The times they are a-changin! It can be so hard to manage your time when it is flying by. Finding a good time management system will help you in prioritizing your errands as well as everything else on your calendar. It may surprise you that with a few organizational skills you will be able to save a stitch in time without being a calendar crazed-time planner-cop. This video is the first in a five part series where I will show you some of the time management skills I have developed over the years. It’s true that with effective time management and prioritization you will feel like you added minutes (or even hours) to your time schedule! “If your time to you is worth savin’, then you better start swimmin’, or you’ll sink like a stone. For the times they are a-changin’.” Wise words indeed Mr. Dylan!
(Click here to watch on YouTube if you can’t see the embedded player. Or watch the video at http://bit.ly/TCDTime1.)
Transcript:
Hi. I’m Lorie Marrero, and today’s Clutter Video Tip is Part 1 in a five-part series we’re doing on time management. People are making a big mistake out there, and that is thinking they have to conform to someone else’s time management system and do it perfectly. People think they have to buy this company’s day planner, and they have to fill out those forms exactly as they are, or they have to buy this expert’s book, and they have to follow that person’s advice and do it exactly the way they do it. And to me, that’s a recipe for disaster because one size does not fit all, and I believe time management is as unique and individual as a fingerprint, and it can change over time.
There are five elements to time management: capture, commit, cue, complete, and correct. And today in Part 1 of our series we’re going to go over capturing. So, you have a lot of information coming at you all the time, and that information needs to be captured so that you can look at that later and decide whether that’s something you actually want to do, and if you do, when you’re going to do it, or maybe if that’s just a piece of reference information that you need for later. So, you want to have a lot of these capturing tools in your toolbox. If you’re sitting at your desk, that’s really easy. You probably have a computer right there. You can type appointments directly into your calendar. You have a “to do” list right there; you have all manner of databases that you can capture and put information into. But if you’re not at your desk or maybe even if you are, you probably have a paper and pen, and you’ve got probably a notebook or a day planner. Or you may even have some kind of a list-making tool like this, or sometimes people even carry 3×5 cards around with them everywhere and use those as a capturing tool. There’s lots of ways to do it. Paper and pen is a great way that most people use on a regular basis. But you may be out and about, and you may not have a computer with you or even a piece of paper. But you probably have with you your phone.
Now, even if you don’t have a Smart phone, you can still use some very smart things about your phone and that is a service called Reqall for one. Reqall is a free service that you can sign up for and you call the special Reqall number, and you can say a message into the service and in a few minutes, you will receive a transcribed text of exactly what you said via e-mail. I am sure you can see how handy that might be. And, of course, you also have a camera on your phone and you can use that camera to capture information too. Maybe you don’t have a pen, but you can take a picture of somebody’s business card or take a picture of the hours of a business that you want to frequent.
So there are lots of ways to use your camera and in one example also you can use an app with your camera, Evernote. And that is a way to capture lots of information into your Evernote database – I use this all the time – your camera works with it, but also you can type directly into the Evernote database. And, of course, you have maybe a calendar or a “to do” list on a Smart phone. I use Remember the Milk, which is a “to do” list function that I sync with Outlook via my phone. And, of course, I can make calendar appointments or whatever I need to as well.
I’d like to give you an assignment today and have you think about what your favorite capturing tools are. And think about narrowing those down to just a few that are your favorites that you know that you will consistently check and work on. So today write those down and if you’re having trouble with that, you can look at our Member Message Board area where we have our organizing expert team that has helped thousands of people in over 18 countries since 2006 for about the price of a pizza. So, we can consult with you on what those capturing tools might be for you and your lifestyle. You can see more about that at clutterdiet.com/learnmore.
See you next time, and may you always be happy and grateful for having more than enough.
For the rest of this series on Time Management, please follow these links:
Part 2- Commit
Part 3- Cue
Part 4- Complete
Part 5- Correct
You may have been searching for how to effectively manage time, or best tools for information capture.
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