By tracking your time and understanding where it's going, you can identify areas where you can make more time for what's important both personally and professionally. (Shutterstock)

Too many time management systems, however, focus on setting up complicated labels and lists for your to-do items, with complex flowcharts designed to help you choose what to do when. In practice, it always seems to be a bit much to stick with. Although having a plan, priorities, and a to-do list is important, you must first understand time in a much broader sense before you can begin divvying up how you spend yours. Time is so important that Control Your TIME is the second of the Three Keys to Extreme Productivity (XP3). At RAIN Group, we've developed a time management method that's been a game changer for our clients. The method revolves around the word "TIME." |

The time management system

You should think of time in four ways: A great way to remember these four areas is this way: |

• Take Treasured.
• Increase Investment.
• Minimize Mandatory.
• Eliminate Empty.

If you can minimize your mandatory time and eliminate your empty time, you can focus on your investment time, which is where you want to be. |

Changing where you spend your time

This part is not easy. You have to obsess over TIME if you want to take control it. The first step is to understand where you're currently spending your time. It's not enough to track how you spend chunks of your time. (For example, I spent an hour writing a sales follow-up e-mail). You need to track by the minute. Did you get up to get a glass of water? Were you interrupted by someone walking into your office? Record everything. Once you track your time, you can identify where you're getting distracted and how much you're spending on empty vs. mandatory vs. investment activities. Tracking allows you to uncover where you can convert mandatory time into investment or treasured time. For example, I've converted my commuting time into investment time by downloading and listening to business books and podcasts during my commute. I use a lawn service so I can spend more treasured time with my family. You can track your time on paper, in a spreadsheet or using an app. Where you track doesn't matter. That you track, obsess and are meticulous about it for a few days is what's important. By tracking your time and understanding where it's going, you can identify areas where you can make more time for what's important both personally and professionally. So, forget about the complicated time management systems you may have learned and simply remember TIME. Mike Schultz is director of the RAIN Group Center for Sales Research and president of RAIN Group, a global sales training and performance improvement company. He can be reached at [email protected]. See also: 7 tips for a more effective insurance claim 3 leading data trends shaping the future of insurance claims Time to move your insurance claims processing into the digital age