The Changing Role of Time Management

Too much to do and too much information forces a change of focus

Twenty years ago if you were talking on the telephone for ten minutes callers would get a busy signal and either call you back later of get the information from someone else. Today after hanging up you would be faced with several voice mail messages, e-mails and faxes. You might even have messages on your cell phone, PDA or beeper. Being unavailable at the time does not exempt you from having to handle the task at a later time. Communications do not stop simply because you do. As a consequence workload increases along with urgency, anxiety and stress.

As technology increases, so do expectations. People expect immediate responses, instant action and multitasking. It's not unusual to receive 100 e-mails daily in addition to the dozens of voice mail messages, faxes, hard copy memos and live telephone calls or visits. In brief, we are in a continual state of overload.

To say that we are suffering from information overload is an understatement. One Sunday edition of the New York Times contains more information than the average person acquires in a lifetime. Perform an Internet search on the words information overload and you can spend eight hours a day for the rest of your life reading the material. A year 2000 study at the University of California, Berkeley revealed that we produce 1.5 billion gigabytes of content each year.

Overload causes stress. A Reuter's study in the UK found that 42 percent of the respondents attributed ill health to this stress. 61 percent claim they had to cancel social activities because of the information overload, while 60 percent said they were frequently too tired for leisure activities.

Too much information is counterproductive. Besides the stress, decision-making is more difficult. The overabundance of conflicting information causes analysis paralysis. Time is wasted and effectiveness decreases. And executives tend to work longer hours in an attempt to cope with this overload.

Too much information is as bad as too little. We must draw the line at obtaining enough information to make an intelligent decision and resist the urge to review more data simply because it's available. Otherwise we may fall victim to the law of diminishing returns. The cost of time spent analyzing the additional information may exceed the value of any resulting benefit.

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Time management has taken on a new meaning. It is no longer aimed at getting more done in less time, but rather at choosing the best things to do while maintaining a healthy lifestyle. It is no longer a productivity tool; it is a survival tool. Where it used to focus on doing more things, it is now focused on doing more important things. It no longer involves physical skill and dexterity as much as mental skill and emotional intelligence.

Twenty years ago the dilemma was trying to gather enough information to solve a problem, make a decision or complete a project. Today it is sifting through the plethora of information obtained by a mere click of a mouse on a Google search button. The information explosion continues to explode.

Time management is now self-management. It consists of coping skills and decision-making skills. We must make wise choices, deciding what to do and what to ignore. We cannot do everything. We must be able to select the priorities without feeling guilty about leaving the rest undone. We must also know our limitations and recognize that our number one priority is not our jobs but our health.

Time management is still evolving. It is moving through self-management to life management. The emphasis is shifting from personal productivity to life balance and from tasks to relationships. The measure of success will no longer be about what a person does but about who a person is and how he or she has impacted those around them.