Time Management Strategies

There will never be enough time. There just won’t.

“Time management” is the process of organizing and planning how to divide your time between specific activities. Good time management enables you to work smarter – not harder – so that you get more done in less time, even when time is tight and pressures are high. Failing to manage your time damages your effectiveness and causes stress.

As a leader, not only do you need to make sure that you are planning and delivering brilliant lessons for your pupils (and all the marking and assessment that goes with them) but you are also managing sometimes-conflicting demands from the senior leadership team and those in the team that you lead. It can feel like an overwhelming cocktail of pressures.

So what’s the answer?

First and foremost, the challenge is to protect time not just for day-to-day delivery but to allow you to focus on how you are able to :

1. deliver through others in your team by developing, empowering and delegating to them

2. make the time to step back and think about the more strategic approach to your work, taking a helicopter view of what you are up to as an individual and as a team

This isn’t easy. But if you can protect some time for these two vital elements of your role, you will be well on the way to increasing your effectiveness and reducing your to-do list at the same time.

Facing Your To-Do List

Simple model to-do list created by Amit Varma,

In addition to the above model, you can use Allen's Input Processing Technique is a simple process that helps you manage your "inputs", so that you stay on top of everything that you need to do.

And last but not least is The Eisenhower Method, developed by Dwight Eisenhower, a five-star general in the United States Army, the Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe during World War II, President of Columbia University, oh, and a two-term US President, this simple box divides tasks into simple categories :

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