It doesn’t matter what industry you work in or what job you’re hoping to secure, good time management will always be important in the workplace.
But simply listing ‘time management’ on your CV isn’t always enough to impress.
Sometimes it can be beneficial to break this down into more specific skills related to time management, as this can increase your chances of grabbing the recruiter’s attention.
In the guide below, we’ll share 35 time management skills that could help to boost your CV, along with examples of how to use them.
Contents
Time management skills
There are several time management skills that can help you to succeed in any position. So, if you want to prove you’re a good fit for the role, you might wish to include the following skills:
- Planning – e.g. “Planned and executed 6 promotional events over a 3 month period, generating 100 promising new leads”
- Multitasking – e.g. “Administrative assistant with 3 years of experience managing multiple executive schedules, whilst maintaining excellent performance across daily admin duties”
- Forecasting – e.g. “Reliable accountant with 5 years of experience, proficient in using popular forecasting software like Sage and QuickBooks, to help to predict cash flow and profit”
- Prioritising – e.g. “Prioritised the change roadmap to quickly and seamlessly integrate the new company policies and protocols before the new year”
- Delegation – e.g. “Tackled multiple orders of over 5,000 units in the lead up to Christmas, delegating smaller tasks to the warehouse assistants to ensure all shipments went out on time”
- Decision-making – e.g. “Deliberated with the senior engineer to decide which tasks needed to be prioritised to ensure the project didn’t run behind schedule”
- Written communication – e.g. “Sent detailed project briefs to the team over email, setting out deadlines for each stage of the project”
- Project management – e.g. “Experienced project manager with a proven track record in delivering multi-million-pound projects for global logistics companies”
- Problem-solving – e.g. “Implemented an incentive-based scheme which rewarded writers for submitting articles early, after a series of missed deadlines”
- Communication – e.g. “Circulated calendars via email on a weekly basis, providing a breakdown of the key meetings and appointments managers had to attend that week”
- Scheduling – e.g. “Arranged and managed schedules and travel plans for 2 C-suite executives alongside daily office administration”
- Managing appointments – e.g. “Introduced a new online booking system for internal and external appointments”
- Record keeping – e.g. “Awarded ‘Employee of the Month’ on 3 occasions for meticulous record-keeping efforts”
- Setting boundaries – e.g. “Created a program of mandatory ‘quiet times’ when employees were to not call or visit each other’s desks for three thirty-minute periods a day”
- Teamwork – e.g. “Invested in a new design platform that aided the collaboration between the design and dev team, allowing them to stay up to date on changes and leave comments for one another”
- Organisation – e.g. “Passionate marketing graduate with strong communication skills, seeking a digital copywriter position at Boo PR Ltd, to leverage my organisation, research and social media skills”
- Meeting deadlines – e.g. “Managed 10 products at once, coming in at 15% under budget and ensuring every deadline was met or exceeded”
- Stress management – e.g. “Coached team members through stressful periods, teaching them how to prioritise and delegate to stop them from becoming overwhelmed and falling behind”
- Resource management – e.g. “Site manager with 15+ years experience and a proven track record of effectively managing and allocating resources during large-scale construction projects”
- Creativity – e.g. “Introduced an ideation session at the end of every month to generate a content and design schedule for the month ahead”
- Collaboration – e.g. “Implemented a new internal communication system across the business to make collaborating with other departments much quicker and easier”
- Optimisation – e.g. “Optimised project management workflows, increasing operation efficiency by 25%”
- Interpersonal communication – e.g. “Trained and mentored 5 recruitment consultants in order to speed up the hiring process, cutting average time to hire by 30%”
- Efficiency – e.g. “Resolved all customer queries within 12 hours, reducing the previous wait time by an average of 40%”
- Time tracking – e.g. “Introduced a time-tracking app that reduced the time spent on each client’s advertising campaign by an average of 2 working days”
- Self-awareness – e.g. “Aware of my preferred communication style, introduced a new instant messaging platform that saved an average of 5 hours a week on emails and phone calls”
- Task management software – e.g. “Organised and approachable personal assistant, proficient in task management software, including Asana, Zoho and ClickUp”
- Goal setting – e.g. “Worked closely with the sales team to set SMART goals and clarify the key focus for the next quarter. Sales increased by 10% as a result”
- List-writing – e.g. “Monitored productivity using Microsoft To Do, ensuring that all tasks were completed by the deadline”
- Focus – e.g. “Hiring manager with the ability to focus and work hard under pressure. Effectively met tight deadlines when tasked with finding urgent hires on short notice”
- Listening – e.g. “Set up one-to-ones within the team to encourage active listening and quickly solve any conflicts or creative differences to keep projects on track”
- Spreadsheets – e.g. “Created spreadsheets in Excel, using formulas to prioritise essential tasks and mark those that had been completed”
- Persuasion – e.g. “Persuaded an important vendor to ship materials early so that we could get ahead of our own production before the seasonal rush”
- Leadership – e.g. “Managed a team of 10 nurses, creating a monthly rota, taking into account holiday and other commitments like childcare”
- Innovation – e.g. “Introduced a new system that kept track of inventory and supplies, automatically sending notifications when it was time to place an order”
What are time management skills?
Time management skills are the abilities you possess that allow you to effectively plan and manage your time. These are the skills and qualities that help you to be productive and to complete tasks or activities in a given time frame.
These skills require you to prioritise your to-do list, to always be aware of your workload and to determine what’s urgent and what can wait.
Why are time management skills important?
Time management is important because it allows you to be productive and reduce procrastination. This allows you to meet deadlines and achieve bigger goals, something that is vital in the workplace.
After all, employers don’t want workers who are always behind, late to the office or overwhelmed by their list of tasks. Being able to manage your time effectively is vital in most job roles, so these skills are important on your CV.
How to include time management skills on your CV
Every CV should include some of these time management skills, but deciding where to put these is also important. Of course, your key skills section is the obvious place to start, but outside of this, there are a few ways you can highlight your skills.
In your CV profile
Your CV profile is your first chance to show off your time management skills. However, we recommend focusing on what you’ve achieved using these skills, rather than simply saying you have good time management.
For example, you could highlight how you finished a project early saving the business money.
Providing facts and figures wherever possible can make your skills even more impressive and give the recruiter a real idea of how you can add value.
In your jobs
Your work experience section gives you the opportunity to go into a lot more detail about your skills and experience.
With each relevant position you choose to list, use bullet points to break out your key responsibilities and achievements. You should go through the job description, highlighting any keywords the employer has used related to time management and pepper these skills throughout this section.
This makes it easier for the recruiter to quickly determine that you’re a good fit for the role as they scan through your application.
What to avoid
When writing a CV and listing your most relevant time management skills – or any other skills for that matter – there are certain things you need to avoid.
You should try to avoid including irrelevant skills that the employer has not asked for unless these are particularly impressive and still support your application. It’s also important that you don’t just rely on your key skills section to highlight these skills, be sure to include them throughout your CV as we’ve discussed above.
Finally, make sure that you never lie or exaggerate about your skills or achievements. You will always have something valuable to offer, so always be honest. The last thing you want is to get caught out in a lie.