Effective time management helps individuals work smarter, not harder. Finding ways to be more efficient is not only good for business but also rewarding for staff. Understanding priorities and what to tackle first, then second and so on is essential to organizational productivity. Quoting Mark Twain who famously said, “Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.” It’s about identifying your most important task first and taking charge of your day.
To ‘find the frog’ and stay focused, people turn to different tools and methods. From sticky notes, to Excel spreadsheets, to various applications, finding a system that works can be challenging. In addition to staying organized, communication and visibility is essential. This is where Professional Services Automation (‘PSA”) systems can help organizations by allowing managers and staff to collaboratively review work assignments, agree on priorities and monitor progress from start to finish.
Below are important time management components every PSA system should have.
- Checklists/To-do Lists – A common practice for organizing tasks is creating checklists or to-do lists and assigning priorities. Some people use one-off applications and others will stick to traditional pen and paper. While both methods work, these are not optimal solutions. An effective PSA should incorporate a mechanism for users to create checklists with the ability to prioritize and mark tasks as in progress or complete.
- At-a-glance views – A strong PSA allows organizations to gain immediate insight into time management and profitability so that they can constantly monitor and increase effectiveness. These views typically include visual indicators and clear and concise data points.
- Dashboards – The dashboard view is an efficient and quick method to identify trends, issues and variances. Effective dashboards take data points and transform them into graphical representations. Common graph types include: bar charts, pie charts, gantt charts, etc.
BusinessTime offers a suite of tools to support effective time management including at-a-glance views, dashboards and task management screens. Request a demo today.
