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2002 Volunteer Leader Training Guide
Time Management
The Care and Feeding of Monkeys
Printer Friendly Version (PDF)
Including Handouts
Introduction
• Target Audience
• Objectives
• Major Teaching Points
• Suggestions for
Teaching the Lesson • Program Guide
• Program Outline
• Some Thoughts About
Monkeys
• To Be a Better
Manager (Zookeeper) • Materials
Needed
• Handouts
Introduction
Get the time monkey off your back. This lesson will help you look at your
time use and help you find practical ways to improve your time management.
Target Audience
Objectives
- To help individuals see the relationship of time to other
resources they manage.
- To identify the many things that occupy personal time and
clarify why time is often used as it is.
- To suggest practical ways to improve time management so that
priority items are accomplished and some free time is available.
Major Teaching Points
- Think about the things you love to do. They may or may not
be how you use your time.
- Code the activities into the categories to see how much the
activities cost, which ones involve some risk, which involve people,
those you can do alone, those which are new to your life and those
you expect will not be part of your life in the future.
- Learn how to analyze the lists.
- Discuss your human energy curve - the down times and the up
times.
- Identify your time monkeys.
- Learn to manage the monkeys by being a better zookeeper.
Suggestions for Teaching the
Lesson
Program Guide
Objectives:
- To help individuals see the relationship of time to other
resources they manage.
- To identify the many things that occupy personal time and
clarify why time is often used as it is.
- To suggest practical ways to improve time management so that
priority items are accomplished and some free time is available.
Procedures
Leader reads entire guide. Make sure you have -
Materials
- Handouts for each participant
- Pens or pencils
- A stuffed monkey or picture of monkeys if available
Equipment
- Blackboard or flip chart
- 4 or 5 different colors of chalk or felt tip pens
Prepared
- Blackboard or flip chart - make a large chart like the one on page 2 of
the activity sheets so you don’t have to take meeting time to do this.
- The room - arrange for congenial setting.
- Yourself - familiarize yourself with the terms for the care and feeding
of monkeys.
Program Outline
- Introduce the lesson as follows:
“Probably the most misunderstood resource is TIME. We are
limited in the ways we can increase its availability. We have
limited control of it. Regardless of how much time we “save”
today - tomorrow, today will be yesterday. It will never be
(today’s date) again. This is truly one resource we never seem
to have enough of to do all the things we would like to do.
Everything we do consumes some of this resource.”
“The purposes of today’s program are:
a) To help individuals see the relationship of time to other
resources they manage.
b) To identify the many things that
occupy personal time and clarify why time is often used as it
is.
c) To suggest practical ways to improve time management
so that priority items are accomplished and some free time is
available.”
- Hand out activity sheets. Introduce Activity 1.
“For just a few minutes, let’s look at some of the things we like to do
with our time. As quickly as you can, list 10 things in life you really love
to do. These are things personal to you; there are no right or wrong
answers. Think of what you love to do - not what you think you should do or
should be doing.”
- Encourage all participants to complete their
lists. When everyone is finished, have them code their lists.
If participants can’t think of 10, help them see why. You might
say:
“It is often difficult to think of 10 things we would like to do. It would
be easier to list 10 things we dislike doing, wouldn’t it? When you feel you
need a change of pace or feel boredom or frustration from what you’re
presently doing, try to think in positive terms. Think of things you would
‘rather be doing’ than the task you would ‘rather not be doing’.”
- Coding. Tell participants to code as follows:
a) Under the $5+ sign, you will notice a column of boxes; place a check in
the box following each item that costs you $5 or more each time you do it.
b) For each item on your list that involves some RISK, check the RISK box.
c) Place a check in the box marked PEOPLE for each item you prefer to do with
other PEOPLE.
d) Check the ALONE box if this is a love of yours - you enjoy ALONE.
e) The 5- YEARS refers to items that would not have been on your list 5 years
ago.
f) If the item will not be on your list 5 years from now, put a check in the
5+ YEARS box.
g) Finally, go through your list and indicate (as nearly as you can) the date
you last did it.
- Analysis of lists. (Encourage discussion of
following.)
“As we look at the list of things we love to do, what might keep us from
doing them? Do you notice a grouping of checks? What does this suggest? Do
you avoid some of your ‘loves’ because they all cost too much? Involve too
much risk? You would rather do alone and you have few alone moments.”
