Identify the Consequences
Time Management Series (3)
While in the university as an undergraduate student, a senior colleague of mine who was meant to graduate the previous year returned back to the university due to a course he had failed. In the course of the semester, attendance to lectures for this particular course was mandatory and the course lecturer allocated some marks for attendance.
However, this senior colleague didn’t attend the lectures but showed up for the exams. This was not enough to give him a passing grade for the course. He failed it a second time and thereafter abandoned the university without getting his certificate. He went into politics and rose quickly. At some point, he was earmarked for a top position until someone spilled that he didn’t graduate from the university. The party leaders summoned him and asked for his certificate which he couldn’t produce. He lost out of that opportunity and that was the beginning of his downward slide in politics.
One of the most important words in developing the discipline of time management is ‘consequences’. A task is as important as the degree to which it has serious potential consequences for completion or non-completion. Check and identify the consequences. It is unimportant if it doesn’t matter if it is done or not.
For instance, not completing a course of study at the university can have enormous consequences that can impact your life for the next fifty years. Completing a major task or project at work can have significant consequences for your job and next promotion. On the other hand, chatting with friends and shopping online may be enjoyable but has few consequences for your life and goals.
That is, doing them or not makes little difference to your life. However, people tend to spend more time on activities with little or no consequences. For efficient time management, identify activities whose consequences have a great impact on your life and spend more time on these. Then watch as your life goes forward in leaps and bounds.
Have a good week and keep achieving.
© Nkese Umofia
Photo: Bradyn Trollip
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