Design Practise: January 2012

#1 TIME MANAGEMENT

Time management is the act or process of planning and exercising conscious control over the amount of time spent on specific activities, especially to increase efficiency or productivity. Time management may be aided by a range of skills, tools, and techniques used to manage time when accomplishing specific tasks, projects and goals complying with a due date.
"Get Organized" - paperwork and task triage
"Protect Your Time" - insulate, isolate, delegate
"Set gravitational goals" - that attract actions automatically
"Achieve through Goal management Goal Focus" - motivational emphasis
"Work in Priority Order" - set goals and prioritize
"Use Magical Tools to Get More Out of Your Time" - depends on when written
"Master the Skills of Time Management"
"Go with the Flow" - natural rhythms, Eastern philosophy
"Recover from Bad Time Habits" - recovery from underlying psychological problems, e.g. procrastination
ime Management is not doing the wrong things quicker. That just gets us nowhere faster. Time Management is doing the right things.

#2 SPEEDING/DOING THINGS FASTER

Most Important Tasks (MITs): At the start of each day (or the night before) highlight the three or four most important things you have to do in the coming day. Do them first. If you get nothing else accomplished aside from your MITs, you’ve still had a pretty productive day.
Wake up earlier: Add a productive hour to your day by getting up an hour earlier — before everyone else starts imposing on your time.
Ubiquitous Capture: Always carry something to take notes with — a pen and paper, a PDA, a stack of index cards. Capture every thought that comes into your mind, whether it’s an idea for a project you’d like to do, an appointment you need to make, something you need to pick up next time you’re at the store, whatever. Review it regularly and transfer everything to where it belongs: a todo list, a filing system, a journal, etc.
10+2*5: Work in short spurts of 10 minutes, interrupted by 2 minute breaks. Use a timer. Do this 5 times an hour to stay on target without over-taxing your physical and mental resources. Spend those 2 minutes getting a drink, going to the bathroom, or staring out a window.
80/20 Rule/Pareto Principle: Generally speaking, the 80/20 Principle says that most of our results come from a small portion of our actual work, and conversely, that we spend most of our energy doing things that aren’t ultimately all that important. Figure out which part of your work has the greatest results and focus as much of your energy as you can on that part.
Don’t Break the Chain: Use a calendar to track your daily goals. Every day you do something, like working out or writing 1,000 words, make a big red “X”. Every day the chain will grow longer. Don’t break the chain! That is, don’t let any non-X days interrupt your chain of successful days.
Do It Now: Fight procrastination by adopting “do it now!” as your mantra. Limit yourself to 60 seconds when making a decision, decide what you’re going to do with every input in your life as soon as you encounter it, learn to make bold decisions even when you’re not really sure. Keep moving forward.
ToDon’t List: A list of things not to do — useful for keeping track of habits that lead you to be unproductive, like playing online flash games.
50-30-20: Spend 50% of your working day on tasks that advance your long-term, life goals, spend 30% on tasks that advance your middle-term (2-years or so) goals, and the remaining 20% on things that affect only the next 90 days or so.
1 hour of planing saves 10 hours of doing.

#3 SAVING TIME

Use a planner. You may be used to making only mental notes for appointments and deadlines. MIT schedules become steadily more complex and your brain's short-term memory may overflow. Use your phone or iPod, a PDA, software on your computer, even a paper pocket calendar—whatever technology is easy for you to enter and retrieve information and receive reminders. Ironically, writing things down (or typing them in) actually helps your brain remember them.
Plan your study time. Each subject's syllabus gives you lots of clues as to when and how much you need to study each week. At the beginning of the term block out periods for psets, preparing for hour exams, and writing papers. Then you won't waste time each week figuring out what to do first. See Take Charge of Your Time for detailed help on this.
Break big tasks into smaller ones. Before you start on a large research project, a paper, or preparing for finals, divide it up into smaller tasks (for example, "Assemble lists of website to consult," "Get bibliography from TA," "Execute lab tests." This helps you focus on each task, eliminating time wasted worrying about how to get everything done. It also gives you a welcome sense of accomplishment as you check off each one. Try our Assignment Timeline as a framework for this process.
Organize your space, The old proverb, "A place for everything and everything in its place" says it all. Invest a little time in organizing now, and you'll save it many times over when you're in a last-minute rush and need your notebooks, soccer pads, water bottle, and snacks.
OHIO: Only Handle It Once. Sort postal mail into three piles, maybe using a desk organizer: items that need action (put them on your To-Do List), items to file for future reference, recycling. Handle your email and voicemail similarly; don't waste time saying, "Oh, I'll go back and read this more carefully some other time."
Stop the Time Thieves. Pick a quiet, comfortable study location where you are not likely be disturbed (see Where and When to Study), and tell your friends where you will be only if you can trust them not to interrupt you unnecessarily. Turn off your phone. If being online is too much of a temptation, turn off your computer's network connection. Concentrating on study now allows you to concentrate only on socializing later.
Make Waiting Productive. When you have just a few minutes between classes, on line, or on the T, review some note cards, touch up your lecture notes, continue with a reading assignment, or work on a problem set. Every minute counts
One reason why going slow helps is because it gives more time for the brain to process information. You need to think of your brain as a computer. Like a computer, if you open 5 applications and are downloading video, streaming music and talking to friends all at the same time, the computer will get annoyed and become very slow because it cannot process all the information in the time you want it too. The same holds true for the brain.

