While making a list of activities that determine how you manage your time
It’s no secret that effective time organization is a vital skill for employees and employers alike. You can also use the best productivity apps and apply the best time tracking practices. But that’s not always enough. That’s why learning time management skills should be a priority for your business. One powerful and fascinating way of learning helpful time management techniques, without additional stress, is through time management games. Show
What Are Time Management Games?If you notice the first signs of poor time management in your company – missed deadlines, lateness to meetings, poor performance – it’s time to take action! But, having your employees sit through another lecture on the ‘importance of timekeeping’ might not be the best idea. Instead, why not switch up the game a little and turn learning discipline into fun time management activities? But before that, here are some basic tips:
Why Everhour? Everhour integrates seamlessly with the most popular project management apps, such as Asana, Trello, ClickUp, Basecamp, Jira, GitHub (there is a very high chance you use one of these). This makes tracking time way easier. Benefits of Time Management GamesSelf-education to improve time management skills after a hectic and task-packed day can help your employees learn useful new skills. And these time management games can be a perfect solution to unwind. Did you know that time management games are an excellent tool for training the sensory nervous system, improving concentration, and critical thinking? You can use them as:
A range of time management games and techniques are freely available on the internet. They can be online and offline, group, or individual. But to help you sort the wheat from the chaff and know which games genuinely work, we’ve gathered the best time management games and activities for you and your staff. Why Do Games Work?‘Gamification’ isn’t just a recent trend; it’s an innovative way of learning that has caught teachers’ and students’ attention. Using interactive and fun ways of learning has numerous benefits. But these are our top favorites:
Traditional offline time management games are best played in an office environment. They are designed for individual and team play and involve lots of human interaction – the more people, the more fun. These games are great for understanding how to boost daily productivity and make better use of working time. And if you are looking for some extra tips on how to make yourself highly productive, follow the link. 1. The Big Picture ChallengeTeach your team to look beyond the immediate horizon in their work and plan for the future with the “Big Picture Challenge.” Inspired by Orangeworks.
Teams must adopt a ‘big picture’ approach to ensure that the final result is a success. This creative team bonding exercise requires effective color coordination and collaborative teamwork is required for each canvas to fit perfectly. And BTW, here is the best software tools to help your colleagues plan effectively. 2. Circadian RhythmTeach your team to synchronize their work with their body clock with the “Circadian Rhythm” game.
Points to discuss:
Wrap-up: If the participants share their rhythms with each other, they could build an efficient working schedule for the whole team. It’s also an excellent opportunity to get to know teammates better and boost communication skills at the same time. Another effective way for your colleagues to control their working time and breaks is to use the Pomodoro technique. It’ll help avoid overburdening and quick-burning out with time work periods and relaxation intervals. 3. Time SquaredShow your colleagues how they allocate their time throughout the day by playing the “Time Squared” game.
The task can be done throughout the day, so that your co-workers have more precise results on their papers, allowing them to evaluate time efficiently. Points to discuss:
Wrap-up: This game is a convenient way to actually see on paper how time is spent throughout the day. Afterward, ask your colleagues to find new ways to improve their time management. One great place to start is with some time management literature. 4. Delegation Skill PracticeTeach your colleagues to delegate tasks effectively with the “Delegation Skill Practice” exercise.
Points to discuss:
Wrap-up: Knowing how to delegate tasks is an essential skill for any manager. It optimizes time spent and helps ensure the best person for the job is assigned to it, whenever possible. To help better manage your team, and allocate time more efficiently, check out the techniques and strategies we’ve come up with here. 5. What I Did YesterdayTeach your team how to find patterns in everyday working activities with the “What I did yesterday” game.
