Fly with time

you have to do

PERHAPS THE MOST powerful time management tool is a

daily list of activities that you create to serve as a blueprint

for your day.

All successful time managers think on paper and work

from a daily list of activities. Just as a pilot uses a checklist

before every takeoff, effective executives take a few minutes

to create a to-do list before they begin each day.

The best time to make a list is the night before, so your

subconscious mind can work on your list while you sleep.

When you wake up in the morning, you will often have ideas

and insights to help you achieve some of the most important

goals on your list.

At the end of each day, the last thing you do should be to

plan out the next day. In a study of more than fifty highly.effective corporate executives, forty-nine of the fifty said

that the best time management system they had ever found

was a simple pad of paper on which they wrote down everything they had to do before they began.

Sleep Better

Many people toss and turn at night trying not to forget

something they have to do the following day. If you create a

list before you go to bed, writing down everything you have

planned for the coming workday, you will sleep far better

and awake more refreshed.

According to time management specialists, it takes about

twelve minutes each day to write out a list of your tasks for

that day. But this list will save you ten times that amount of

time in improved productivity. Twelve minutes spent in

preparing a daily list will give you a payback of 120 minutes,

or two hours of increased productivity, when you actually

begin work. Thats an incredible payoff for such a simple task.

The ABCDE Method

Once you have made up a list of everything that you plan to

do the next day, organize your list by applying the ABCDE

method to your activities.

The most important word in time management is consequences. A task is important depending on the potential

consequences of doing it or not doing it. When you set priorities, you apply this principle to every task, and you always

begin with the task that has the greatest consequences. This

is where the ABCDE method is especially helpful. Begin by making a list of everything you have to do the following day. Then, write an A, B, C, D, or E next to each

item on your list before you begin work.

An item thats marked A is something you must do. It is

something that is important and there are serious consequences for either doing it or not doing it. Put an A next to