Identifying problem areas

Often, time mysteriously disappears without any explanation. The most important step in time management is understanding where the time goes.

Self-Analysis How-To

To identify the problem areas, try to analyze a typical week in your life.

Write out a list of your typical activities. In this list, you should include sleep, breakfast, lunch, dinner, getting dressed, watching television, and other preparation or leisure activities.

Next to each item in the list, write down the number of hours you spend on the activity during a typical week. For example, if you sleep for 8 hours each night, write down 8 x 7 = 56 hours.

Once you have written down the weekly hours for each activity, add up all the hours. The total should be 24 x 7 = 168 hours; if you calculated a different number, adjust the weekly hours for each activity until the calculation becomes consistent.

Highlight each item that you spend too much time on or wish to eliminate. These items are the problem areas that you may want to improve.

Don't stop yet

The results of your self-analysis are extremely valuable if you are trying to make changes.

Use this data as a springboard to help yourself improve your time management skills.