Create a Time Log to Eliminate Time Wasting Activities and Maximize the Usage of Your Time

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Know Where Your Time Goes

Find out what you spend your time on and eliminate time-wasting activities by creating a time log.

You can know exactly where your time goes, and you can start focusing your time on the 20% tasks that bring 80% value - based on the 80/20 rule.

Do you know how ineffective time managers spend their time?They spend most of their time on activities that bring 20% of results. As their important projects reach the due date, the activities that deliver 80% of value are not done; they are done only in the last minute!

That’s why it’s important for you to track your activities, these steps will show you how to track your activities, then you will learn how to use it to spend your time more effectively.

Steps for Creating and Using a Time Log for Increased Personal Productivity

1. Record Your Activities

Record all the activities you do every 15 minutes.

Whether it’s taking a shower, chatting with friends, travelling or working; record these activities down.

At the end of the week you will have a record of how you spent your time.

2. Evaluate

3. Eliminate Time Wasting Activities

4. Maximize Your Time

Work in blocks of time. Take a look at your time log, are you switching from one task to the next every few minutes? Learn how to focus on one thing until it gets done. Create blocks of uninterrupted time to get your most important tasks done.

Work on high value tasks. Focus on tasks that bring you the highest return of your time. Take a look at the activities in your time log, which one or two activities made a real difference in your life? Focus on these few activities, these are the 20% tasks that bring 80% value according to the 80/20 rule.

Learn while travelling. You can turn your free time to ‘learning time’ with what business speaker Zig Ziglar calls an ‘automobile university’. When you are driving, listen to educational tapes that will help you in your field, 8 hours of driving a week adds up to 32 hours of learning a month. Within a year you will have 384 hours of learning all the material in your particular field, with absolutely no extra effort on your part - this is truly maximizing your time!

Prioritize your activities. Look at the time management matrix, are you prioritizing your activities every day with your to-do list ? Make it a point today to plan all your activities in advance and get important work done before any other activities.

What is Good Use of Your Time?

Visit the goal setting section of this website for goal setting tips and resources.

Be aware of how you use your time daily.

Record your daily activities in your time-log for another week and you will see big improvements when you implement these recommended techniques for maximizing your time.

You were asked earlier on whether you would like to accomplish more in your current workweek WITHOUT increasing the number of hours you work. Since you have read until the end of this article, it's safe to assume that you answered “Yes!” to that question.

You have already been exposed to a technique to increase your personal productivity and efficiency. Now continually improve the way you spend your time with the help of a time log. Follow the steps above. This will make you a more effective worker.