Time Management
Basic Time Management Considerations
Time management is a crucial factor in the busy marketplace
of today's webdesigner trade. As I did, I am sure that you also
want to learn ways to improve your design abilities while making
a comfortable living doing what you love to do. I am here to warn
you though, that should you not make time management a part of your
day to day routine, you will fall short in other areas of your life.
Although major research has found that although
money is not the answer to everything, money is however something
that will make most of the problems people face more bearable. They
have found that people with better financial resources usually have
an easier time finding solutions to common problems they face. Should
that be from having a reserve to draw from when emergencies arise,
or the financial flow to meet their present financial obligations
is not the point here. The point is finding a balance in your life
between business, personal, spiritual, and family that make your
successes even more successful through proper time management. Without
it, you will fall into the same trap that many webmasters do. Your
work will begin to consume you as you work harder, instead of smarter,
to accomplish unrealistic goals. When you finally do accomplish
your dreams, the chances are you will have nobody there to share
your success with.
Time Management Traps
Time Management Trap #1 - The Workaholic's Trap:
"If I could only get this and that done, and
get this to happen, then I will be all right. But I need to keep
at it in order to get it done." There is a saying about "all
work and no play", and let me tell you from first hand experience
that it is true. It's fine and dandy to be passionate about your
work. That applies in any situation. When it is taken to extremes
it becomes a problem for the person and those that depend on them.
The biggest problem from this mentality is the uninformed assumptions
that most new website designers and webmasters make. The internet
is full of hype about the ability to make millions from operating
a website. Everyday, people look at this hype and decide to strike
out in search of riches. It's almost like the California Gold Rush
of our history, but in a present day setting. Potential new webmasters
and website designers fall victim to visions of quickly amassing
riches to catapult them to financial freedom. Can people become
rich from the Internet?
The answer to this one is a careful "yes".
What I mean by "careful" is having the proper mindset
that will allow you to meet your goals of financial freedom. It
is having the realization that an Internet business is just like
any other business in the fact that they ALL take time to build
and produce. There is no way that you are going to put a website
online and within days make it an overnight success. At least not
if you are new to business and have no contacts. If you have a pile
of money to invest, then that is another story. I speak here to
the typical webmaster and designer, NOT the exceptions to the rule.
The typical potential new webmaster and website designers
I am talking about here are those that usually start out with little
or no business finances. They probably don't even have a business
plan concept, or any practical business experience other than the
experience they have from previous employment (many times no experience
with design exists even in their employment history). Many of them
have had no formal training in website design, HTML coding, JavaScript,
or anything else. Most end up starting out from a hobby, and have
the intention of trying to make a go of something they have found
they like doing. And most have no clue about marketing or promotion.
They start out with these massive learning curves
and still expect to become successful overnight. Their lack of preparation
only serves to maximize the workaholics trap. They are so motivated
to make their venture a success that they throw themselves into
their work. I used to personally be one that would throw 16 or more
hours into my work habits a day just trying to beat the learning
curve. And as I did, others in my life that I cared about suffered.
In retrospect, it isn't something that I am not proud of, but I
was misinformed and naive.
Many talented people end up burning themselves out
because they do not use proper time management techniques. They
become discouraged when their unrealistic goals are not achieved.
And that is a sad point to this trap. There are truly talented designers
and webmasters out there that have given up because they were unrealistic.
They did not take the time to pace themselves. They did not take
the time to enjoy life. They simply threw themselves into a project
and wasted a lot of their time simply because they were misinformed,
or uninformed.
Time Management Trap #1 - The Workaholic's Trap Solutions
The solutions to avoiding this pitfall are simple.
The first is having realistic expectations of yourself and abilities.
You need to know what you can and can't do. Along with that needs
to come the ability to set realistic goals, NOT goals born from
Internet hype. The Internet is the wild wild west of our history.
In the beginning, it was lawless and loaded with danger. The Internet
is still loaded with dangers. There are people out there that feed
off of our lack of education or experience. That is the kind of
hype that I talk of.
These people make promises that they either can't
keep, or never expected to keep in the first place. The results
usually end up being misplaced investments in products or services
that were not beneficial to us, or didn't deliver as planned. Webmasters
and designers need to be especially alert to this type of hype.
It makes us work harder instead of smarter, and detracts from our
ability to achieve our goals. We are targets for these types of
people because they have programs that may be set up to benefit
them more than us. Those scams make more work for us without a return
on our investment. Granted, it may only require a time investment,
but it detracts from time we could have spent on other things that
could have moved us closer to our goals.
Avoiding the things that add unproductive time to
our work is the key. It is important to weigh the benefits of each
possibility. What are the time factors involved? What is the usual
return on this type of time investment? Are those time factors worth
the return? What can we expect to lose from the time commitment?
Have others benefited from this type of time commitment? Is it a
tried and true method of reaching my goals? Will this action really
help move me towards my goal? These are all questions that should
be asked and answered before committing additional time to a website
design or webmaster venture.
There are other important questions to ask yourself
about before even considering to undertake the website design or
webmaster route. Why do I really want to do this, what is my goal
in this, and what part of my life is it going to fulfill? Do I have
the time to do this? Will it take time away from the things in life
that I like to do? Can I make it fit into my life and still have
the same quality of life that I enjoy now, or better? Do I really
know the requirements for such a venture? Am I informed and being
realistic, or do I suffer from Internet hype? Do I know what I am
doing, or am I going to have to learn the ropes? Do I have a complete
list of all the things that I am going to need to make this work,
do I have the time to do it, and how can I manage the tasks and
still have time for the things in my life that matter most? Having
the answers to these questions can drastically reduce the possibilities
of falling into the workaholic's trap.
Back
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Time
Management Trap #2 (Article Continues)
By James R. Sanders
December 17, 2001
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About the Author
James R. Sanders is the owner of Sanders
Consultation Group Plus. He has been a webmaster and website designer since
1997. He has also been involved in self employment ventures since 1992. He is
presently a contributing author of NewbieHangout,
and has been published through WebProNews
and 4Rankings.com.
His writing is targeted to webmasters, would be webmasters, website designers,
would be website designers, self employed, or those researching information
looking for solutions to questions associated with design, business operations,
and promotion today. His goal is to provide practical information based upon
his years of experience to help webmasters, website designers, and self employed
people achieve their goals in today's competitive global market. You can subscribe
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