Odds are you have heard the phrase, "Time is money." When you are talking about the length of business projects, this cannot be more true. The less time it takes you to complete one project, the faster you can get started on another, meaning more clients, more completed work and more pay. However, anyone could reduce project duration if they did not have to produce quality products. The challenge comes when you are considering how to do just as good or even better work in less time.
Keep track of how time is used and eliminate time wasters. When working on your next project, set a timer for everything you do to complete a given project. Track not only your steps in project completion, but also your activities that are not project-related, but take time away from the project. For example, keep track of the time you use getting snacks or returning unrelated phone calls. At the end of the project, add up the numbers and cut or modify unnecessary steps that are taking up your time. For example, perhaps you've spent a total of two hours over a course of a month walking back and forth to the copy room to get more paper. To solve this problem, ask the office manager to stock your drawer with copy paper. While things like getting snacks may not be able to be eliminated, modify them by bringing snacks to your desk or designating snack break times for yourself.
Create an agenda or system to follow when working on projects. Make weekly or daily task lists, including detailed items to do; cross off each task as you accomplish it. This will not only allow you to feel good about getting something done, but will ensure that you are working on projects even when you are stumped. Putting even the smallest details -- such as printing and stapling reports -- on the agenda will also prevent you from underestimating how long some of the most mundane, low-level tasks take to be resolved.
Understand how you work best. Try working in a few different environments, with music on and without music, and while multi-tasking and without multi-tasking. Think about which environment feels more comfortable to you, and compare the work you got done in each. Try to reproduce the same environment for every task. For example, if you work best in the early morning, try to dedicate your mornings at work to working on projects. Leave the afternoons for meetings when you are talking about ideas rather than accomplishing them.
Collaborate and delegate. Work with others, and split up the project into parts by strengths. This way, people who are weak in a particular area do not have to spend days completing a project when someone who is strong in that area could have had it done in hours. Discuss strengths and weaknesses in the office or in your project teams so that you know who to contact about helping you with your project.
Let others know you are working on an important project, and cut out time wasted using technology such as social networking, texting and emailing. While these technologies are fun to use and may even help you communicate important business information, you don't have to use them during time that has been allotted for working on a project. Tell people that you are generally working during a certain part of the day, and explain that you will have technology turned off, but that you will be happy to get back to this technology later in the day day or the following day. However, always make sure there is a way for others to get in contact with you, should there be an emergency. For example, you may want to keep your office phone on.
- Do not overwork yourself just to reduce project duration. Projects that are the result of stressed and frantic work are not often of a high-quality. Instead, consider giving your yourself or your team rewards or breaks when you accomplish goals that you set beforehand.
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