Time management is the core of success. There is a lot of time management books available in the market, even when I searched “time management books” on Amazon I got more than 70,000 results. it could be time-consuming for you to select the best book to read for time management.
We value your time and to save you the most precious time my friend we come with a quick summary of some of the best time management books that you should definitely read this year.
Let’s start with the best time management book.
13 Best time management books to read
1. Eat That Frog!: 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time
Author: Brian Tracy
Eat that frog! contains 21 principles people should follow to stop procrastination and boost their productivity. This book will suggest doing the most important thing first in the day to reach your goals more quickly.
Here is the list of 21 principles that Brian Tracy give in the book
Quick summary of the book: Eat the Frog
1. Define your goals and write them down
Decide exactly what you want. Clarity is essential for success. Brian Tracy said, “that lack of clarity and intent is the main reason behind procrastination.
Write down your goal and objective before you begin. Make your goals SMART and use brainstorming techniques to jump the thought process.
Related: Set a SMART goal
2. Create plans for what you will work on
Think on paper. Every minute you spend in planning can save yours five or ten minutes in execution, Brain Tracy said. He recommends having these four lists.
- A master list of tasks that you want to achieve in your life
- A monthly list of the tasks (mapping toward master list)
- A weekly list of the tasks (mapping toward monthly list)
- A daily list of task (mapping toward weekly list)
After making the list of tasks you will know the exactly most important thing you need to do in the morning.
3. Focus on 20% task
According to this 20/80 principle.” Twenty percent of your activities will count for eighty percent of the results. Always concentrate your effort on the top 20% for better results.
We have written down a separate article on the 20/80 principle of time management. Explore the article.
4. Think long-term to make short-term decisions
Your most important tasks and priorities are those that can have the most serious consequences. Positive or negative, on your life or work. Focus on these above all else.
5. Procrastinate on purpose
You can’t do everything. And Brian Tracy suggests procrastinating on the things that have low value and focusing on the right high-value things.
Related: Get rid of procrastination
6. Use the ABCDE method
This method helps you to priorities tasks.
- A are the must-do taks, they are most important taks to do. you can use A1, A2, A3… if you have more than one “A” taks.
- B is the things you should do.
- C is the nice to-dos tasks. You probably want to do them, but there are no consequences if you don’t.
- D are the taks that you delegate to someone else to have more time for A taks.
- E for Elimnate the task that you don’t need to do.
7. Understand exactly what work you’re accountable for
This time management hack helps you to stop procrastination. it will help you to focus on the task that you are accountable for and eliminate the tasks that are not related to your job.
8. When it’s time to work, work
The best way to achieve a work-life balance and give more time to family is to do work when it’s time to work. Every minute you spend on the unproductive task (watching TV or scrolling social media) results in you taking more time to achieve tasks and giving less time to family.
9. Prepare for your work before you start on it
Planning the next day after the end of the first workday will help you to be ready to face the first challenge of the day.
10. Focus on one task at a time
Multitasking kills productivity, you can achieve everything if you do one thing one step at a time.
11. Develop your skills
Brian Tracy said that the more you master your key skills faster you can start your task and the sooner you will finish your job. Whatever you do master your key skills.
12. Use your strengths
Brain Tracy said that we all have unique skills that we can do in the best way or have the capability to the best, throw all your heart to this to attain the best result.
13. Identify the things that are holding you back
Once you have set your goals, identify why you are not able to achieve this task till now? Identify the things and try to eliminate those factors.
14. Find your motivation
You need to find ways to motivate yourself to eat your frogs. Create your own deadlines, try to beat the deadlines you’ve set, and hold yourself to high expectations.
15. Make the most of your energy levels
Identify the time when your mental and physical energy level is high, structure your most important and demanding task to that time and use your peak hours well.
16. Become an optimist
Be your own cheerleaders and try to find positive in each scenario. Focus on the solution rather than the problem.
17. Don’t let technology distract you
Use technology to improve your result not to become the slave of it. Use technology to get success.
18. Break your tasks down to their smallest possible components
The secret of achieving big things break your tasks into the smallest possible components and then do one part at a time. You will reach your task soon.
19. Schedule time on your calendar for eating your frogs
Tracy recommends scheduling time for focused work. Schedule time on your calendar at the end of every workday for working on your frog the next morning.
20. Find your flow
Momentum has a big impact on our mindset. Make a habit of moving fast when you doing well or performing your key task.
21. Work on a task until it’s complete
To maximize your productivity work on the task until you achieve 100% of the result.
We recommend you to buy this book, for the better understanding of these 21 principles , these is our favourite book to start time management.
2. Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity
Author: David Allen
David Allen’s book Getting things Done is a perfect book to make your thought process more clear. Allen says things rarely get stuck because of lack of time. They struck because of a lack of clarity.
The main motive of the book is the “get things done” and he describes the 5 step workflow to achieve whatever you want. Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity presents the reader with a simple yet detailed system for increasing productivity.
