By Robin Sharma
As I wrote in my first book MegaLiving, time is your most precious commodity. Manage it wisely and you are certain to achieve personal, professional and even spiritual fulfillment. Spend it ineffectively and sooner or later, you will be flooded with a sense of regret over missed sales opportunities, triumphs and achievements. The heart of skillful time management lies in devoting your time to the things that count. Yet in these information-crazed times we live in, where salespeople are faced with endless voice mail messages, stacks of faxes and a steady stream of e-mail messages, focusing on those high-leverage priorities can be an enormous challenge.
Here are six practical strategies to manage your time more effectively in these turbulent times:
Embrace Technology
It is to offer a blinding glimpse of the obvious to state that technology has the power to rule your life if you don't take charge. For example, a chief financial officer at a company in Silicon Valley returned to work after a seven-day vacation to find 2,000 e-mail messages waiting for him. His response? He deleted them all on the assumption that the important ones would be sent again. Modern "smart tools" ranging from voice-mail to the internet, are a wonderful servants but tyrannical masters. As the IBM motto said: "Machines should work. People should think." Set aside specific times during the day to review e-mail and voice-messages. Become an expert computer user. Keep faxes under one page in length (the recipients will appreciate you to no end) and send them during off-hours.
Master Multitasking
As I teach in my time management seminars for sales companies, it is essential to master the art of doing two things at once to save time. Sort mail while on hold, read while exercising on a stationary bike at the gym, pay your bills while watching television. Listen to motivational tapes over breakfast. Effective time control requires nothing more than a little creativity and a strong desire to enhance the quality of your personal and professional life.
Join the 5 O'clock Club
From Mahatma Gandhi to Ted Turner, one of the best strategies to get more done in your day is to rise early. Plan to get up at progressively earlier times for 21 days in a row, the period it takes to create a new habit. Set up a series of small rewards to keep you motivated to follow through on your goal. In time, this habit will become a part of you and offer you a few extra hours every day.
Renew Yourself
"Find the right balance in life. Man is body, mind and spirit. Give the right attention to each," wrote Montapert. Top performing salespeople understand that time spent renewing themselves, whether through watching the sun rise once a week or going for a run every evening, is time well spent. You cannot do good unless you feel good. By scheduling time for stress reduction, physical fitness and care of the spirit, you will nourish every other hour with energy, creativity and effectiveness. As Abe Lincoln noted sagely "if I had 8 hours to chop down a tree, I'd spend 6 hours sharpening an axe."
Use Your Commute Time Wisely
If you commute thirty minutes each way every day, by the end of one year, you will have spent six weeks of eight hour days in this activity. Use your commute time to reflect, to return phone calls, to dictate or to listen to motivational cassettes. Make your car a college on wheels, using your drive time to learn and improve.
Be Unorthodox
Run your own race. Break away from time traditions and start doing things when no one else is doing them. Call your prospects between 8 and 9 am. Dine at restaurants during non-peak hours to beat the line ups and get better service. Do your weekend errands early Saturday morning to beat the rush; what might normally take you three hours to accomplish can be done in half the time. Schedule your flights at low traffic times rather than rushing to catch the seven o'clock flight for a day of business in another city. Remember, good time management is good life management.