In your estimation, what are the most common ways that we undermine our time management skills? Please give us a few strategies we can implement to increase our personal time-management ability.

Principle 1: The most effective graphic illustration I’ve given on time management in a lecture demonstrates the efficient use of time. I had filled a glass jar full of beans and asked the audience whether they thought it was filled to capacity. Everyone agreed that it was full except for a few brave souls in the back of the room who somehow sensed that there was more to the question than met the eye.

I then added a cup of salt into the already full jar. This time the audience was unanimous that no more could be added to the jar. I then filled it with a half cup of water. I explained that tasks needed to be categorized into beans, salt, and water. The little snippets of time, such as waiting for your bath water to run, can be filled with something from your list of small tasks that need to be done, such as replacing the batteries in the television remote control.

Application: When assessing students’ success in applying this principle, I find that all too often the smaller things are still left undone because the bigger tasks take precedence.