Essay on Time Management in Higher Education: Analysis & Evaluation

This essay delves into the critical role of time management in both personal and professional spheres, with a specific focus on its application within a higher education context. The essay begins by defining time management and highlighting its significance in enhancing productivity, recognizing opportunities, and reducing stress. It then presents a discussion of the importance of time management skills, emphasizing the need for prioritization, planning, and efficient allocation of time. The author reflects on personal experiences with time management, including the use of to-do lists and planners, and discusses the benefits of these techniques in meeting deadlines and improving efficiency. The essay also evaluates the suggestions made in a provided article on time management, including the importance of planning, setting goals, eliminating distractions, and maintaining a tracking system. The author agrees with the importance of planning and prioritizing tasks but disagrees with the skill of assessing the urgency of each task as certain tasks becomes equally important to deliver. The essay concludes by emphasizing the necessity of time management for achieving both personal and professional goals and the importance of prioritizing work and planning through the use of to-do lists.

Running head: IMPORTANCE OF TIME MANAGEMENT
IMPORTANCE OF TIME MANAGEMENT
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1IMPORTANCE OF TIME MANAGEMENT
Introduction:
The process of organizing and an exercise of dividing time spent on prioritized events
of life, defines the concept of time management. Skills in time management ensures better
possibilities in recognizing opportunities, improved productivity, efficient approach as well
as lesser amount of stress. The paper will discuss on the importance of time management
skills and the advantages pertaining to the skill. The purpose of the paper is to understand the
methods by which time management skills can be improved and applied in the date to day
personal and professional life. The paper will stress on the importance of the skills of
managing time as well as how planning can help in achieving efficiency by understanding the
priorities.
Discussion:
“You may delay, but time will not.”- Benjamin Franklin. In order to get success in our
life we need to know the value of time (Lock 2017). If time is not given priority, time will fly
away, it will not wait for anyone and thereafter it will affect in the process of identity creation
(Lock 2017). Thus, we need to manage and respect time. Time management refers to various
activities involving allocation of the right time for the right activity, assignment of specific
slots for several tasks in regards with their significance and making the right use of the
essence of time as it does not wait for anyone (Akcoltekin 2015). We need to understand the
value of every moment
Management of time is one of the most important tasks. It includes a proper planning,
objectivity, allocation of a time range, responsibility delegation, listing the tasks as per their
importance, spending the time that has been allocated on each task and a proper planning
system (Morden 2017). I always try to follow time management skills in order to meet my
deadlines in whatever work I do. I always prepare a to-do list and allot certain time range to
each task and then finish them one by one. The most important thing is to start with the

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pending works before starting with anything new (Bradley et al. 2017). I also do not start any
new work unless I finish my existing. This process has helped me in improving my efficiency
skills and I can complete my tasks within time. At times I also use a planner in order to make
some long term plans. The procedure involved in time management helps in uplifting morale,
reducing stress level and makes a person punctual (Ertug and Faydali 2018). It helped me to
instil confidence and discipline in my life.
I agree with the fact that time management is a serious problem in our daily life and
we all need to manage time in order to reach our goals easily. Every action requires a proper
planning and setup so as time management, which helps us in achieving better planning and
forecasting of other facts and figures. It also helps us in staying focused and organized. Time
management deals with planning and deciding how we allocate and spend our time in
achieving the goals. Personally, I faced a lot of trouble managing time initially when I did not
use to maintain a to do list and went ahead without any planning. One of the basic strategy
that can be adopted is making a list of tasks as per the urgency and assigning time range to
each tasks (Oettingen et al. 2015). This has helped me in prioritizing my needs and thereafter
prevented from wasting time on endless details. It should be taken as a challenge in
completing each task within the assigned time or trying to finish it before the time range and
then noting down the time saved (Broadbent and Poon 2015). This has helped me in easy
achievements of deadlines and delivery of several projects on time at ease. The proper plan of
action, organization of work, allocation of time, spending the right time on the right activity
will help in making commitments and delivering such commitments on time (Kossek,
Thompson and Lautsch 2015).
Although, I disagree with the skill of assessing the urgency of each task as certain
tasks becomes equally important to deliver and in such a case sorting the task becomes a little
bit difficult, which test the skill of your pressure handling. Sometimes you may be assigned
with extra tasks. Although time management helps in sensing the urgency of work but when

3IMPORTANCE OF TIME MANAGEMENT
it comes to real life situation, delegation of work is not always possible (Wilson 2018).
Saying ‘No’ to your superiors at work might not be feasible all the time. These are a few
points that are yet to be dealt with when it comes about time management.
We just have 24 hours to spend in a day and we all know that once time is lost, it can
never be found again. So mere planning won’t suffice. There are certain things which I think
one should consider while managing time. Planning is necessary but what is more important
is that we must know our goals that is what we want to achieve.
We need to eliminate the distractions. Various kinds of distractions arise while doing
important tasks and now a days social media is one of the biggest distraction. Thus, as per the
urgency and importance of the work such distractions are needed to be eliminated. I
personally strike the task done in the “to do list”, which most of the people forget to do.
Striking off that done task is really important to avoid confusion, which also gives a sense of
achivement. One must try to maintain a track sheet, which I personally maintain. This would
help a person in determining how productive the week has been and how efficiently and in
how much time are those tasks achieved. Health is one of the most important factors to be
considered in case of time management. Unhealthy mind and physique will deteriorate our
efficiency. Hence, plenty of sleep and proper exercise is also necessary. The human break can
only focus for an hour or more and hence small gaps should be taken under consideration in
the “to do list” in order to maintain the quality of the tasks.
Conclusion:
The paper can be concluded by the fact that the skills of time management is required
for both personal and professional life and must be used to instil efficiency. It can be
achieved by prioritizing work and planning by making a to do list, which can enable
completion of any work or assignment in the stipulated period.

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References:
Akcoltekin, A., 2015. High school students time management skills in relation to research
anxiety. Educational Research and Reviews, 10(16), pp.2241-2249.
Bradley, L.M.W., Brantner, T., Brown, J.M. and Gawor, H.L., International Business
Machines Corp, 2017. Action based to-do list. U.S. Patent 9,754,224.
Broadbent, J. and Poon, W.L., 2015. Self-regulated learning strategies & academic
achievement in online higher education learning environments: A systematic review. The
Internet and Higher Education, 27, pp.1-13.
Ertug, N. and Faydali, S., 2018. Investigating the Relationship Between Self-Directed
Learning Readiness and Time Management Skills in Turkish Undergraduate Nursing
Students. Nursing education perspectives, 39(2), pp.E2-E5.
Kossek, E.E., Thompson, R.J. and Lautsch, B.A., 2015. Balanced workplace flexibility:
Avoiding the traps. California Management Review, 57(4), pp.5-25.
Lock, D., 2017. The essentials of project management. Routledge.
Morden, T., 2017. Principles of management. Routledge.
Oettingen, G., Kappes, H.B., Guttenberg, K.B. and Gollwitzer, P.M., 2015. Self‐regulation of
time management: Mental contrasting with implementation intentions. European Journal of
Social Psychology, 45(2), pp.218-229.
Wilson, A.M., 2018. Management skills.