Why Time Management Is A Terrible Term
If I were to hold up a box of tissues and ask, “What is this?”, how would you answer? If you’re like most, you’d probably answer Kleenex because you recognize the brand, when really, they are tissues. All the other tissue companies would be very happy if you would call tissues by their product name, and not by the brand name Kleenex.
Oftentimes we use a word or phrase that might be symbolic of something else, much like Kleenex is symbolic of tissues. It doesn’t explain everything about the object. The same can be said for time management. Back in 1911, Frederick Winslow Taylor became known as the father of scientific method, which paved the way to today’s time management. He coined the term about work in factories and how to become more efficient, and ever since then, we’ve used the phrase time management anytime we want to talk about getting more efficient or more productive.
The challenge is, we can’t really manage time. We can be accountable for time. We can look back and see how we’ve used it. Did we use it efficiently? Did we procrastinate? But time is a constant resource. The reality is that what can be “managed” are some different things. What we should be saying is that “I need to be focusing on managing something else better, so I can make the best use of my time.” Some examples of manageable things include:
Schedule
You can manage your schedule so you can get the right things done. You can plan time blocks, to-do-lists, morning/evening routines and more into your day. You can schedule for the short-term and the long-term and even for the much needed vacations!
People
You can manage people so they aren’t so distracting to your day. Let someone know if you can’t talk with them at the moment, but also offer a better time where you’ll be able to give them your full attention. Listen to people with an open mind and balance criticism with praise.
Technology
You can manage technology with helpful apps such as RescueTime, Toggl and Calendar. You can also access their analytics to see where you’re actually spending your time and use it to help you make better choices.
When you feel the pressure of saying, “I’ve got so much to do and I need to get better at managing my time”, stop yourself and insert something more definitive. Change your wording to something like, “I need to get better at managing my ___” and fill in the blank with something more exact like: schedule, focus or energy. This will help you get down to the root of your time management challenges so you can make your best choices. As Charlie Gilkey said, “Money can be managed. People can be managed. Schedules can be managed. Time can only can be accounted for.”
How will you account for your time?
