Plan and Organization of Time and Relationship: Starting College Life

Jumping from secondary school to college life, there is a profound shift in the way we manage ourselves both academically and socially. It has been suggested, knowledge workers must be their own chief executive effectively and learn how to manage their future and what they want to contribute to their careers. After reading of the article “Managing Oneself” by Professor Peter Drucker which argued about the core elements that needed to be considered, like strength and values as well as the way ones perform, I gained a deep understanding and inspiration of how I intend to manage myself in my first year of college. This essay will focus on the main arguments connected to strengths with values, relationship management, and self-performance to achieve true excellence at the end of the year.

College life is quite different from what we used to live through, as it requires strong independency and critical self-analysis throughout. To figure out how I aim to manage myself, first and foremost, I should identify my strengths and weaknesses by applying the SWOT test which also includes the feedback analysis suggested by Professor Peter Drucker. Before making the decision or taking the action, the first thing to do is writing down what I expect will happen, and then after a certain period, normally no more than 18 months, it is clear to notice what I am good at, by comparing the expectations with results. This process efficiently shows the observation of my key strengths and things that I have no competence to do. It offers me the opportunity “to improve from first-rate performance to excellence' and allows me to realize the gap in knowledge then fill up it with effectiveness. The application of the feedback analysis is a useful way of managing myself as it saves the energy, resources and time that I could use on the aspects of my strength instead of wasting on what not to do.

Furthermore, to achieve the goal of managing myself productively, knowing the key values I have and the way I perform the best, are vitally important in the first year of college as it will form the basis for the future. Everyone performs in different ways under various situations, to find a way that suits me the best will produce an outstanding outcome. Since the performance relates to the personality traits that individuals have, I should find out if I am a reader or listener and the way I learn the most because it plays a significant role in completing assignments and doing examinations. Likewise, defining the value system of myself is another component I should involve when managing myself, which means clarifying the person I hope to see in the future. Based on that, several short-term goals along with a long-term goal are essential when shaping myself in the progress, which the former will provide fast and satisfying results but the latter will construct a solid growth which is beneficial in a long run. However, the value conflicts may arise as the college is a big organization filling up with a large number of people that coming from different background, to avoid dispute, what I have learned is to make my value compatible with the majority to a large extent.

Conclusion

In addition to what I mentioned above, learning how to plan and organize my time and relationship is also crucial in my college life. Planning requires a clear vision of things I would like to achieve in an efficient way in which the plans should have the following features. Firstly, the results should be hard to achieve but within reach, as it will demand some degrees of effort that we put in, but not as hard as impossible. Then, the goal of the plan should be meaningful as well as visible and measurable because it offers the chance for us to investigate the outcome we gained at the end. Yet, as a college student, we should take responsibility for relationships and understanding that other people are individuals as who you are. We should observe people around us that the way they work to cooperate with them most successfully.

Bibliography

• Drucker, P. (2008) Managing Oneself. Boston: Harvard Business Press.