Slide 1 : 1 God says: “The son of man aggrieves Me when he abuses Time, whereas I am Time.
(Al-Hadith) OPTIMAL TIME MANAGEMENT (A Roadmap towards Effective Life-Pattern)
Basic Human Urges/Wants : 2 Basic Human Urges/Wants It is basic human urge to live a successful life, both privately and publicly.
A person wants better health profile, maximum peace of mind, highest level of spiritual contentment, esteemed social status, and financial abundance.
Life Pattern : 3 Life Pattern A life-pattern is unique combination of thought-pattern (mindset) and work-pattern (behaviour).
A life-pattern has two aspects, habitual and innovative.
A habitual life-pattern is outcome of consistent and repetitive actions towards multiple chores of life; moreover, it is developed slowly, gradually, and painfully.
An innovative approach towards life activities gives a productive shape to routine efforts or shape a new routine.
We propose that an effective life-pattern, either habitual or innovative, is based on Optimal Time Management.
Optimal Time Management : 4 Optimal Time Management Optimal Time Management is setting and following a schedule of life activities in order to optimize the usage of limited available time
Time-Task Duality : 5 Time-Task Duality The time-task duality directs the individuals how tasks are linked, directly and indirectly, with multiple time durations.
The ultimate goal during some activity is to attain maximum return from each and every unit of time-spent.
Optimal Time Management-Key Issues : 6 Optimal Time Management-Key Issues The key issues related to optimal time management, especially related to an effective manager, are:
Nomenclature of Life Activities;
Time-Task Duality (Divine Perspective);
Priority Setting;
Prime Time Selection;
Prime Motive - Performance;&
Developing Time Management Skills.
Life Activities-Interactive Specification : 7 Life Activities-Interactive Specification Life is temporally evolved and spatially settled phenomenon of cosmic economy.
Mankind is epitome of multiple life upshots.
An individual spends his/her time on various activities. We may group these activities into three categories – personal, social, and economical.
Life Activities-Temporal Specification : 8 Life Activities-Temporal Specification A classic time scheduling has three levels, weekly, monthly, and yearly.
A person complete some works on weekly basis, while some tasks are accomplished on monthly basis, and still some responsibilities are fulfilled on yearly basis.
Temporal intelligence guides someone towards wise specification of time-scheduling.
Time-Task Duality (Divine Perspective) : 9 Time-Task Duality (Divine Perspective) Time has two dimensions inner or personal and outer or universal.
At personal level time is creative impulse of self-expression and linked with some memorable immaterial activities, while at universal level time is outcome of lunar/solar/celestial phenomena and linked with memorable material activities.
The creative urge of Omnipotent linked with memorable immaterial activities is Absolute Time, a solely divine attribute. The Absolute Time created its numerous counterparts, i.e., multiple relative times.
The matter-oriented time is relative or serial time, while the urge-oriented time is Absolute Time.
Man is vice-regent of Allah, the very basis of human life-pattern is existential- pattern of God. Allah accomplishes any task accommodating the time, both absolute and relative.
A divine-oriented approach towards time-task duality makes the mankind time-efficient and leads, ultimately, towards effective life-pattern.
Priority Setting : 10 Priority Setting A priority setting should be based on two elements - importance and urgency – A task is composition of various mixtures of these elements. We can set priority list as follows:
Important & urgent (top priority)
Important & less urgent (second priority)
Less important & urgent (third priority)
Less important & less urgent (last priority)
The important activities are supportive for goal materialization, while urgent activities demand quick fixing. The urgent activities do not fulfill, normally, our goals, they fulfill, generally, the goals of others.
Wisdom is needed to define importance and urgency.
General Guidelines : 11 General Guidelines The general guidelines for effective priority-setting are:
Pick the future possibilities against the past glories.
Focus on the opportunity rather than on problems.
Choose your own direction rather than climb on the bandwagon.
Aim high and better.
Prime Time : 12 Prime Time Parkinson’s Law states that work expands to fill the available time. That is, more time is spent on a specific job without considering the time duration of a job.
Time efficiency is spoiled by ignoring time-task duality.
In prime time evaluation, we assess and integrate the job and prime time – prime time is the time at which the person can produce best performance in his work..
It is important to note that coordination between work schedule and prime time enhances the productivity of an individual about 15 to 20 percent.
The assessment of prime time for staff and setting their activities to prime time will make them more efficient and productive. As a result, the whole system will produce optimum results.
Prime Motive - Performance : 13 Prime Motive - Performance An organization is created to materialize certain goals & objectives.
Any result-oriented effort towards multiple goals & objectives is effective, generally, for organizational development, so that, the prime motive behind countless efforts must be performance.
Moreover, for highest performance, it is important to utilize strengths not weaknesses.
The performance–oriented efforts are distorted due to countless reasons.
The Major time wasters in a system are Lack of Proper Delegation System, Overstaffed or Understaffed Environ, Non-incentive Reward Structure, Malfunctions in Information, Excessive Meetings or Large Size of Meeting Staff or Boundless Agenda of Meetings, & Miscommunication.
Developing Time Management Skills : 14 Developing Time Management Skills Develop a logbook, formal or informal, to ascertain WHERE the time is going on?
Deciding the activity plan for important/urgent activities to assess WHAT tasks are worthy to tackle?
Evaluating Prime time to judge HOW much time is needed for different set of activities?
Finalizing the work-plan to know WHEN to execute an activity?
A work-plan is prepared on several bases, it is daily or weekly or monthly or yearly. It is noteworthy that the more time we spend on work planning; the less total time is required for the whole task.
Time-efficiency will improve with these practices, consequentially, the optimal time management expertise will be developed in someone’s life.
Proper Vs Poor Time Management : 15 Proper Vs Poor Time Management If you manage time properly, you can accomplish more and better in your day, and leave yourself to other important works or may indulge in recreational activities, you would be more productive. It is a productive cycle.
On the other hand, if you manage time poorly, you accomplish less and quality of work is low, you are stressed, which means you have to work more hours, it causes your work to slide even further into the abyss. It is a vicious cycle.