning a schedule, but it works in reverse. Instead of writing down the things that you are planning to do, time logging is a process of writing down the things that you have already done. Doing this is sort of a get- to-know-yourself exercise because this process will highlight many of your habits that you may unknowingly ignore currently.
For instance, some people find that every time they plan to do math homework they end up watching TV. Instead of studying for that math test, they play Internet poker. Other people just don’t seem to follow their schedule until the week before finals.
Whatever your time habits are, time tracking will help you adjust and fine-tune your time management habits. Having accurate information concerning your time usage patterns can serve as another important point of reference for self-monitoring. The following are several ways to track your time. Take a moment to do this – it will truly help you open your eyes and take control of your time.
1. Time tracking is fairly straightforward. At the end of every hour jot yourself a quick note about how you specifically spent your time for that hour. The note needn’t be long - one sentence or less should do. If the way you spend your time does not tally with an already planned activity, just enter a comment as to what you really did during that time. This way you will be able to reflect on patterns that emerge in the way you use your time and make the relevant adjustments to improve your productivity.
2. Some may find it helpful to modify the planning page to facilitate tracking time. The modifications are easy enough: make two columns on your paper for each day of the week. In one column, write down the plan you are trying to follow; in the second column, make notes on what you actually did with your time. The side-by-side comparison is very telling and is an effective way of figuring out where you’re not using time in the way you have intended.
3. Another effective way to make changes and get results from your time management strategies is to summarize your time use by time categories such as: sleep, study, work, travel, etc.
Estimate how much time you think you spend on the various activities listed and enter these in the “expected” row in the summary sheet. Feel free to include any additional categories that might be helpful. Then log your time for one week on an hour by hour basis. When the week comes to a close, summarize your time by category for each day, add up the values for all seven days of the week, and write the totals in the “actual” row of the summary sheet.
Summarizing your usage of time enables you to understand the precise amount of time you really spend in the various areas of your life. It is almost certain that you will see a significant difference between the number of hours you expected to use in certain categories and the actual number of hours you spend.
If you realize that you spend more time in one area than you intended, and less in another, the weekly summary of how you use your time clearly shows you which activities to reduce to find the extra time you want for more important areas of your life. Indeed, you will find that time tracking by activity will serve you well as one of the most helpful time management strategies that you can employ as you implement it in your daily life.
Topics: Time Management |
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