Getting ANYWHERE on time!

We've all been there - the best intentions in the world and yet, somehow, here we are again, sitting in traffic in our car, sat nav telling us its 15 mins to go to get to the meeting - and we are already 5 mins late. HOW HAS THIS HAPPENED AGAIN!

There are a few ways that you can try that will help with this in future - see which work for you and let me know how it goes!



1. Start to write down the start time of meetings or appointments 10 mins earlier than they actually are.
2. Set your watch 10 mins later than it actually is

Both of these will give you that wriggle time hopefully, but can be difficult to maintain, as you will find that you start to work 10 mins behind your watch anyway and whats the good of that!

3. The best way by far is to really work with your diary and make it work for you. For example, most people if they have a meeting scheduled for 10am will write down - MEETING 10am at the right section in their diary and thats about it. What I find is absolutely critical (and helps when you are scheduling other meetings) is to put in time blocks before the meeting with the relevant TO DO's in i.e.

9am - Change into meeting clothes
9.15am - Sort out paperwork that needs to be taken
9.30am - Get in car and travel to meeting (journey time 15mins)
10am - Meeting starts

Therefore, to be at the meeting with some room for travel times to increase, and any other unforseen circumstances, you need to start getting ready at 9am. If you didn't have this in your diary it is very easy to start something else totally unrelated at 9am and then realise you are going to be late when its too late to do anything about it. If i can give you just one trick today, then schedule in your preparation time as well as your meeting time.

It also helps when you are self employed or just time poor, to see how long a meeting is actually going to take out of your day - you may be surprised and think a little more before agreeing to meeting up in the first place. Could a meeting be done over the phone, nearer where you are, in the same day as another meeting in that area to save doubling up on travel time etc...... - working hard with your diary will give you more control, and hopefully enable you to see exactly where your time is actually going!