Wrap-up: The ‘light bulb’ moment is the recognition that we spend time on things that have little or no consequence on our performance. Using this activity, participants can adjust the expectations of their daily schedule and become more efficient. This will help them accept an appropriate amount of work, prioritize and be able to give a clearer deadline. Leading to a more prosperous, efficient company. 6. The Mayo Jar LessonThe mayo jar activity demonstrates the importance of doing the most important tasks first. As the story goes a professor stands before his philosophy class with an empty jar, fills it to the top with golf balls, and asks if it’s full. The group says “yes.” Yet he still manages to fill the jar with more stuff — first pebbles, then sand, even a beer or two! It’s a powerful lesson. Depending on which objects you put in first determines how many other items you can put in afterward. If you put sand in first, nothing else will fit (except some water), but if you start with the big rocks (our most important tasks) and go down, you can fit some of everything in. This jar represents your life. The rocks are the important things – your family, your partner, your health, your work – things that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full. The pebbles are the other things that matter – your house, your car. The sand is everything else, the small stuff. How will you manage your time jar?If you put the sand into the jar first, there is no room for the pebbles or the rocks. The same goes for your life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are important to you. Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Play with your children. There will always be time to clean the house, throw a dinner party, or fix the disposal. 7. $86,400Emphasize the importance of time and you are in control of how you spend it. Time is about making the right choices. Run it as a clock here.Imagine there is a bank account that credits your account each morning with $86,400. It carries over no balance from day to day. Every evening the bank deletes whatever part of the balance you failed to use during the day. What would you do? Draw out every cent, of course? The Bank of TIMEEach of us has such a bank. Its name is TIME. Every morning, it credits you with 86,400 seconds. Every night it writes off as lost, whatever of this you have failed to invest. It carries over no balance from the day before. It allows no overdrafts. Each day it opens a new account for you. Each night it burns what remains of the day.
Credit to The Coaching Toolbox. 8. Ribbon of LifeFor this time management exercise, you need a ribbon with a length of 100cm (1 meter) and a pair of scissors. Ask your team: What is the estimated lifespan of an individual? The normal response will be between 75 and 85 years. Let’s say it’s 79. So you need to cut 21cm off your ribbon. It is now 79cm long, meaning we have 79 years left. What is the average age of the participants?This depends on the group you’re doing this exercise with. But let’s say the number you get is 29, so you chop another 29cm of your ribbon. These years are what you would call “sunk costs”, you can’t do anything about them. The ribbon now has 50cm. So we have 50 years left? The actual answer is no.You still need to factor in a lot of variables: weekends, public holidays, casual/sick leave, and annual holidays. Every year has 52 weeks, so that’s 52 Sundays per year. Multiply that by 50 years (the current length of our ribbon) and you get 7.14. Reduce the ribbon by 7cm. The same logic applies to Saturdays. Reduce another 7cm. The ribbon now has 36cm. 36 cm minus holidays and leaveThere are 10 Public/National holidays per year, which gives us 1.5 years when multiplied by 50. Reduce the ribbon by 1.5 cm. Plus we spend approximately 40 days a year on casual leave, sick leave, and annual holidays. That’s around 5 years, so you cut off another 5 cm. The ribbon now has 29.5cm. 29 cm and counting…But we still need to take into account sleeping, eating, and commuting. We spend a third of our day (and so a third of our year) sleeping. Considering an average of 8 hours of sleep per day, we get 122 * 50 = almost 17 years. Cut off another 17 cm. The ribbon now has 12.5 cm. You need around 2 hours per day to eat lunch, breakfast, snacks, and dinner. 30 days a year X 50 years= 4 years or so. Cut off another 4 cm. The ribbon now has 8.5cm. Lastly, let’s factor in commuting and time spent traveling from one place to another for activities. If we average one hour a day, that’s 2 more years. The ribbon now has 6.5cm. In fact, when all is said and done, there are ONLY 6 years of life to make it or break it!Credit to Daniel Silvestre. Online Time Management GamesTime is an essential and widely-used value in any video game. If you’ve ever played against the clock, you’ll know that even in the game environment, it can be stressful. But there is an upside. Playing games with timers means you’re already on the way to developing essential time perception skills. But instead of ‘wasting’ your time with a shoot-’em-up, why not try out the specific category of games designed especially for time management skills improvement – time management games? And make playtime productivity time? Let’s take a look at some popular online time management games. 9. Overcooked!Overcooked! is a restaurant time management game. The idea behind the game is to serve various food to your customers, try to keep them happy, and cook everything in absurdly stressful conditions – like a hot air balloon or in the middle of the street. Sounds like a normal day at the office, right? The game offers lots of obstacles to overcome, a diversity of cooking recipes, and lots of fun, especially in multiplayer mode. Time management skills trained:
