SUMMARY

Summary

Summary

Scheduling & Planning

Properly planning a project at the very beginning is crucial to project success. More projects fail because they're improperly initiated than for any other single reason. In Andy Crow's book Alpha Project Managers: What the Top 2% Know That Everyone Else Does Not, he points out that the top project managers, the top 2% spend twice as much time planning as the normal project manager.

Scheduling is the process by which you plan your use of time. By scheduling effectively, you can reduce stress and maximize your effectiveness. This makes it one of the most important time management skills you can use.

Before you can schedule efficiently, you need an effective scheduling system. This can be a diary, calendar, paper-based organizer, PDA or a software package like MS Outlook. The best solution depends entirely on your circumstances.

Scheduling is then a five-step process:

1. Start by identifying the time you want to make available for your work. This will depend on the design of your job and on your personal goals in life.

2. Next, block in the actions you absolutely must take to do a good job. These will often be the things you are assessed against. 3. Review your To Do List, and schedule in the high-priority, urgent activities, as well as the essential maintenance tasks that cannot be delegated and cannot be avoided.

4. Next, block in appropriate contingency time. You will learn how much of this you need by experience. Normally, the more unpredictable your job, the more contingency time you need. The reality of many people's work is of constant interruption: Studies show some managers getting an average of as little as six minutes uninterrupted work done at a time. Obviously, you cannot tell when interruptions will occur. However, by leaving space in your ...