#4 PROCRASTINATION

Twenty percent of people identify themselves as chronic procrastinators. For them procrastination is a lifestyle, albeit a maladaptive one. And it cuts across all domains of their life. They don't pay bills on time. They miss opportunities for buying tickets to concerts. They don't cash gift certificates or checks. They file income tax returns late. They leave their Christmas shopping until Christmas eve.
It's not trivial, although as a culture we don't take it seriously as a problem. It represents a profound problem of self-regulation. And there may be more of it in the U.S. than in other countries because we are so nice; we don't call people on their excuses ("my grandmother died last week") even when we don't believe them.
Procrastination is not a problem of time management or of planning. Procrastinators are not different in their ability to estimate time, although they are more optimistic than others. "Telling someone who procrastinates to buy a weekly planner is like telling someone with chronic depression to just cheer up," insists Dr. Ferrari.
Procrastinators are made not born. Procrastination is learned in the family milieu, but not directly. It is one response to an authoritarianparenting style. Having a harsh, controlling father keeps children from developing the ability to regulate themselves, from internalizing their own intentions and then learning to act on them. Procrastination can even be a form of rebellion, one of the few forms available under such circumstances. What's more, under those household conditions, procrastinators turn more to friends than to parents for support, and their friends may reinforce procrastination because they tend to be tolerant of their excuses.
Procrastination predicts higher levels of consumption of alcoholamong those people who drink. Procrastinators drink more than they intend to—a manifestation of generalized problems in self-regulation. That is over and above the effect of avoidant coping styles that underlie procrastination and lead to disengagement viasubstance abuse.
Procrastinators tell lies to themselves. Such as, "I'll feel more like doing this tomorrow." Or "I work best under pressure." But in fact they do not get the urge the next day or work best under pressure. In addition, they protect their sense of self by saying "this isn't important." Another big lie procrastinators indulge is that time pressure makes them more creative. Unfortunately they do not turn out to be more creative; they only feel that way. They squander their resources.
Procrastinators actively look for distractions, particularly ones that don't take a lot of commitment on their part. Checking e-mail is almost perfect for this purpose. They distract themselves as a way of regulating their emotions such as fear of failure.
There's more than one flavor of procrastination. People procrastinate for different reasons. Dr. Ferrari identifies three basic types of procrastinators:

arousal types, or thrill-seekers, who wait to the last minute for the euphoric rush.
avoiders, who may be avoiding fear of failure or even fear of success, but in either case are very concerned with what others think of them; they would rather have others think they lack effort than ability.
decisional procrastinators, who cannot make a decision. Not making a decision absolves procrastinators of responsibility for the outcome of events.

9. There are big costs to procrastination. Health is one. Just over the course of a single academic term, procrastinating college students had such evidence of compromised immune systems as more colds and flu, more gastrointestinal problems. And they had insomnia. In addition, procrastination has a high cost to others as well as oneself; it shifts the burden of responsibilities onto others, who become resentful. Procrastination destroys teamwork in the workplace and private relationships.

10. Procrastinators can change their behavior—but doing so consumes a lot of psychic energy. And it doesn't necessarily mean one feels transformed internally. It can be done with highly structured cognitive behavioral therap

11. The modern term comes from the Latin word procrastinatus, which is the past participle of procrastinare derived from pro- (forward) and crastinus (of tomorrow).^[6] Though descriptions of procrastination appear in ancient Egyptian, Greek and Roman texts, it first appears by name in the English language in 1548 according to the Oxford English Dictionaryy.

