You have no doubt heard the old saying that time is money.
Saving Time is Popular Advice
Just today in an email from Sitepoint, one of my favorite resources for learning about web matters, I read a comment that relates directly to this point:
Trimming a few minutes out of common tasks can add up to hundreds of hours saved in the long term. That time could mean more clients, better work, new skills, or perhaps just room for those personal projects that are full of potential.
One of the best ways to increase your income and productivity in general is to learn how to save time. And the really good news is that it is altogether possible to do it on a massive scale.
In many if not most cases, almost any job can be done in much less time if you know how and have the right tools.
Saving Time is Neglected Advice
The primary reason most people neglect this opportunity is that they focus on the forest rather than the trees, so to speak. Time can sometimes be saved in big ways, by learning a new skill or adopting a new tool for example. But more often, the trick is to learn new ways to do small things.
One of our major commitments is to senior adult foster care. We spend a lot of time in the kitchen. It only takes a few seconds to get a gallon of milk out of the refrigerator, but it can be done in half the time if the milk is always on the same shelf in the same location. Multiply this over and over on a lot of small undertakings and a significant amount of time is saved. But it is easy to neglect these simple skills.
Illustration:
I do a lot of my banking online. Chase bank has one of the best credit card setups. After logging in I can choose my payment amount, the date to pay and prepare to submit my payment with only three clicks of my mouse. Very user friendly.
Another bank I use, but will not name, is quite the opposite. I only continue to use them because I get a 5% discount (it is associated with AAA) on my gasoline each month which adds up to a worthwhile sum. In their case the same transaction requires anywhere from 12-15 clicks.
The most irritating aspect of the setup is that to change the default payment date you click on a calendar image which goes to a two month selection of the following two months, excluding the current month. Who would ever need to set their currently due payment two months or more ahead? You have to back up the calendar to get to the month you are in!
Who designed this? What were they thinking, or were they thinking at all? Do any of their own people use this thing? Most to our point, is anyone thinking about the time users must waste in order to use their site. This may seem a small matter, but it shows how often people neglect to give consideration to how much they waste time for themselves or others.
Saving Time Does Help You Make Money
Sometimes saving time is as simple as doing the task at the most opportune time. We have a lot of gardening chores because of our large yard and numerous flower beds. Once the weeds get ahead of you, as they are right now in our rock garden, weeding gets to be a large and time consuming job! But done at the right time with a hula hoe, a large bed can be weeded in short order.
Saving time is one of the best ways to make available the time you need to make or manage your money better. Learn a new skill, get a new tool, or just discover new tricks of the trade to do a hard job quicker—there are many ways to save time that can help you make more money or find time for new money making activities. But it requires timely action.
