Use this time management trick to save more time than ever

Have you ever procrastinated on getting something completed and knocked out the task in the last minutes? Or have you ever noticed how something that should be easy to complete takes all day?In 1955 Cyril Parkinson wrote an essay that was published in the Economist that discussed this specific phenomenon that came to be known as Parkinson's law. Parkinson's law says that "Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion."  Ok, so that's what the law says but what does that mean and how can we use it to our advantage?

What does this mean?

Parkinson's law means that bureaucracy increases with time. The longer you have to complete a task the more time it will take to complete that task. If you ask your child to clean their room before the end of the day it will take them right up until bedtime to get it completed. However, if you ask them to complete it in 30 minutes before they can run outside and play with their friends, they will suddenly be able to complete that same task in 30 minutes.

There are of course limits to the ability to compress or expand work. You won't take all day to put the garlic powder back in the spice rack and you won't build an entire house in 30 minutes. The principles however, still remain true. The longer the amount of time you allow for a task, the longer that task will take. 

When you provide a long timeline for the completion of the task you allow for the introduction of extraneous tasks or inefficiencies into the process. If you have a large presentation to complete and have 2 weeks to complete it, you may find yourself going out of your way to explore different options in the presentation or stopping to consider how you will put the presentation together. By giving yourself a long timeline, you've reduced the pressure to keep moving forward. You've created an environment where you have no feeling of immediate accountability to complete the task. As a result you may find yourself wasting time and resources that could be better spent elsewhere, and time is more valuable than any other resource you have.

How do you take advantage of Parkinson's law?

Step 1

First you must realize that you are already procrastinating and vastly over estimating the amount of time you will need to complete tasks. You want to start to dial back the amount of time you allow to complete projects. You want to set aggressive and optimistic timelines. You want to be sure that there is some pressure to complete things quickly. 

Step 2

Secondly, while you must set aggressive timelines, be sure that you're setting realistic ones. For example, if you need to create a presentation and the computer system that will spit out the reporting takes 30 minutes to generate and export the data, you certainly can't complete the entire presentation in 30 minutes. You'll need to adjust your timelines wisely to account for the minimum amount of time you need to complete the tasks.

Step 3

Step three is...there is no step 3. That's it.  Just two steps to taking advantage of Parkinson's law.  Set aggressive but realistic timelines. Don't give yourself all day Saturday to clean out the garage, give yourself 2 hours.  You'll surprise yourself with how quickly and efficiently you're able to work under the pressure. 

Things to consider

If you have your timelines set for you and you do not have the ability to adjust them, you should still consider setting personal timelines. If you are allotted 8 hours to complete a task but you are able to set a 2 hour personal timeline to complete it, then do so. You will be able to use the other 6 hours to work on personal projects or personal development. Remember that time is your most valuable resource and you should consider those 6 extra hours a gift. 

You will not get this right, directly out of the gate. It will take time to get good at estimating and setting aggressive timelines.  That's OK! Through trial and error you will begin to learn just how effective and quickly you can work. 

If you're setting out to complete a task that you're totally unfamiliar with you won't necessarily have a baseline to estimate the time it will take to complete the task.  Just look at the work and use your best judgement. You may overestimate or underestimate. Just adjust your timeline as you work through the project to ensure that you set a realistic aggressive timeline.