What to discuss with your team:
10. Game Dev StoryYou play as a video game developer making hit video games and brand-new consoles in start-up projects. To be a success and keep things afloat, you need to hire and manage your own team, control the process of game development, and deal with the critics. Time management skills trained:
What to discuss with your team:
11. FarmeramaIn Farmerama, you have your own farm where you grow your harvest, take care of the animals, and come under fire from alien attacks that happen out of the blue. Time management skills trained:
What to discuss with your team:
12. 12 labors of HerculesYou’ll play as Hercules, who has to complete his 12 Labours in order to rescue his wife from Hades’ Underworld. The game has a definite time limit, so you’ll have to find ways to stop it while completing various tasks. Time management skills trained:
What to discuss with your team:
13. Plague Inc.In this popular strategy game, you’ll join the dark side and play for the team of viruses and diseases, trying to contaminate as much territory as possible. The world scientific community will oppose you, developing effective medicine against you. Will you succeed in your evil task? Time management skills trained:
What to discuss with your team:
Remember! Be careful not to lose too much time while playing games. Time Management Games Wrap-upTime management games are a truly great way to train those important organizational skills. They use non-formal education methods to train your brain to react to time differently. Available both online and offline and as individual and team activities, you’ll be sure to find one that suits you. To help you decide quickly which to try first. Here’s a breakdown: Offline GamesBest suited for playing in the office. They help learn your strong and weak points as well as get to know your colleagues better and strengthen relationships with them. Online GamesGreat for improving your cognitive functions, such as attention, reaction, prioritizing, logic, and critical thinking. Besides, online games are excellent tools for developing time-tracking, organizational, and general business skills. Bonus: From Games to Real Life: Time Management With EverhourNow that you’ve had some fun trying out these time management games and activities, it’s time to get down to business. Are you looking to improve time management practices in your company? We’d like to help you choose the right timesheet app, tailored for your business needs and corporate culture. Seamless time management solution by EverhourEverhour’s online time management solution is a simple, efficient, and handy tool. With Everhour’s Chrome time tracking you’ll be able to:
Everhour provides a seamless time-tracking experience as it is one of the best time and attendance software out there. It can be easily integrated into other project-management apps, such as Asana, Trello, Basecamp, Jira, and more, allowing you to manage your projects and time without switching back and forth between tabs. It uses the best time tracking practices to ensure not a single minute gets lost. Pros of Everhour for your businessWith Everhour you can forget about:
Try our demo for free to explore how our time tracking software can optimize your business, or get in touch with our team who’ll be happy to answer any questions you might have. How do you manage your time activities?Workplace time management activities. The 60 seconds game. Although a minute is by definition 60 seconds, many people might have less awareness of how long it feels. ... . Calibrate your internal clock. ... . Build a puzzle. ... . The time jar. ... . Practice role-playing. ... . Shuffle the deck. ... . Line up. ... . Gathering blocks.. What are the 5 tips in effective time management?5 Tips to Better Your Time Management. Set reminders for all your tasks.. Create a daily planner.. Give each task a time limit.. Block out distractions.. Establish routine.. When learning to manage time it is important to reward?Rewards can be a great motivator for good time management. Give yourself a small reward for every task you accomplish in the day. For instance, you could celebrate finishing up a report by taking a 15-minute walk outside. Rewards keep you motivated on the job and can help you achieve a better work-life balance.
How do you teach time management in the workplace?4 Time Management Techniques to Teach Employees. Plan Ahead. Planning ahead allows you to mentally prepare for anything that could come your way. ... . Prioritize Tasks. ... . Understand the Role Energy Plays in Productivity. ... . Use Technology to Automate Certain Tasks.. |