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  • The Importance of Being Early: Punctuality and You

    The Importance of Being Early: Punctuality and You

    Coming from a person who is predictably early, lateness can be incredibly unprofessional. I’m not just talking job interviews—this applies to meeting friends for coffee, extra-curricular meetings, and pretty much anything you sign up for. If you make a habit of being on time, it shows that you respect the commitments you’re making. In turn, people are going to respect you.

    Lateness can also have repercussions, especially in a professional environment. Showing up late to meetings or handing in projects days past the deadline sends the message that you don’t care about your job. When it comes time for a promotion or bonus, that reputation isn’t going to play well with your boss. Moreover, there are some things you just can’t hand in late—projects that meet urgent deadlines, or collaborative projects in which co-workers depend on one another to do their jobs. If you can’t fulfill those kinds of expectations, expect reprimand. Unfortunately, in fact, you might lose that job altogether.

    That’s why it’s so important to be early. The benefits of punctuality (developing a good reputation and avoiding some serious repercussions) far outweigh the drawbacks (getting up a little earlier in the morning). That being said, some people have trouble with punctuality, so it’s important to develop strategies that can help you be on time. If you get an early start on those habits—ha!—it will save you a lot of trouble in the long run.

    If you need help being on time, here are some general tips.

    1)      Do the math. Figure out how long it takes you to get ready in the morning, how long your bus ride is, etc. As a general rule, you should add 10-15 minutes of extra time for external variables, like traffic. According to that formula, set your alarm.

    2)      Have a game plan. If you can take 5 minutes the night before to lay out exactly where you have to be (and when), your routine will run more smoothly in the morning. You can also “cheat” by doing some things the night before, like laying out your outfit or packing your lunch.

    3)      Call ahead. If something does happen to hold you up, make sure you give as much notice as possible. That way, the person you’re meeting—a friend, a coworker, an employer—can be prepared for a 10- or 20-minute delay, and adjust their schedule accordingly.

    4)      Trick yourself (for a good cause). The classic strategy is setting your watch 10 minutes early: even if you plan your day perfectly and everything goes right, you’ll have some wiggle room. Another way to do this is overestimate how long it’s going to take you to do things. It’s better to have extra time than no time at all.

  • Practicing Time Management

    Practicing Time Management

    Time management is a problem for many people because there are so many distractions in our day-to-day lives that can interfere with whatever goals we have to accomplish that day, week or year. Often we can have a to-do list, but none of the items end up getting done because we get caught up in doing everything but what we are supposed to be doing. Sometimes, when there is too much to do, we feel especially challenged to make the most of our time. When we are short on time and have a lot to do, we must learn to prioritize.

    This means cutting off some of the less important things and focusing our energy on accomplishing what is the most important. Making lists that order your tasks from most important to least important is a really good trick that can save time and keep you on track. The worst scenario, when short on time, is wasting your energy worrying about everything that you have to do. What you want to do is get down to work as soon as possible, as soon as you are finished drawing out what it is that you are needing to get done.

    If, for example, you have 5 assignments that need to get done, focusing on the assignment that is due next week is more important than focusing on the assignment that is due in two months. You may want to create a short list of the tasks that you want to get done and order them by nearest date to farthest date. Think about how long it will take you to accomplish each one of the tasks, and jot this down next to the due date. Create a schedule for when you will start working on the task and how much time you will devote to it. By doing this, you are assuring that you will not forget about one project in favor of focusing on another or getting distracted entirely.

    If you are really crunched for time, you may also want to include what grade you are expecting to get on each one of the assignments so that you can put a little more time and care into the ones that will mean more to get a good mark on. In this way you will not be wasting your time doing too much research on an assignment for which a good grade will not mean much to you, or for which the overall weighting of the assignment is minimal.

    One last way of practicing good time management is to avoid procrastinating. Often, if we have a lot to do, we may be tempted to do anything but what it is that we are supposed to be doing. This is a natural tendency and we all do it at some point. The important thing to remember is that facing your challenge head on will actually facilitate the task and make it that much easier to complete. By making a list and prioritizing what is the most important (and the least important), we face the challenge head on and avoid procrastinating.