Time Management Tips for Working at Home - Be Decisive
Effective time management helps you decide how to use your time. Being decisive in your daily decision making leads you to becoming a more proactive worker. But learning to be decisive can be difficult, especially if you are used to others making decisions for you.
How often in the day do you dither in reaching a decision? Do you weigh up all the pros and cons and still find it difficult to make a choice? Are you hampered by the fear that your decision will be the wrong one?
Let’s start with something as simple as going through the daily mail. You’ve put it in a pile to do something about it, maybe later. But you have to act on it. The pile is overflowing and you need to decide what to do with each piece of paper. Try the DRAFT technique and see if it helps with being decisive about the mail.
DRAFT -
Delegate the task OR
Read the mail, THEN
Act on it OR
File it OR
Toss it
See? You’ve been decisive about the mail. Being decisive means you will assess the risks involved in each task (with the mail you’ll be worrying whether that bit of information is important or not.
What happens if you toss it and was it important?). You will act on a task, rather than react to events around you. Being decisive helps you manage your tasks and goals more effectively. Once you’ve made your assessment you’ll be able to decide on a course of action and do it.
Avoiding decisions often seems the easiest path to take, but all you are doing is making more work for yourself and not managing your time well. Be decisive and accept the consequences and you will stay in control of your life.
Think about these steps when making a decision:
1. Identify the problem you are trying to solve. Why do you need to solve it?
2. Find out what you can about the problem
3. Identify the alternatives
4. List the consequences of each alternative
5. Select the best alternative
6. Action plan your decision
7. Do it!
Effective decision making involves keeping your eye on the goal you are trying to achieve. Sometimes we make our choice by analysis, other times it’s a gut feeling that this choice is the right one. However you decide to spend your time, be decisive. Don’t waste time by dithering.
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