(Discuss these.)
“Some things may be taking lots of time now that will not occupy time in
the future. For example, you may be very busy with pre-school parents - and
love the involvement - but this may not occupy lots of time 5 years from
now. What kinds of things replace this involvement? What are you doing now
that you were not doing 5 years ago? As you get new interests or
involvements, what things do you give up?”
“If you feel frustrated that some of the things you would really enjoy
doing have not been done for quite some time, let’s look at how you are
spending your time now.”
- Energy curve activity. (See Activity 2, page 2.)
Have three or four volunteers describe their “typical” day. You could
sketch this on the board or flip chart following their instructions. Allow
the curve to illustrate “up or down” times during the day. Using different
colored chalk or markers for each person’s curve allows participants to see
how time is spent during a day as it relates to human energy.
- Continue the lesson by leading the participants
through Activity 2, parts 1-3. When those parts are completed,
share the following thoughts about monkeys (use your stuffed
monkey or picture or drawing for attention).
Some Thoughts About Monkeys
- As we view management - that is, the effective care and
feeding of monkeys - we see some similarities.
- Monkeys are dependent, demanding, screeching, little
animals. Visualize a monkey and say: “A
monkey is any
involvement or activity dependent upon and demanding of my time
and energies and ‘screeching’ for attention.”
- Not all activities need our full, undivided attention.
- Not all monkeys require the zookeeper’s full time and
attention. At some times, however, one monkey may need a little
extra Tender Loving Care, just as some activities may require
more time for awhile and a minimum amount of time later. (For
example, a fair committee membership: The committee may meet
long and often before and during fair time, after which the
involvement lessens.)
- If you manage along the way, you seldom have work pile up.
Real frustration comes when a whole day approaches with too many
things needing to be done “yesterday.”
- If animals are well cared for, there is less possibility of
them becoming ill and needing extra attention or care - and just
imagine a whole cage of sick monkeys!!
- You are involved with lots of activities. Are all the
activities that require your time dependent upon
YOU?
- There are many varieties of monkeys. Does the one zookeeper
feed all the monkeys in the zoo? There are many kinds of tasks
to be done. Does one person have to do them all?
To Be a Better Manager
(Zookeeper)
- You must have the freedom to manage - are you the manager
(zookeeper) or being manipulated
(caretaker)?
- You must seriously and sincerely want to be a good manager.
- You must have time to be a good manager. It takes 5 minutes
a day to feed a monkey in a zoo. How long does it take to clean
the bathroom?
- You must learn how to improve your managerial skills.
- You must be willing to relinquish responsibility if you
delegate it to someone else.
If you are responsible for a monkey (an activity), you may not:
- poison it (make excuses for lack of attention).
- starve it (procrastinate).
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Remember: Starving or poisoning are not humane ways to treat
monkeys, and procrastination is not a good substitute for problem
solving.
You may:
• Accept the responsibility of its care.
• Return it to its rightful owner and be willing to let that caretaker
handle it.
• Decide it is not really your monkey and leave it with its responsible
owner.
• Shoot a monkey if you can see it would end up being procrastinated to
death anyway.
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- Now lead the group to complete the rest of
Activity 2, parts 4, 5 and 6.
- Summary:
“We’ve just spent some time learning how to care and feed the monkeys in
our lives. The goal of the program was to become an expert zookeeper. If
you’ll each try out tomorrow the ‘feeding schedule’ you developed today,
you’ll be on your way to monkey care. Revise your schedule as needed. With
practice, patience and perseverance, you’ll be an expert zookeeper in no
time at all.”
Materials Needed
- Activity Sheets - 1 for each participant
- Equipment
- Pens or pencils
- A stuffed monkey or pictures of monkeys, if available
- Colored chalk or markers
- Blackboard or flip chart - make a large chart like the one
on page 2 of the activity sheet so you don’t have to take
meeting time to do this
Handouts
Original manuscript prepared by Bonnie Braun, Ph.D., Family Resource
Management Specialist, Home Economics Cooperative Extension, Oklahoma State
University.
Recommended to Arkansas by Judith R. Urich, Ph.D., CFP, Family Resource
Management Specialist, 2002.
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