Quick Summary of the book ” Get things done”
Step0: The zero-step is to set up the Get things done concept for the 5 steps. Here are the next 5 steps to get things done.
Step1: Collect
The first step is to collect everything at a place in a bucket, it could be a physical bucket or online bucket list for online work.
Step2: Process
After collecting all data on the bucket list, you need to process the things that you collected.
Step3: Organize
The processed data should now be organized for the next action.
Step4: Review
Step 4 is about to review your action plan what have you made. The goal of step4 is to make sure your plan is clean and complete.
Step5: Do
Now the plan is ready, it is time for action.
This bucket system is useful when the data is up-to-date. You need to process with the most updated and accurate date revise your data a minimum of once per week.
3. Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World
Author: Cal Newport
This masterpiece by Cal Newport helps you to get rid of distractions to get succeeded in life. Deep work is like a superpower in our increasingly competitive world. Deep work tells you how increasing technologies ruin your concentration and you get back it with some rules. Understand the next phase-
“Professional activities performed in a state of distraction-free concentration that pushes your cognitive capabilities to their limit. These efforts create new value, improve your skill, and are hard to replicate.”
This book helps you to understand how multitasking kills you productively, and it also breaks all myths about multitasking. This book will help you to understand the things when you could do the multitasking and when you should be focused on one task at a time.
To attain the Deep work this book suggests four methods-
- Cut out all the distraction and think like monk at work. Put Don’t Distrub board outside your room and on moblie phone.
- Get clear about the intention that you want to work on a single task for a long without changing your focus on other tasks and do whatever you want after it.
- Choose your most important block of time (peak hours) to attain deep work
- General Stick technology- This method didn’t need any scheduling, this approach is about to use your extra time for deep work.
Note the important Rules
- Rule #1: Work Deeply.
- Rule #2: Embrace Boredom.
- Rule #3: Quit Social Media.
- Rule #4: Drain the Shallows.
I suggest buying this awesome masterpiece to attain time for Deep Work.
4. 168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think
Author: Laura Vanderkam
The book title makes it clear that you have more time than you think. 168 hours by Laura Vanderkam is a simple calculation of a week’s hours, 24X7=168.
168 Hours is filled with tips and tricks on how you can be more efficient every day. By being more productive at work and home, you’ll create more free time to focus on the truly fulfilling activities in your life, rather than the simply mundane.
These books start with the argument the nobody has time in this busy world and how the author explains that 168 hours a week is enough time to fit in a robust career, a strong family life, exercise, hobbies, and enough sleep per night.
Lots of us spend a lot of time being busy but doing things that aren’t actually that valuable. If you also think that you didn’t have time, start hour and hour tracking, for a week and you will get how you spend your time. Note your hours and you will get to know you have enough time exactly.
This book helps you to spend time on your hobbies, nourish your relationships and maximize your time. You have 168 hours per week and you Sleep-56, Work-60, that’s 52 left, over 7 hours per day!. The author will help you add productive work to your day and eliminate unproductive things from your daily life.
5. The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
Author: Timothy Ferriss
Timothy Ferriss’s book “four-hour workweek” is a step-by-step guide to escape the rat race in the running world. It will help you to free yourself from the shackles of the corporate world and create an asset to fund the lifestyle of your dreams.
A quote from the book by Tim Ferris which motivated me the most- “Doing something unimportant well does not make it important. This book come in 2007 and is still one of the best books that will teach how to escape 9-5 and become rich. Well, it didn’t have any secrets hidden to be rich but it definety give you the correct definition of being rich.
Don’t try to do everything by yourself and waste your precious time and energy. Another thing the book “4-hour workweek” teaches us is to start outsourcing your work. If there’s a task that someone else can do for you (better than you), wait for no further and delegate it immediately.
Three notable points from the book-
- Be effective, not efficient.
- Validate all of your business ideas.
- Charge a premium to make your life easier.
The four-hour workweek gives a DEAL principle, which stands for Definition, Elimination, Automation and Liberation, to escape a 9 to 5 life and live as a ‘New Rich life from tomorrow. Suggest this book especially those who think what are they doing at corporate jobs in their life.
6. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
Author: Stephen R. Covey
This book comes with a strong idea to change perception to change the world. Convey’s said in order to change a current situation, you need to change first and for this, you need to change your perceptions. In this book, Convey shares the 7 habits that make every successful person successful. And the 7 most common habits of a successful person are-
1. Be Proactive
Proactive people, however, recognize they have a responsibility to change a given situation. It is more about can-do thinking in a situation. Convey explain beautifully how proactive people expand their circle of influence and reduce the level of concern in their lives.
2. Begin with the End in Mind
This habit is more about goals, Convey’s said we should start everything in our life with a clear destination in mind. When we know where exactly we need to go, we could take control of our journey better. Convey use imagination to develop the path of life.
Before we as individuals or organizations can start setting and achieving goals, we must be able to identify our values. This process may involve some rescripting to be able to assert our own personal values.
