A CHRISTIAN leader needs to understand that there is time for everything in this life. There is the time to pursue higher education, time to work, time to marry, time to procreate, time to buy a parcel of land and build a house, time to spend with the family, time to rest, time to fast and pray and time to study the Bible.
And he must be aware about the imminent time when he will be unable to engage in any active work. A lecturer at a private university in Kumasi, the Ashanti Regional capital, once shared his experience about the importance of time management with his students.
The story was simply about his inability to plan well concerning the time he should have married and given birth. He had concentrated all his time on pursuing PhD abroad. At the time he was clocking 60 years, his first child was just in a primary school. He feared that he could not work hard enough in his old age to cater for his young children’s education.
Professor Stephen Adei, in his book, “Called To Lead: Be The Leader Your Family Needs” points out that, “The tragedy of many leaders is that the proper use of time does not appear on their most-important list. Our vision, goals, and roles must drive our use of time and not vice versa. This is because: time management is self-management, time management is an exercise in choice, time management is an exercise in discipline and time management involves skills and tools.”
Now, for me and other Christian leaders to ensure effective use of time, it is important to unearth and take into account certain key factors. First of all, behaviours which are considered to be time wasters must be identified and avoided. Key on the list is procrastination; a person who makes postponement of duties shows how indecisive he is.
It is said that procrastination is a thief of time. The cure to procrastination is the application of the principle of Christ Jesus that says, “I must work the works of him that sent me…” This principle does not give room for procrastination. It actually supports the maxim that “what must be done must be done now.”
In his book, “The Art of Leadership”, Bishop Dag Heward-Mills wrote, “Many people claim they cannot do things because they have no time. However, the reality is that they are unable to manage their time…a leader must be able to distinguish between important things and urgent things”. He continues that “Many things that are urgent are not important and many important things are not urgent.”
Also, spending hours to watch TV, chat with friends, play computer games and socializing reduces the time for engaging in real productive enterprises. It is equally important that we avoid the temptation to engage in many activities at the same time. People who find themselves in this situation show the absence of planning in their lives.
Bishop Dag Heward-Mills further asserts that “A real leader is someone who cuts away the unimportant things and ensures that he does what he is supposed to do”. The next wasting issue to consider is the decision to do everything alone. Deciding to do everything alone smacks of insecure leadership.
If we must be free to operate at our best and achieve our best, we must learn to delegate some of our responsibilities to our associates. Delegating responsibility is not abandoning responsibility. It is simply sharing duties to ensure effectiveness and efficiency.
For example, I should trust another minister in the church to preach or pray for the sick while I attend to other important duties during church service. This is necessary for the expression and operation of everyone’s ministerial gifts. How do other ministers use their gifts if they are not given the opportunity to serve? However, here, Heward-Mills encourages leaders to “get rid of people who fail to do jobs that are delegated to them.”
Another factor to look at is unnecessary meetings and constant flow of visitors to the office and the house. These are common occurrences in the life of most Christian leaders today. Most managers have practical experiences about the reality of these challenges. Sometimes, family members and friends pay visits to the office to engage in fruitless arguments and discussions which waste precious time.
To avoid these challenges which lead to low productivity, straight-forward working policies must be formulated and clearly communicated to discourage uninvited visitors. Furthermore, it is important that we plan our work schedules according to order of importance, timeliness, emergency and immediacy.
There is no denying the fact that good planning takes quality time to make, but it is worth it in the long run during its implementation as great success is achieved. Another method to make the best of use of our time is the urgency to set priorities for our daily activities. This can be done through careful and prayerful consideration of important and pressing matters which need urgent attention.
By James Quansah
jamesquansah@yahoo.com