Time is the scarcest resource.

If you were to ask ten small business owners what they wanted more of (besides money) I would put my house on all ten saying time. This article will show you how to snatch back some precious time by showing you how to work more effectively.

Try this very simple 10 minute exercise by yourself.  It might help to reveal some interesting insights into where your time is running out on you!

If you read on into the article, you’ll also learn how you can take these insights and using the teachings of one of the world’s top Business Gurus, you’ll be able to make more time for yourself.

What would you do with an extra hour a day?

You could read 33 books a year!  You could learn two foreign languages a year! You could update your neglected website! You could spend more time with your spouse! (Or maybe not?) Either way everyone would like more time.

Do this Ten Minute Exercise – no more than 10 minutes – after all, this is about time management!

Download this document and print it off for yourself.  The instructions are printed on the exercise.

Once you’ve finished – check out your score below then read on to learn how you can improve your score and more importantly make more effective use of your time.

So how do you score?

Use this table to score yourself:

Important	+2
Urgent and Important	+1
Urgent and Unimportant	-1
Non-urgent and Unimportant or don’t know why you do this activity	-2

If you got a score of:

0 – 3* ~  you really need to start taking time out from everyday activities to sit down and plan.

4 – 6* ~ you most likely already do some planning, but you could still benefit from taking time out of everyday activities.

7+* ~ you already do a considerable amount of planning.

(* based on 8 activities)

This article will mostly benefit people who scored between 0 and 6. However, people who scored above may still benefit as they can learn more efficient ways of using their time.

And the most important part…. how to improve your score and more importantly, how to earn back precious time in your day.

I’m sure that you’ve heard of Steven Covey –Business Guru, Time Management Expert, Author of Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, amongst other things.

And if you’ve heard of Steven Covey, you’re probably familiar with ‘Covey’s Quadrant’. Download it here.

Now look at how you would score yourself into Covey’s Quadrant using the 10 minute exercise that you completed.

Where do you spend most of your time?

Quadrant 1 is where most people are.

This is the ‘fire-fighting’ part of a business. For example, crisis management and deadline driven projects. Constantly working in this quadrant will more likely result in stress and burnout rather than growth and development for your business, something we all want to achieve. Although working in this quadrant is undesirable it is needed, but only to a certain extent. The extent to which will be defined by how much of your efforts are spent in Quadrant 2.

Where should you spend most of your time?

Quadrant 2 is where the majority of your efforts should be placed.

This is where the planning and prevention takes place. The more time spent here, the less time spent in Quadrant 1 as effective planning should eradicate most crises. It is understandable that you will struggle to find time to sit down and plan as you’re always getting bogged down by ‘urgent’ calls or ‘important’ meetings. However, Stephen Covey talks about prioritizing around our personal mission and having the ability to say ‘no’ to urgent, yet unimportant tasks. Something, he says, is easier to do when you have a very strong ‘yes’ burning inside you. I also found a nice quote from his book which I think sums this concept up very well: “if they (our priorities) are deeply planted in your heart and mind, you will see quadrant 2 as a natural, exciting place to invest your time.”

My top tips for staying in quadrant 2:

• Define your personal mission statement
• Select your goals
• Plan in terms of weeks and months rather than days
• Schedule your priorities rather than prioritize your schedule
• Look at your personal mission statement often

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, which this post was inspired by, is a great read if anyone is interested in learning more on this subject.

If you only take one thing from this article, it should be that you need to define your priorities. This is the first step to using your time more effectively.

For more tips on how to move yourself to Q2 why not subscribe to our monthly newsletter or email “Top Time Tips” and we’ll forward some great practical, simple steps that you can put in place which have really helped our clients.