#5 WASTING TIME

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Procrastination
a key to not wasting time is having sufficient motivation. Motivation can come in all sorts of ways–the key is to figure out what motivates you and then set yourself up to succeed by using that motivation as a carrot to pull you forward. It can be a good idea to share your motivations with managers so they understand what drives you.
Top 5 Time-Wasting Excuses (%)
- Don’t have enough work to do 33.2%
Year of Birth Time Wasted Per Day:

1930-1949 0.50 hours

1950-1959 0.68 hours

1960-1969 1.19 hours

1970-1979 1.61 hours

1980-1985 1.95 hours

6. Top 5 Time Wasting Industries (per day)

Insurance 2.5 hours

Public Sector (Non-Education) 2.4 hours

Research & Development 2.3 hours

Education 2.2 hours

Software and Internet 2.2 hours

7. Top 5 Time Wasting States

State – Time Wasted (hours/day) – Salary Dollars Wasted (per year)

Missouri – 3.2 hours – $28.1 billion

Indiana – 2.8 hours – $25.1 billion

Kentucky – 2.8 hours – $15.4 billion

Wisconsin – 2.8 hours – $23.8 billion

Nevada – 2.7 hours – $9.8 billion

8. The average person spends 1/3 of their lifetime sleeping

9. Smoking

10.

#6 QUATES ABOUT TIME

You will never “find” time for anything. If you want time, you must make it.Charles Bruxton
To think too long about doing a thing often becomes its undoing.Eva Young
All that really belongs to us is time; even he who has nothing else has that.Baltasar Gracian
One thing you can’t recycle is wasted time.Author Unknown
Never let yesterday use up today.Richard H. Nelson
To do two things at once is to do neither.Publius Syrus
Take care of the minutes and the hours will take care of themselves.Lord Chesterfield
t’s not enough to be busy, so are the ants. The question is, what are we busy about?Henry David Thoreau
Ordinary people think merely of spending time. Great people think of using it.Author Unknown
Time as he grows old teaches many lessons.Aeschylus

#7 TIME AND WORK/JOB

Stand – By standing when someone walks into your office, you will usually prevent them from taking a seat. This can help keep them focused on the purpose of their visit and getting back to work (where they can sit again).
The average working person spends less than 30 seconds a day in meaningful communication with their children.
The average working person spends less than 2 minutes per day in meaningful communication with their spouse or "significant other".
Average hours American worker actually wastes – 2.09 hours per day
Average hours American workers are expected to waste by HR – .94 hours per day
Difference between expected and actual time wasted – 1.15 hours per day, 299 hours per year
Total salary dollars wasted per employee – $5,720 per year
In the last 20 years, working time has increased by 15% and leisure time has decreased by 33%.
The average person gets 1 interruption every 8 minutes, or approximately 7 an hour, or 50-60 per day. The average interruption takes 5 minutes, totaling about 4 hours or 50% of the average workday. 80% of those interruptions are typically rated as "little value" or "no value" creating approximately 3 hours of wasted time per day.

#8 DAYLIGHT SAVING TIME

Officially, it's "daylight saving time," not "daylight savings time." But don't feel bad if you thought there was a final "s" on "saving"; far more people Google the incorrect phrase than the correct one.
Daylight saving time has mixed effects on people's health. Transitions into and out of DST can disturb people's sleeping patterns, for example, and make them more restless at night. Night owls tend to be more bothered by the time changes than people who like mornings, Finnish researchers concluded last year.
There's a spike in heart attacks during the first week of daylight saving time, according to another study published last year. The loss of an hour's sleep may make people more susceptible to an attack, some experts say. When daylight saving time ends in the fall, heart attacks briefly become less frequent than usual.
People are safer drivers during daylight hours, and researchers have found that DST reduces lethal car crashes and pedestrian strikes. In fact, a study concluded that observing DST year-round would annually prevent about 195 deaths of motor vehicle occupants and about 171 pedestrian fatalities.
A U.S. law signed by President George W. Bush in 2005 extended the length of daylight saving time by four weeks. It now begins at 2 a.m. on the second Sunday in March. It ends on the first Sunday in November.
In 2005, Kazakhstan abolished daylight saving time, citing negative health effects. The country's government reportedly calculated that 51.6 percent of Kazakhs responded badly to the time change.
Daylight saving time (DST)—also summer time in several countries including in British English and European official terminology (see Terminology)—is the practice of temporarily advancing clocks during the summertime so that evenings have moredaylight and mornings have less. Typically clocks are adjusted forward one hour near the start of spring and are adjusted backward in autumn. Modern DST was first proposed in 1895 by George Vernon Hudson and it was first implemented during the First World War. Many countries have used it at various times since then; details vary by location.
Many other countries observe daylight saving time, but not all do so on the same day. That can create confusion for international travelers, business communications, and more.
The first American to advocate for daylight saving was Benjamin Franklin. He realized in 1784 that many people burned candles at night yet slept past dawn in the summer, wasting early-morning sunlight.
The effect of DST on energy use has changed over time and varies from place to place. Experts even disagree on whether DST still saves the nation energy. But so many people like to "spring forward" that it might be hard for officials to end the tradition, even if they determined it's wasteful.

