FINDING TIME FOR FUN ~ Time Management for School Leaders #SAVMP 2:4

Time Management for School Leaders - Finding Time for Fun!

The topic of Time Management is a critical one for leaders these days as we are being buried under an ever increasing load of paperwork. The paperwork can include appraisals of faculty and staff, school improvement planning, and federal and district requirements. I have previously written about my efforts to organize and manage my days in a post called: Time Management from the Perspective of an Efficiency Freak. This topic has come up again in my focus during the 2014-2015 school year but in a bit of a different way. With a little twist, I have begun to explore how I manage my time at home and continue to be effective in my other jobs: MOM, WIFE, DAUGHTER, FRIEND. 

As I entered into my third year as a school leader, I have been able to turn my gaze back to a "Search for Balance." That first year as Principal was a type of audit and inventory of my new environment. I used a facilitative leadership style where I just facilitated the life of the school while at the same time taking stock and shaping my vision for the future. That first year was very, very busy. It was the year I had to establish credibility, build relationships, and learn everything possible as quickly as possible about my new responsibilities. I felt like I worked ALL THE TIME--like till 1 and 2 A.M. most nights. The second year was a bit better for the total hours I worked per day, but it was at a more intense level as I used a pacesetter leadership style. I showed the faculty the vision and the pace, and I asked them to keep up or to look for a better fit--nothing personal. And, NOW, as I have moved into the winter of my third year, I feel as if the staff and I are unified and working together collectively to increase student achievement and impact student success in the life of our school. This is my favorite style, the visionary leadership style. Most everyone is rowing the boat in the same direction, and no one is trying to sink it! This has been a refreshing year, and it has helped that I have one of the strongest assistant administrators I have ever met working closely with me on all levels. We share the same vision and have similar kindred spirits. These elements have allowed me to work on the necessary balance between home and work life.

EXERCISE: First, I make certain I know what my focus is at home. Rather than coming home from work exhausted and binge eating in front of the TV, I am working to include exercise every day. On my birthday, my husband bought me a fitbit. I love goal setting, and this wearable technology meets my goal-oriented needs. Here is a picture of my progress today from the app. on my SmartPhone which synchronizes various times throughout the day. My daily goal is 10,000 steps every day. Of course, I would show a day when I met my goal! The Dashboard also tracks my meals and my sleep patterns. It synchronizes with my favorite calorie counter app. myfitnesspal. Both of these tools are at my fingertips and help me maintain my focus. 

     

During Christmas, I converted my garage into a mini-gymnasium. It used to be such a pain to get dressed for the gym, drive to the gym, and then work around everyone else on the nautilus equipment or the free weights. Now I have my very own gymnasium heaven! Here is a picture, and I jokingly call it my nightly date with "Gym."  My mini-gym has everything I need, and I especially love the DVD player where I watch my favorite CSI: Las Vegas episodes while walking on the treadmill. My gym is just feet away. I am grateful for a new focus on exercise that is quick and easy. 

FUN & FAMILY:  The next thing I do to keep my focus is I plot out everything on a weekly calendar (my only tracking item using traditional paper) that sits on my desk in my bedroom. I put all appointments like my daughter's upcoming soccer booster club meeting on my Google Calendar, but I put the little things on this calendar. Things like read my spiritual devotional every morning, play my DuoLinguo app., mail a package to my son in college, visit my father during the weekend, date night with the husband, movie night with my #CoffeeClubGirls, etc. etc. I am adverse to any paper calendars and PREFER the digital version in my apps. Google Calendar, G-Tasks, Google Keep, and Sticky Notes, but I still use this old-fashioned calendar when I am at home because when I walk in the door, I truly try to put the phone down and disconnect from the grid temporarily. This visual calendar gives me just a couple of items to focus on every day so that I DO feel accomplished during the week, and I don't succumb to  the hustle and bustle which can drain me at the end of each day. This daily focus allows me to get the important things done as soon as I get home, and then I am not panicking to finish everything during my two days off on the weekend.

And, after I complete the "first things first" I can download and do the fun things like reading a great book or watching my favorite crime drama on Netflix. Here are a stack of books I am working on now:

PAPERLESS: And, lastly, I am moving many things to paperless in our home. I am using Evernote frequently to journal vs. my old way of writing in bulky journals. Also, the digital version is quicker to write/type. I now have all of my papery type things accumulating in EverNote. I have all of my recipe collections, movie ratings, and a journal committed to my wonderful husband all building in Evernote. What would have taken shelves to house and time to write is now all contained in the Cloud and typed up quickly with all sorts of little bells and whistles that can be added with images, fonts, and it is all done within either my SmartPhone or on my laptop. I prefer paperless. 

     

Here is an example of all of the movie ratings I have been collecting in my Evernote app. I can add images of the movie ticket along with my commentary. I can scroll through these or even share them with a link such as this one to my American Sniper review: 

Movies! Review of American Sniper by C. R.

