Whether on the job or in your personal life, you more than likely run up against the “tyranny of the clock” at some point. Time management experts tell us we need to focus on the most critical factors to get the most out of each day and accomplish the most we possibly can. You might feel on occasion–such as around the year-end holidays–that no matter how good you are at time management, you’ll never dig yourself out of the pit you’ve fallen into (or been dragged into by others).
Don’t lose all hope, though. I recently read an article in Reader’s Digest that suggests you and I are worrying ourselves needlessly in our efforts to somehow get ahead of the game.
A Case Against the Clock
The article, titled “A Case Against the Clock,” was published in the December 2015-January 2016 issue of Reader’s Digest (originally published in Quartz, 2015). It mentions that “we haven’t always been this obsessed with time. In fact, before the Industrial Revolution, clocks were largely irrelevant.” However, the Industrial Revolution changed society in massive ways. Now we over-schedule our days, trying to make them as efficient as possible. We think we would be more effective and happier if we just organized our time better, but this belief is “damaging our careers and the rest of our lives.”
Here’s a quote from the article that makes a telling point about our misconceptions regarding time management and its potential benefits for us:
“Research shows that if you increase people’s awareness of time–by placing a big clock in front of them–they do more stuff….it’s one of the great fantasies of time management: If you get more organized, you will get on top. However, that works only in a finite world. We haven’t lived in that world for quite a while.”
3 Results of Time Management “Miss-thinking”
The article mentions 3 outcomes of the misdirected notion that better time management will somehow bring you out on top:
- You Just Get Busier
- Your Attention Suffers
- You’re Less Effective
So getting better and better at time management, as applied by conventional wisdom, appears to be an empty promise in terms of beneficial outcomes for us. According to the article, what’s needed isn’t more “repetitive, synchronized activity…[but more] thinking, creativity, and problem solving.” How are your thinking, creativity, and problem-solving skills shaping up these days?
And a final message from the article: “…it’s time for us to develop a different strategy–one that starts from the recognition that, in our overloaded world, the greatest shortage is not of time but of attention.”
With less than 3 weeks left in 2015, maybe now you should seriously consider re-thinking time management and enable yourself to master time–don’t let it master you. Look at your days, weeks, months from a new perspective. What you DO with your time matters–in terms of quality even more than in terms of quantity. Ultimately, the quality of both your professional life and your personal life will reflect the choices you make.