What is time management?
Time management is about what we do with our time; how we manage our daily activities and work towards our goals. It can involve planning, goal-setting, and prioritising, among other skills.
Time management is important because it can improve our well-being, sense of life satisfaction, and performance at work or school. Many people would like to improve their time management skills, so that they can gain control of their endless to-do lists or spend more time on their hobbies. For this reason, it’s a popular focus in coaching work.
One misconception about improving time management is that it’s an all-or-nothing type of problem. So often, people will say to their coach that they’re simply “bad” at time management, as though it’s something we’re either born with or not.
The truth is, time management is a skill. Like a muscle, it needs regular practice to become strong. By increasing our awareness of our personal obstacles to time management (such as how we handle distractions or struggle with perfectionism), we can begin experimenting with new strategies.
Coaching is a great form of support for identifying these challenges and creating plans for overcoming them.
Why can time management be difficult?
Despite good intentions, many challenges can get in the way of time management. For instance, we might grapple with wanting our work to be perfect, causing us to never start. Or we might try to follow a colleague’s time management advice, which doesn’t align with our working style.
Identifying your own obstacles to good time management can be a great place to begin thinking about what gets in your way. Common time management challenges include:
- daily stress and anxiety, which can reduce energy levels and brainpower, making it harder for you to be productive
- pressures to be productive, as these can create guilt, which leads to additional anxiety and fatigue
- perfectionism, which can lead to the procrastination of tasks
- frustration with trying to emulate someone else’s style of time management when it doesn’t work for you
- attempting to multitask, which is often inefficient and stress-inducing
- underestimating how long things will take and not factoring in breaks or distractions
Once you’ve gained an awareness of what it is exactly that’s preventing you from managing your time, you can begin to think about tackling those obstacles and developing corresponding skills.
Nuerodivergence and time management
It's worth noting that neurodivergent people can experience difficulties with time management and may find traditional tools less helpful. If this is the case, working with a coach who is neurodiversity-informed and exploring different time management techniques can help you understand what works best for you.
What are time management skills?
There are several elements of time management that can be defined as separate skills.
These include:
Breaking things down
Breaking down tasks into defined, achievable steps is key to good time management. This taps into something called the ‘task completion bias’, whereby we feel rewarded by the quick completion of small tasks.
Doing so makes larger projects feel more manageable because they’ve been broken down into neater chunks. Plus, it can be easier to estimate how long smaller tasks will take, which makes your time management more accurate.
Prioritising
Being disorganised can create additional stress alongside our responsibilities and make it difficult to distinguish between the important and less important tasks.
So, one of the key elements of time management is being able to prioritise your responsibilities. This means asking yourself, Which tasks are most important? Which can I realistically complete today? And, which tasks will take the most time or preparation?
Overscheduling yourself can create extra stress and expectations. So, when prioritising, it’s better to be realistic about what you can accomplish on a given day, week, or month. You can always revise your priorities as time goes on, so it doesn’t need to be viewed rigidly. This brings us to the next skill, knowing what you’re capable of.
Knowing yourself
The way you organise your time will be personal to you. For instance, if you identify as a morning person, you won’t want to waste valuable morning brain power on less important activities.
Or if you know your limit is five hours of focused work per day, this is valuable information when it comes to planning. Time management shouldn’t be a rigid thing that’s based on what other people do. It works better when it’s personalised and aligned with your capabilities.
Since time management is an ongoing thing, it’s helpful to choose a system that feels easy for you. If it’s too complicated, you’ll be less likely to stick to it. For example, some prefer a paper to-do list, while others use digital platforms.
Identifying your strengths and limitations will be helpful when it comes to managing your time so that you can build a sustainable system that works for you. Working with a coach is a great way to focus on your unique needs.
Deep work
Effective time management involves deep work, which is when you’re entirely focused on a particular activity. Instead of multitasking, deep work requires you to schedule and protect blocks of time in which you can focus.
Effective deep work means altering your surroundings so that you’ll have minimal distractions or interruptions. This might mean using headphones, setting up auto-replies for incoming emails, or putting a ‘do not disturb’ sign on your office door.
Being intentional about periods of deep work is key to good time management, as it gives you space to truly focus and produce quality work.
Knowing when to take a break
We all tend to underestimate how much downtime we really need. Mental breaks, time with family and friends, and holidays are so important. When you’re getting enough rest, you’ll be in a much better position to tackle your responsibilities.
So, time management also involves allowing for rest, social plans, and hobbies, as these are part of a healthy lifestyle.
Seeing a greater purpose
Many of us will have short-term tasks and long-term dreams. If none of our short-term tasks help us work towards long-term dreams, we might feel less motivated to work and manage our time effectively.
For example, your short-term work tasks might connect with a long-term dream of holidaying in Fiji, but what about that dream to learn to play the saxophone? A greater vision for what you’re working towards can serve as motivation to manage your time and tasks. Without this, time management might feel pointless.
If you decide to work with a coach, they can help you identify the skills that you’re already good at and those that you might need to strengthen.
How to improve time management
As mentioned, the best time management techniques will vary person to person, depending on your particular challenges and styles of working. However, here’s a summary of suggested time management methods and tips based on what we’ve discussed on this page:
- Plan to do only the tasks that can realistically be done in a day, week, or month.
- Arrange your schedule around your usual energy levels and lifestyle, such as deep work in the mornings or more straightforward tasks on Fridays.
- Break down your tasks into smaller sub-tasks.
- Allow for blocks of deep work.
- Schedule in breaks and time for socialising, exercise, or hobbies.
- Combat forecasted distractions with headphones or auto-reply emails.
- Connect some of your weekly tasks with long-term goals to boost motivation.
Of course, what works for you won’t work for everyone. Working with a coach can help identify the best time management techniques for you.
How time management coaching can help
Time management isn’t about being the world’s most perfect organiser. It’s about figuring out what techniques work for you and your lifestyle. With self-compassion, you can identify what tends to get in your way and what allowances you need to work effectively.
Working with a time management coach can help this process by giving you an outside eye with expertise in goals, challenges, and personalised strategies. When working with a coach, you can expect:
- an initial conversation about your aims and difficulties
- to explore your values and motivations
- a personalised plan to achieve your goals
- ongoing support and check-ins
At Life Coach Directory, we list verified business and life coaches across the UK, making it easy to explore your options and find someone who can support you in developing your time management skills. Browse our website to learn more about the benefits of coaching or use our search tool to find a coach with a style that works for you.