3. Put First Things First
This habit is actually putting the things that take you toward your goal is in order and executing your priorities on a day-to-day, moment-to-moment basis. He explains how to prioritize the correct thing in order is become one of the most common problems. He gives 4 quadrants of task management to prioritize tasks.
If we focus on Quadrant I and spend our time managing crises and problems, it keeps getting bigger and bigger until it consumes us.
If we focus on Quadrant III, we spend most of our time reacting to matters that seem urgent, when the reality is their perceived urgency is based on the priorities and expectations of others. This leads to short-term focus, feeling out of control, and shallow or broken relationships.
If we focus on Quadrant IV, we are basically leading an irresponsible life. This often leads to getting fired from jobs and being highly dependent on others.
Quadrant II is at the heart of effective personal management. It deals with things like building relationships, long-term planning, exercising, preparation — all things we know we need to do but somehow seldom get around to actually doing because they don’t feel urgent.
4. Think Win-Win
In Win-Win situations, Both people win. Agreements or solutions are mutually beneficial and satisfying to both parties. To achieve Win-Win, keep the focus on results, not methods; on problems, not people. Convey explain in that habit that the more committed we are to Win-Win, the more powerful our influence will be.
5. Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood
You’ve spent years of your life learning how to read and write, years learning how to speak. But about listening?
This habit is about listening to others. says Convey says we must seek first to understand, then to be understood. In order to seek to understand, we must learn to listen.
6. Synergize
By understanding and valuing the differences in another person’s perspective, we have the opportunity to create synergy, which allows us to uncover new possibilities through openness and creativity.
7. Sharpen the Saw
To be effective, we must devote the time to renewing ourselves physically, spiritually, mentally, and socially. The continuous renewal allows us to synergistically increase our ability to practice each habit.
7. 15 Secrets Successful People Know About Time Management
The Productivity Habits of 7 Billionaires, 13 Olympic Athletes, 29 Straight-A Students, and 239 Entrepreneurs
Author: Kevin Kruse
In this book, Kevin Kruse shares the input about time management that he takes from 7 billionaires, 13 athletes, 29 bright students and 239 entrepreneurs. The author finds something common secret behind the success and he shares 15 from them in this book. The 15 secrets of Time management in this book are-
- Time is Your Most Valuable And Scarcest Resource
- Identify Your Most Important Task and Work On It Each Day Before Doing Anything Else
- Work From Your Calendar, Not a To Do List
- Procrastination Can Be Overcome When You Figure Out How to Beat Your Future Self, Who Cannot Be Trusted To Do The Right Thing
- Accept the Fact That There Will ALWAYS Be More To Do and More That Can Be Done
- Always Carry a Notebook
- Email Is A Great Way For Other People to Put Their Priorities In Your Life; Control Your Inbox
- Schedule And Attend Meetings As A Last Resort, When All Other Forms of Communication Won’t Work
- Say No To Everything That Doesn’t Support Your Immediate Goals
- Eighty Percent Of Outcomes Are Generated By Twenty Percent Of Activities
- Focus Your Time Only On Things That Utilize Your Unique Strengths And Passions
- Batch Your Work With Recurring Themes For Different Days Of The Week
- The most i loved, If A Task Can Be Completed In Less Than Five Minutes, Do It Immediately
- Invest The First 60 Minutes Of Each Day In Rituals That Strengthen Your Mind, Body, And Spirit
- Productivity Is About Energy And Focus, Not Time
He also includes 20 productive hacks to get things done and attain most of your day. 3 of them is here
- Off-Load Your Memory With Your Camera Phone
- Know That Done Is Better Than Perfect
- Always Cook More Than One Meal At A Time
8. Make Time: How to Focus on What Matters Every Day
Author: Jake Zeratsky and John Knapp
I love the idea of the book and how to focus on only one priority per day so that all of your time and energy are present for that specific task. The authors propose a four-step system for making this happen. Instead of focusing on making radical changes, they suggest small changes that anyone can implement.
The three key lessons from the author that describe in the book are-
- Highlight your most important, joyful or meaningful task of your day. Important may be related to your office or duties, Meaningful is related to something that satisfy yourself, for example working on your passion. And the joyful is that bring smile on your face.
- Minmimize distractions– Especailly social media, the author give effective way to minimize distraction from your life.
- Do the things to make you healthy
By deliberately creating space in their lives for the projects they really wanted to tackle, eliminating distractions, and prioritizing their health, they turned unmindful reactiveness into mindful proactivity. Here
The book summary of more time management books will come soon.
8. Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less
Author: Greg McKeown
10. The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles
Author: Steffen Pressfield
11. Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time
Author: Jeff Sutherland
12. The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results
Author: Gary Keller
13. The Bullet Journal Method: Track the Past, Order the Present, Design the Future
Author: Ryder Carroll
Read best Time Management quotes
Related: Master you time with the 80/20 principle of time management
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