Tag: halloween

It’s November: Time to Revisit Your Priorities?

61 days left of opportunity before the New Year.

That is, opportunity or “opportunity costs.” The choice is up to you!

Hello November sign on blackboard

Hello November! Today marks 61 days to the end of the year!

If you saw my time management posts from last week, you know that productivity or even prioritization is not the ultimate goal. The goal is to spend your time like the precious commodity that it is. 

If you count up the days in November and December, you have 61 days of opportunity before the New Year. That’s 1,464 hours.

1,464 hours to make count on what is meaningful to you. 

Clients often ask me how to make better use of their time. Here’s what I suggest:

Figure out what you want to do most. For example, maybe you want to celebrate Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas and/or Kwanzaa holidays without interruptions. Then back into what you can do now to get yourself there. What do you know will be lingering over your head, ready to jump out at you, if you don’t address it early?

If you can get ahead of the game, without rushing, not only will your work product be better but also your quality of life.

Again, Happy November! Hope your hours are meaningful, however you choose (or need) to spend them.

Anne Marie Segal is a career and leadership coach, author and resume writer for attorneys, executives and entrepreneurs. She recently brushed up on her time management skills to finish her first book, Master the Interview. Her short post about what it is like to write a book is here.

Image above from Adobe Images.

Four Quick Tips for Controlling the Time Demon on Halloween (or Any Other Day of the Year)

If you live in the U.S., it’s almost Halloween. That means time for fun, if you can get the work done.

Here are four quick tips to making your day more productive, so you can get on with the festivities.

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If you live in the U.S., it’s almost Halloween. 

For working parents, this can present a particular time crunch. You may want to run out to Trick o’ Treat or watch a costume parade with your children. So while the rest of the world (or most of it) is going at a regular pace, you need to get your work out the door in half the time.

Four Quick Tips to Getting It Done

Here are four quick tips to making your day more productive, so you can get on with the festivities.

PRIORITIZE

DELEGATE

TAKE BREAKS

BE ORGANIZED

  1. Prioritize. Only do what really matters, and the parts that matter, based on what results can be achieved before November 1. (Coming back to the rest when you have more time, and prioritizing again.)
  2. Delegate ruthlessly. If there is a better person to complete a task than you, and you can be confident it will be done right, take the time to pass it on. 
  3. Take breaks. Even if you are racing at breakneck speed to get stuff done, you will be more productive if you break up the tasks with a walk or change of scene every hour or so. 
  4. Be organized. Just as chefs set out all of their ingredients and utensils before starting to cook (called “mise en place”), you will achieve a greater result in less time if you can mitigate distractions and sustain concentration while completing a task.

Copyright 2016 Anne Marie Segal. All rights reserved.

Image above from Adobe Images.