Effective Ways To Manage Your Time As A Manager

Last updated: January 19, 2026

By Mark Fiebert

Key Takeaways

• Time Visibility: Use smart systems to make schedules, breaks, and coverage transparent so you manage outcomes, not minute-by-minute behavior.
• Smarter Scheduling: Real-time scheduling and clock-in tools reduce last-minute confusion, cut payroll fixes, and keep teams aligned with minimal admin effort.
• Clear Communication: Intentional messaging prevents rework by defining the ask, the context, and what “done” looks like before work begins.
• Right Channel: Match communication to purpose by using quick chats for coordination and written updates for decisions that people must reference later.
• Fewer Meetings: Replace unnecessary meetings with concise emails or shared documents, reserving live discussions for decisions that truly require collaboration.

As a manager, you wear many hats. One of those proverbial hats is that of a time manager. Since time is money, as they say, you want to ensure you are helping the company and its employees put the time to work for them instead of wasting it. Keep reading for some pro tips on how to maximize your time for success.

Streamline Time Tracking

You do not have time to watch every employee throughout their respective shifts. It is impossible to know when everyone clocks in and out of work or for their scheduled breaks. In a work smarter, not harder moment, you can turn to technology to help manage your employees’ working hours and work schedules through an innovative program such as Retail Staff Scheduling Software.

With a real-time time tracking tool, you will free up your precious work time to do your job. In addition, your employees will enjoy the freedom and ease of interacting with this program. They do not have to rely on printed schedules to be informed of their shift times. 

With an app that your employees can download on their smartphones, they will receive tailored reminders for shift start times and clock-in notifications. Their new or updated schedules are available via email or directly in the app. Using technology such as this is a win for everyone and makes going to work easier.

Communicate Effectively

Effective communication saves time. If you think otherwise, consider the times in your personal and professional lives when you have had miscommunications. Take note of all the wasted time spent backtracking to explain or discuss things differently.

Do your best to think about how you say things to your employees and be mindful of how they might hear what you say. 

Rethink Meetings

Could that meeting have been an email? That is a question that many of your staff have probably asked themselves more than once throughout their time working for you. The answer, for everyone, is likely a definitive yes.

If that is, indeed, the case, then it is time to do things differently. Start by gathering all the information you wish to disseminate to your team. Next, focus on the main point and pertinent information you need to address. Now put them into an email or shared document. Use clear language with adequate spacing between paragraphs to not overwhelm the readers with information. Once you have taken care of important content, add the rest of the information you wish to share.

Employees appreciate it when you value their time and avoid unnecessary meetings where everyone is sitting in a room, bored and disengaged, and wishing they were somewhere else. You still need to get essential points across to them, but now you can do it more efficiently.

Take these effective tips and make them your own. Incorporate them into your daily workplace operations to ensure a more functional and efficient employee base. When your team works better, so do you.

Modern Time Tracking Without Micromanaging

As a manager, your job is to make time visible without hovering over people. Real-time tracking and scheduling tools can replace the chaos of paper schedules, last-minute texts, and guesswork around breaks and shift swaps. When employees can see updates instantly and receive reminders automatically, you reduce interruptions and avoid unnecessary payroll fixes. That frees you to focus on coaching, priorities, and results instead of policing clocks and chasing down details.

Communication That Prevents Rework

Miscommunication is one of the most expensive time drains because it creates hidden loops: clarification meetings, redoing work, and unnecessary tension. The fix is not talking more; it is communicating with intention by matching the message to the moment, using plain language, and confirming what “done” looks like before people start. The goal is to shorten feedback cycles while maintaining high trust, so your team moves faster without cutting corners.

• Clarity First: Start with the decision or ask, then add context, then define the outcome so people do not guess what success means.
• Confirm Back: End key requests by asking for a quick paraphrase of next actions, which surfaces misunderstandings before they become delays.
• Channel Match: Use chat for quick coordination, email for durable decisions, and a shared doc for evolving plans to cut repeated explanations.
• How To Improve: Practice concise project updates using a project poster to align goals, owners, and timelines before work begins.

Meetings as a Last Resort

Most teams do not have a meeting problem; they have a clarity problem that meetings attempt to fix. Before you schedule time, gather what needs to be shared, identify the single purpose, and decide whether the information can travel asynchronously. A well structured email or shared document often replaces a recurring meeting while improving documentation. When meetings are truly necessary, keeping them purposeful and brief signals respect for everyone’s time and attention.

Further Guidance & Tools

• Timekeeping Checklist: Use SHRM’s checklist to review timekeeping rules, reduce errors, and tighten compliance without adding admin burden.
• Shift Scheduling: Use Microsoft Shifts to centralize schedules, swaps, and team visibility so coverage issues don’t turn into constant interruptions.
• Communication Norms: Use this HBR tip to set channel and response expectations that prevent delays, reduce rework, and lower team stress.
• Meeting Discipline: Use Atlassian’s meeting guide to run fewer, sharper meetings with clear objectives, tighter agendas, and actionable follow-ups.
• Stress Signals: Use NIOSH guidance to spot early job-stress warning signs and adjust workload and control factors that sabotage focus and performance.

Next Steps

• Audit Time: Review how shifts, breaks, and edits are handled, then standardize one simple workflow everyone can follow.
• Set Norms: Define when to use chat, email, or documents, and write a short rule set your team can reference.
• Trim Meetings: Replace low-stakes status meetings with a shared update format, reserving live time for decisions and blockers.
• Clarify Outcomes: For key tasks, state the goal, owner, and definition of done upfront to prevent rework and confusion.
• Support Focus: Reduce avoidable interruptions by batching questions, using office hours, and protecting quiet work blocks for deep work.

Final Words

Great time management as a manager is less about squeezing minutes and more about designing smoother systems. When schedules are transparent, communication is intentional, and meetings earn their spot on the calendar, your team spends less time recovering from confusion and more time executing. Build simple norms, reinforce them consistently, and you’ll see productivity rise without burning people out.

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01/26/2026 08:01 am GMT