By Debbie Undercoffer
At times it seems like your college classes can be too much, but how do you handle going to school, working and taking on an internship? The best piece of advice I can give someone, is to work on your time management skills. If you’re not able to manage your time wisely, you can quickly get overwhelmed, over-worked and begin to miss important deadlines. There are a few things that I do to keep things in order and hopefully they will help you do the same:
First, I always start out by writing down my priorities and putting them in order. Say you have a class starting at 8am, then your internship from 10am-4pm and your shift at work starts at 5pm. Map out every single day and write it down so you have a visual aid. Once you have that mapped out, then break down each responsibility for each activity. For example, you have 2 assignments due on Monday for that 8am class. Then your internship is asking that you have a blog post written so you can post it as soon as you get in. Lastly, your shift manager needs you to have the budget report completed by the end of the week. If you write down everything that is needed for each activity and start to prioritize, then you’ll be able to manage your time correctly and make sure you hit all your deadlines.
Separating things out and prioritizing them like this will help you plan out your week and will give you a little more free time than if you did it on the fly and realize at 10:30pm on a Sunday that you haven’t started a single one of the assignments for the next day. It’s important to include giving yourself a little time to just relax. Don’t over-book or over-commit to things and burn yourself out. Your mental health should always come first. If you start feeling over-worked and you notice that things are starting to slip through the cracks, start asking for help. Maybe one of your classmates can help you study for that exam, or one of your co-workers can step in and assist with a project. Don’t be afraid to reach out for help. Sometimes even having someone pick up dinner for you can make a all the difference.
Of course everyone is different and the way I do things may not work for you, and that’s ok! Go and shuffle that playlist of your favorite Olivia Management artists to listen to while you set calendar reminders for yourself, leave sticky notes on your mirror, or make a calendar and hang it on your wall. Just be sure to find a process that works best for you and stick to it!
