Time management is an invaluable skill needed to live a quality life. In our current society, people constantly struggle to attend to their duties and responsibilities and find time for leisure, family and oneself. To handle life’s demands without going crazy, one must learn the skill of management. However, what is time management?

Before we get into the six essential elements that make up the definition of time management, it’s important to know how this skill influences an individual’s overall quality of life. Timing is one of the skills that an individual has to learn to be productive. A person’s productivity is measured in terms of what he can do and achieve in a given period. Personal productivity is one of the vital elements of life management. If one can master life management, he can live life to the fullest.

Now that the relationship between time management, personal productivity, and life management has been clarified, it’s time to move on to the six essential elements of the management definition.

1. Managing Goals: Goals are important in a person’s life. Without goals, one will wander aimlessly through life, haunted by the feeling of not achieving anything. Personal goals will guide an individual in the right direction and help this person focus on their strengths to achieve that goal. Thus, at the end of the day, this individual will have a feeling of personal fulfillment.
2. Task management: Each person tackles important tasks every day. Managing these tasks is imperative to making sure a person doesn’t end up with too many things to do. Also, task management will ensure that a person does not forget any important errands or miss any deadlines.
3. Prioritize: Learning to prioritize is also a good skill to complement management tasks. Since time is very limited, it is vital that a person complete their priorities first before anything else. In this way, a person gets closer every day to achieving her goals. Prioritizing is simply knowing what is necessary to complete a goal and knowing what to do next.
4. Using the Calendar: A calendar is important to manage one’s time completely. Whether it is a desktop calendar or an electronic one, it is essential that a person have one. It is also recommended, if you have multiple calendars (Outlook, mobile phone, PDA, desktop calendar), that all calendars are in sync so you don’t miss anything.
5. Managing Procrastination: Everyone has a tendency to procrastinate, and for some, it is a feeling that is very difficult to resist. However, for one to be a successful time manager, one must learn to resist the calls of procrastination.
6. Reminder systems: A good tracking system is necessary to not forget old tasks or projects. There are new things to do every day that may need a lot of attention and a good reminder system will definitely help manage all these tasks.

Time Management Definition: In general, time management is a skill to help a person manage their time in order to accomplish their tasks, achieve their goals, and still have time for themselves.