So, with this different twist I have shared how I have increased my focus at home so that I am as good at my night job as I am at my day job! I work very hard to enjoy my down-time and all those times I am able to unplug from the grid. My husband knows when I am trying to get things accomplished, and he calls this my "checklist mode." Just the other day, he told me that we must have switched roles because nowadays he is always the one in checklist mode, and I am the one trying to relax. LOL. I laughed, because he used to refer to me as his work-a-holic or captain of the NFL (No-fun-league).  I have been working hard to relax. Wow-What an oxymoron that is. I guess the better way to say it is, I have been using my time wisely so that there is time left for F-U-N. 

Time Management - The Perspective of an Efficiency Freak

#SAVMP Week 10 ~ Time Management

With the ever intensifying demands of the jobs of educators, I believe the need for strong time management skills is more important than ever. I happen to be a weird sort of individual that is intrigued and challenged by increasing efficiency and finding better ways to do things to improve my productivity. I actually consider it a hobby of mine. Yes, I know that sounds bizarre, but I am extremely organized so this hobby fills my need for speed. 

So, George asked us to share advice and tips on time management for school leaders in our #SAVMP post for this week. I respond gladly.  {BIG GRIN}.

Here is how I do it, and I am constantly looking for aggressive ways to intensify my productivity:

1. Email

     Email seems to be one of the most challenging tasks for most people I know. I have glanced over some of my peer's shoulders to see upwards of 2,000 or more emails hanging out in the inbox of folks. OH MY STARS! That would give me nausea. 

     I approach email with a customer service mind. I try to respond to all emails within a 24 hour window. A response, for me, involves action of some sort. I either reply, delegate, file or convert to an action item every single email in my inbox. Action items are the emails that require the most time because I have to develop a document or rely on information from someone else to ultimately file that email. BUT, I star them or keep them hanging out in my inbox until they are completed so that I never lose sight of completing that task. This is how I manage to always meet deadlines and never allow things to fall through the cracks.

     AND, as a rule of thumb, I only touch an email twice. I might view it on my phone or just scan it during a busy day, but the next time I read that email I take an action step. That way I am not plagued by ever-mounting numbers of emails. I set boundaries for myself, such as I never allow my inbox to get past one page {I have my settings at 25 messages per page}. That way I am not ever overwhelmed by my inbox. 

     Filing emails is also a brilliant way of keeping them organized. This requires creating the folders in your inbox to manage them, but I can almost 99% of the time retrieve a conversation or a message that has aided me in numerous scenarios over the course of my career. 

2. Document management and naming conventions

     Again, this is easily done by the development of folders in your document storage location. I see clerical staff or other folks around me who store all of their documents en masse in the My Documents folder. They then struggle to retrieve documents because they must sort through hundreds, yes even thousands of documents. I have tons of folders where documents are sorted accordingly, and I can retrieve a document in seconds. Additionally, I ALWAYS use appropriate naming conventions so I never have to guess which version of a document is the newest. Naming conventions can be as simple as the current date like I might name this BLOG as a Word Document: Time Management_10_22_2013. 

3. Synchronized accounts    

     Synchronizing accounts is critical when leveraging social media for the benefit of education communication. I have my YouTube Channel synced with my Twitter which is synced with my FaceBook which is synced with my BLOG which is then synced with our district's My School App. One post can be simultaneously posted in multiple locations. This is a huge time-saver.

4. Scheduling with Google Calendar and Google Invites

     I believe Google Calendar has become my Holy Grail for staying organized. With the ability to send Google Invites, you can avoid tedious emails to individuals, and it keeps active rosters of who is attending events.

     Further, I schedule reminders that are sent to me via SmartPhone push notifications and email notifications. As long as I have my phone on me, I will get a reminder that says, "Morning Announcements in 10 Minutes." So, if I am engaged in a very important conversation in the breeze way at school, I can finish up our final comments and make my way to my next appointment. I adore this tool!

     AND, I schedule things that might get overlooked in my busy schedule. My GC will have blocks of time committed to Classroom Walk-thru's. If those items are not scheduled, I will get so busy that they fall by the wayside. I can not afford for that to happen.

     Google Calendar has so many other awesome features. You can click on a time that is mentioned in an email by someone and it will automatically post that as an appointment in your GC. Also, if you put the specifics of a location in the appointment, you can click on the link on your SmartPhone and it will take you to the navigation app. on your phone and take you directly to an appointment that is at an unfamiliar location. And who can forget the ability to SHARE calendars with your co-workers? That tool saves me and my leadership team time because we can all see each other's calendar and we never have to have that communication about when or where someone is. We know with the GC. I REPEAT. I love this tool!

5. Give and Take

     Lastly, I must say that I honor and respect that not all folks are efficiency junkies like me. Because of that, I recognize that many people can not take in the amount of information or even produce as much as I can in short amounts of time. I am very sensitive to this in my faculty. Just recently, at a faculty meeting, I gave the faculty exit cards and asked them for their feedback about what I could "take off their plates." Their plates are very full, and I want to assist them in being productive also. The feedback we got was amazing, and I was able to provide several avenues for workload reduction. That was a very cool thing.

Time management is critical for strong leadership--without it, a leader can drown in the morass of multi-tasking. I am always jonesin' for the next app or tip that is going to lead me to increased productivity. If you have some tips, send them my way.