Time Management
Blog #4
Disclaimer: The views expressed here are my own and are not a representation of my employers or clients.
Time Management - the ability to use one's time effectively or productively, especially at work. "time management is the key to efficient working" (Oxford Dictionaries)
The world-renowned Social Emotional platform Casel.org offers a slew of rich robust references, tools, and systemic implementation resources. There is so much information on SEL and yeah this is incredibly useful for advancing one’s social-emotional learning to another level. Casel defines SEL as “the process that all people utilize to acquire and apply knowledge, demonstrate and manage emotions while improving equity, building and maintaining healthy relationships.” You will find that I will often reference Casel's evidence-based modalities, as a source for my practice, and for my write-ups on our, He’s Just A Social Worker forum. For instance, look at the Casel interactive wheel.
Casel’s framework is school-based friendly; however, you can surely implement the social-emotional learning practices beyond that. Because the learning also lends itself to the family, caregiver, and community sectors. Today I want to look at the top right orange spot that reads: self-management from the perspective of an employee in a team setting.
In the book titled Emotional Intelligence by Emily A. Sterrett you can learn about the nuances and the trouble with management in the workplace when they have low emotional intelligence (EQ). The handy dandy pocket book is a quick read that provides great insight into a struggling manager's challenges and how those responses are perceived by staff. The book shows us the importance of social skills in the workplace especially when you are pressed for time.
Time Won't Give Me Time
As a primer I want to be very clear, this post is for anybody and everybody who has struggled with time management in the workplace. This drop is also for those of us, who have dual issues allocating time properly on the job, when working within a team schema. To add on, this is also applicable to individuals who don't agree with their administration’s leadership vision at all times (raise your hands so we can see them). If that's you then good, you’ve come to the right place. One of the major issues for us in a fast-paced work environment is that we just don't have enough time to complete all the things we want. We have challenges with prioritizing, organizational barriers, and, work, work, work, work (Rhianna). Which sort of impacts some of our most desirable objectives like better performance, more success, and teamwork.
Team Prototypes
Procrastinator- usually the person who often thinks that things can be done at some point. Often gets the brunt of the blame when things go wrong.
Animator- this is the person who claims they do everything right. They have multiple ideas/solutions that never materialize because they are caught up in different frameworks.
Glue Guy or Gal- these team players often have to render their gifts for the greater good of the team. However, they are seen as reliable, dependable, and unified for all causes.
Get The Job Done - here we have the prototypical doer who has high-level emotional intelligence skills, is effective, and is usually aligned with the task at hand. Depending on where they are in their career, they get the job done and might be at risk of burn-out due to their feelings of being underappreciated, underpaid, and undervalued.
Think About It Skills
Before we dive into the solutions, let's talk about the science behind our thought process, and how that plays into our emotional-intelligence landscapes. In her book, Emily Sterrett talks to us about the three layers of the brain. She lays out for us how our brain receives, computes, and examines information. It goes a little something like this,
The first brain
The limbic system (emotional brain)
The cortex- the area of the rationalizing part of the brain. This is important for us when we reference a potential high crisis in the workplace, time is of the essence, people. Therefore, these parts of your brain are working at warp speed at any given time.
Super Strategies
For those of us who work on a team, you know how frustrating it can be to work with one another. I mean seriously, you guys know that working with adults sometimes is much more difficult than working with children. As seen by the prototype list above, there are members on your team right now that often struggle to activate their EQ channels properly. This continues to happen, even though you work on what appears to be
A) the same task.
B) just with different clients.
C) ANNnd almost always the same desired outcomes, yes client-centered results.
Let's take a look at my recommendations. Go ahead with your bad self, be that change agent, and improve your time management skills. For starters, remember not to make this about you. It's a multidisciplinary unit so there is no “I” in team. First, lend your focus to the growth areas you want to improve for the betterment of the team. Yes, before you make suggestions or tell others what to do, you should focus on yourself. To do this, think about how your improvements will enhance your time management skills and improve the team’s emotional intelligence scopes. For example, don't waste time on the obvious, how? When? or “why did this happen? "Instead, lead the team in productive discussions with inspirational messaging, and motivational words, or find ways to lift-up the team culture. That is a great use of your team’s time. A good tip is to start the team meeting with an icebreaker, humor, or a celebration. Point is, the more you remind the team of the family culture, the more likely the team will have success.
Another key step is to envision your best self throughout the entire process. During your planning time, think about what you can do to stay focused and emotionally ready, in case something unexpected happens to the team. For example, a team member is absent, you're pressed for time, the internet is not working, or they hired a lawyer. Well maybe not the lawyer example, you might need to call one too- if that ever happens. I'm talking about your emotional connection to the work. What are your team’s desired results? How great will WE all feel, if we accomplish this together? Yep, Winnnnninnnng time.
Exercise your controlled views of your desired outcomes using your time management skills proficiency by looking beyond the common answers. What I mean by this is, your results might come from you, someone else, two team members, or better yet, from all stakeholders. Learning to have multiple views and team participation improves success, builds trust, and enhances team rapport. This is a great example of using your time management skills wisely. It doesn't matter who takes credit we are all meeting, for the greater good, in this case: HELPING THE CLIENTS we service. Controlled views might sound easy but truuust me, it's not that simple. Some work teams can be challenging because some people want ALL the credit or no part of the blame. So, work together and stay focused!
Lastly, make a mental video of your desired results. Take data of your victories, and the, “do better next time clips.” The more you play this out in your mind, the more balanced it becomes, it also saves time and prepares everyone to become emotionally intelligent. See your success, be the success. I'm out of time.
Till Next Time, Same Bat Time, Same Bat Channel
https://casel.org/fundamentals-of-sel/
Sterrett A. Emily Emotional Intelligence (2000) HDR Press
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VeIOuWlmZrk
https://languages.oup.com/google-dictionary-en/time management
