Management thinkers have identified several obstacles to or “time-wasters”. These are as follows:
(1) Telephone Calls:
Telephone has a tremendous influence on all of us. We are compelled to pick up the receiver as soon as the phone rings. The situation has become worse with the availability of mobiles. Some people have a tendency to gossip for hours together on the phone. This kind of ‘phone-holism’ needs to be conquered. Manage your phone; don’ allow the phone to control you and your time.
(2) Visitors:
Indian culture places a great importance to welcoming visitors with the dictum ^t Such visitors can be from within ®r outside the institution (or family/home). If encouraged, they can stay too long and take up your valuable time.
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(3) Socializing:
It refers to idle chats with your colleague- subordinates or students by making yourself freely available. This may force you to take pending work home or staying back in the institution to complete it.
(4) Attempting too Many Things:
Trying to take up and complete many tasks at a time results in not doing anything properly.
(5) Procrastination:
Postponing work to another day piles up unnecessarily. Procrastination is said to be the thief of time.
(6) Failure to Delegate:
Reasons for failure to delegate have been discussed in another chapter in this book in detail.
(7) Meetings:
Unplanned, unscheduled and too man;’ meetings are a prime source of time-wastage.
In addition to these, there are some traits within a manager which are responsible for wasting-time. These include:
(1) Making excuses about past failure.
(2) Lack of self-discipline and lack of prioritizing.
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(3) Indecisiveness.
(4) A tendency to be a perfectionist.
(5) Undue haste in completing tasks.
(6) Negative emotions such as anger, tension, and frustration interfere with sound judgement.
(7) Insecurity.
(8) Failure to recognize the benefits of planning.
(9) Inability to say ‘no’ to unjust demands and requests.
Effective use of time necessitates that these time-wasters should be taken care of.