Manage Time Now to Allow Time for Your Dream Job

If you want to start a new venture outside of your day job, you must first make better use of your time. Given that most people who want to start a new venture are already working 50+ hours on the day job, finding that time is tough.

But what if you got your day job done in less time? Is your boss really requiring 50+ hours? Often those extra hours at work are self-inflicted.

In todays post, I want to help you find that wasted time and get it back. This will not only make more time after hours to do your own thing, but you will also be more productive for your employer!

So here is the plan to find more time in your day

First, find  your time killers. These are things that waste time, those non-productive minutes that turn into hours. Recently in our IEM program, I asked the clients to tell me where their time was wasted. Here is the list

• Email – while critical, so much a waste especially when it take you forever to figure out if you need it or not.
• Drive-bys – People who just stop by your cube, office, or workspace to chat or ask quick question. Often turns into 15 minute or more sessions of chat.
• Meetings – again important, but so often more meetings than needed and the lack of planning makes the meeting longer than needed.
• Waiting – When you show up and you have to wait for others.

Second, find out how much time you really waste. When I asked the busy IEM clients, they told me they were wasting about 1 hour a day on these items. But, when I asked them to track their time for one week, many of them found that they had wasted as many as four hours per day on these time killers. Wow! That is half their day! At their employers’ expense.

So, before you can get a handle on things, I would suggest you first start by tracking for one week where your time is spent. I know you think you know, but like those people trying to lose weight, tracking it shows the truth.

So over the next week, track your time. In particular, track those time killers. Before you can fix a problem, you must be able to understand it.

And even more important, is that when you do leave your day job to chase your dream, these habits of wasting time on the unproductive will become worse, not better. So take control now.

Question: Do you have other time killers not on this list?