Time management

"I Need 48 Hours In A Day"

Introduction

If you have come to this lecture thinking that the answers are mainly external you are wrong. The problems are external the answers are internal.

Firstly you have to stop and think what you are doing.

If you are working over 8 hours a day regularly you are either inefficient or your workload is too high.

On top of these two possibilities, there are only 24 hours in one day and there is only so much a human being can do.

As there is nothing one can do with the former. Let us look at what being a human being means in terms of time management.

We can:

a) prioritise

b) make sure we say no to workloads which overload us

Many fundraisers have consistently spread themselves too thinly across many areas. This inevitably means that we do too much, we don't get an opportunity to learn certain areas of expertise, we're often tired and sometimes our job becomes our life.

First let us remember that life is about balance. Balance within us, balance outside of ourselves. The job a fundraiser does holds a lot of pressure, however it is important that we look after ourselves first because this will help us to become effective and efficient.

This means that we have to be two things:

1) ruthless with our workload, prioritising etc.

2) selfish - to ensure that we enjoy our work and our playtime (playtime does not include representing your charity at events in the evening/weekend etc, playtime means private time).

Let us look at these two areas in more detail.

Ruthlessness

This means that you will have to plan and stick to your plans and you have to be ready to say no when someone asks you to do something that means you get overloaded and your workload goes on hold.
Of course you will have to have some flexibility in helping others in need but if it is because the organisation is constantly in crisis management or if that someone else is always in crisis then you should think seriously about yourself before plunging in to help someone else at your expense (let them have a read of this fact sheet!)

Selfishness

This means that you should have a life outside of the organisation. Commit yourself 100% during your 8-hour day but after that you must have a life. One of the essential components of a good, if not great fundraiser is someone who is creative, organised, calm and can think on their feet. You cannot have these components if you live and breathe your organisation. They cannot come when you are tired, run down and overworked. You have to be selfish if you are to be a better fundraiser.

If you are unable to be the above it may not be worth you continuing this fact sheet?
Would you like to continue the fact sheet or would you like to leave now?

........... You're still here. Good!

Ok. Now you know what is needed from you internally, here are some practical guidelines.

Presumably at this moment your desk is covered in paperwork and you're in crisis management i.e. Everything should have been done yesterday.

Number one

Get your diary out. Next week block out 2 mornings and put a

X

for the first 4 hours of your day.

Under no circumstances is anyone going to take that time away from you. If you have a collective diary as well where the office puts their times in put that you are at meetings on the two days. This is not a lie - you are at meetings on both those occasions - a meeting with yourself because you need to sort your workloads out..

Now do the same for the week after. Every week you will put two mornings in the diary when you are in meetings. This means that at the moment you will have two weeks organised, next week you will do the week after next so you are working two weeks ahead of yourself.

Let me reiterate. You do not move these dates; you do not put other meetings in front of these dates. (Remember at this time you are getting yourself into a habit so you need to stick to this for a while). If necessary go out of the office for these two mornings initially.

Planning is vital to time management.

Number two (if you can get someone to answer your phone for the next hour this will help enormously).

Get three four trays and mark them:

Tray A - urgent/within the next week
Tray B next 2-3 weeks
Tray C things of interest but not vital.
Tray D - for filing

And don't forget to have your wastepaper bin handy.

For the moment and until you have a habit going, everything in tray c should go to into the bin or to filing. Every two weeks if you have not had time to look at tray c, you put it in the bin.

Now you are left with a pile of papers and trays A and B. Right, put all the papers into a pile in front of you and the urgent and 2-3 week trays in front of you. Each paper needs to go into a tray but before doing that, get a pencil, and in the top right hand corner of the paper write what file it will go into when you have finished. Assume that someone else may file it for you and will therefore need to know where to file it. As you pencil the file in put it into the respective tray.

Now you have four trays in front of you. One is empty (tray c). Take the tray marked urgent and go through the tray making a list of needs to be done. This notepad should be carried around with you so you can add things on. Lists should be carried forward to the following day.

The note pad should have three columns e.g.

Things to do
Action to take
Date to be done by

Do what is most urgent; leave the office if necessary to get the time for yourself to complete these jobs. These are the jobs that will haunt you if you do not get them done, so they are vital to good time management.

A small addition to this. Do the jobs you hate first. Because these jobs plague you and do not allow you get stuck into the other ones.

Notes

Make sure you have a lunch break even if it is 10 minutes for wondering around the block.
Try and have a time, preferably in the blocked diary times when someone else is taking your calls. Arrange a reciprocal agreement. After all the more of you who are organised the easier this will be.
Remember that you are only human. You must start to say no to workloads that mean that you will be inundated.
Get help in. If your filing builds up and you have pencilled the file names in the top right corner, get a volunteer in to help you.
If you need more help than this there are colleges that supply overseas students on work placements for three months a go at no cost to the organisation. Finally if the workload is too much, advertise for someone, perhaps an older lady who would like some part time work. There are people around, it is just needs time finding them.
Lastly, sometimes it may be that the management of the organisation is itself unorganised. In this either things change or if you find that you are getting too stressed then it may be time to actually leave. There are many voluntary organisations that are organised and it may not be worth drowning in a sea of disorganisation. (See fact sheet on writing your C.V. /resume!).
Unwinding from work. Most of us have a travel journey to and from work. Try and use this time to unwind so that by the time you get home you have lost some of the work mode you are in. Read a magazine/book/listen to music etc.
Do something else during the week. There are many adult education classes in the UK. We are very lucky as a nation. Go and learn something new and by new not business wise - yoga or creative writing or woodwork. Something that takes your mind somewhere else. Exercise is also good and if you can do that will be helpful.

More notes:

Delegate
Have an 'unavailable' period during the day
Don't work extra hours
Say no
Be clear about you priorities
Give clear direction
Start and finish a task in one go. This is a very important skill. You waste tremendous amounts of time if you do not complete something when you have begun it.
Take time in lieu
Build up strengths, learn more from your weaknesses

Other fact sheets in Personal development
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