(ThySistas.com) We women are all busy these days, whether you’re a working mom or a professional woman climbing the corporate ladder. With so many things to juggle, it can be hard to stay on top of your mounting workload, let alone find some time to rest and recharge.
There are some ways to change your work style to optimize your time at the office yourself. Besides, there are excellent tools available these days that use technology and automation to streamline the workday.
If you work in customer service for a transportation or logistics company, for example, there are automated fuel management systems to help reduce your employer’s costs, increase operational efficiency, and automate workloads. Don’t think of it as robots taking over your job, instead, think of all the time you’ll save and freedom you’ll have to get to all of those human tasks that you haven’t been able to get to for weeks.
How to Improve Your Time Management at Work
1. Start Your Day or Week with a Schedule. The first step to better time management is to organize your day. When you first sit down in the morning, plan out your priorities for tasks that must be done as well as ones that would be nice to complete if you have time. Then put all 
items into your schedule and stick to it! If something takes longer than expected, stop working on it at the allocated time and come back to it later (unless it’s a high-priority, of course). If surprises come up or you get called into an unexpected meeting, shuffle your schedule around as needed, and if possible, say “no” or step out of a surprise meeting early.
2. Learn to Prioritize. If you don’t know how to plan your tasks according to priority, it’s okay! Take your project or task, and look at it from the perspective of its importance to your employer’s business as a whole, or its impact on later stages in the project. If a lot of future tasks depend on this one thing being complete, it’s a higher priority. If the job is a crucial aspect of your employer’s mission or primary business, it’s also a top priority. Focus on the tasks that will bring about the best returns.
3. Set Boundaries, but Be Polite. As noted in Step 1 above, unexpected things will come up, and you’ll sometimes need to find a way to say “no” politely. By setting boundaries, you can make it easier to avoid unnecessary conflict in the workplace. If your colleagues know that a given period of the day is off-limits except in the case of an emergency, you can avoid having your dedicated work time disturbed. Be sure to be clear about which times of the day you should not be disrupted, and identify other periods of the day when you are available for short phone calls or simple requests. You should also explain which emergencies would be considered acceptable interruptions, and when your co-workers should schedule longer meetings.
Be sure to plan time in your day for healthy distractions and breaks, especially for stress management and meals. Stay away from the bad distractions such as social media and even email (sometimes). Where possible, use technology such as scheduling applications and automation tools to help keep you on track. Finally, don’t procrastinate, especially with essential and high-priority tasks.
Staff Writer; Carla Shaw