#9 INTERESTING FACTS ON TIME

Millions of years ago, a day on Earth will have been 20 hours long. It is believed that, in millions of years time, a day on Earth will be 27 hours long.
The length of time it takes for Earth to orbit the Sun is 365 and a quarter days. To make up this extra quarter which isn't counted at the end of a year, we have an extra day every four years on 29th February. The next Leap Year will be in 2012.
Facts is that A day on Mars is about half an hour longer than a day on Earth.
There is no time at the north/south pole as all time zones fall in to one place making it impossible to define the time !!!
One of the best methods for determining something's age, especially for archeologists, is carbon dating. Carbon-14 is a substance that decays approximately 50 percent every 5570 years. Since Carbon-14 appears in almost every substance, archeologists use it to tell how old certain ancient artifacts or other buried treasures are.
Everyone experiences time differently. This is true at the level of both physics and biology. Within physics, we used to have Sir Isaac Newton’s view of time, which was universal and shared by everyone. But then Einstein came along and explained that how much time elapses for a person depends on how they travel through space (especially near the speed of light) as well as the gravitational field (especially if its near a black hole). From a biological or psychological perspective, the time measured by atomic clocks isn’t as important as the time measured by our internal rhythms and the accumulation of memories. That happens differently depending on who we are and what we are experiencing; there’s a real sense in which time moves more quickly when we’re older.
According to a man named Paul Couderc, only one one-thousandth of a second is gained in sixty years of traveling at the speed of sound
You live in the past. About 80 milliseconds in the past, to be precise. Use one hand to touch your nose, and the other to touch one of your feet, at exactly the same time. You will experience them as simultaneous acts. But that’s mysterious — clearly it takes more time for the signal to travel up your nerves from your feet to your brain than from your nose. The reconciliation is simple: our conscious experience takes time to assemble, and your brain waits for all the relevant input before it experiences the “now.” Experiments have shown that the lag between things happening and us experiencing them is about 80 milliseconds. (Via conference participant David Eagleman.)
Aging can be reversed. We all grow old, part of the general trend toward growing disorder. But it’s only the universe as a whole that must increase in entropy, not every individual piece of it. (Otherwise it would be impossible to build a refrigerator.) Reversing the arrow of time for living organisms is a technological challenge, not a physical impossibility. And we’re making progress on a few fronts: stem cells, yeast, and even (with caveats) mice and human muscle tissue. As one biologist told me: “You and I won’t live forever. But as for our grandkids, I’m not placing any bets.”
Early clocks only showed hours. How do you think you would feel if you only could tell time by hours and could not count the minutes?

#10 CLOCKS AND WATCHES

The gnomon was actually an earlier version of the sundial and probably the first device used to tell time. This “device” was essentially a stick in the earth which cast a shadow on markings in the dirt. The Berlin Museum houses a fragment of one of the oldest gnomons known to man.
The Romans constructed their first sundial in 164 B.C.
It is said that Galileo discovered the properties of a pendulum while watching a lamp swing back and forth in the Cathedral of Pisa
The Martinot family of clockmakers provided service to French rulers such as the famous and powerful Sun King, Louis XIV.
In 1797, a tax was placed on clocks in Great Britain. The tax was five shillings.
Concerning weighted cuckoo clocks- NEVER EVER move the hour hand when changing the time. ALWAYS move the minute hand or the clock will need to see a clock doctor. This action upsets the sensitive functions of the time mechanism.
The first alarm clock was invented in Concord New Hampshire by Levi Hutchins in 1787. It was never patented as the inventor didn’t care about money, he just didn’t want to oversleep anymore.
John Harrison, an English clockmaker, devoted his life to the quest of accurately determining longitude in order to make sea faring safer.
Way back during the old times, people rely on sun and water to measure time. Time readings were not accurate then, not until the discovery of mechanical and electrical clocks. A mechanical clock is composed of a set of gears, a spring and a weight that is responsible for the clock’s movement, while an electrical clock uses electricity or battery as a power source. Later on, modern technology introduced atomic and digital clocks and still continues to study for ways to improve it.
Seth Thomas Clocks is America's Oldest Continous Clockmaker, having continuously manufactured clocks in the USA since 1813. Seth Thomas was founded in Thomaston, Connecticut, which at the time of its founding was known as Plymouth Hollow. Plymouth Hollow renamed the town Thomaston in honor of Seth Thomas the individual and the Seth Thomas Clock Company. In the Company's earlier years Seth Thomas Clocks was a fairly sizeable maker of grandfather clocks and grandmother clocks, which as this is written, are no longer part of their product line.