Are you trying to find your life under a blizzard of sticky notes? If someone visited your home or office and began to look around would they find a sticky note in, on , or around almost every area and everything? Perhaps a good time management technique for you is to evaluate your use of one of the most used modern inventions, the sticky note.
Sticky notes are a great tool for the right applications. Unfortunately many times you use them for the wrong application, and eventually it begins to cause you problems. Sticky notes are great for marking a page and making references you don’t want permanently left on the page. They can be a great tool to use when you have a lot of steps and you aren’t sure of the order, and you can keep rearranging the notes until you’re satisfied you have them in the right order. There are many other great uses for sticky notes, but just as many ineffective uses.
One reason sticky notes may not be a good time management technique for you is that you tend to randomly have them everywhere. Your sticky notes will work much better for you if you group them by category, and then prioritize them within the category. The down side to sticky notes is they may not be as portable or transportable as you need. The next time you reach for a sticky note ask yourself if it’s the best tool for your needs. Have you ever thrown one away only to have to dig through the garbage trying to find it later?
A solid time management technique is to do things only once. Would one “To Do” list or project list or action notebook work better than a blizzard of sticky notes here, there, and everywhere around your home and office? When you get pare things down to, for example, one action notebook that you can take with you and check things off as they are done you may find that you not only make your life less complicated but more efficient too.
Sticky notes are great and they have their place just make sure you’re using them in a manner that best fits your needs. Use them when you only need them in reference to a specific page or item and it’s no big deal if they get lost. When you need a more permanent record, and it would be better to have everything together in one place consider the old “To Do” list or action notebook that is easily transportable instead.
Would you like to learn more about your time behaviors? Try this Time Management Analysis and find out where your opportunities for improvement are.
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