Tip: You must be ruthless about tasks that are neither important nor urgent and dump them.

6. Schedule Your Tasks. It is much better to schedule tasks than leave them to be done when you feel like it. For example, you are much more likely to exercise regularly if you do it at a set time each day. One of the best scheduling systems is the 60-20-20 system. This means filling up 60% of your diary with your important tasks and leaving 20% for things that crop up and 20% for emergencies.

Tip: Use the luggage-hold method when planning your diary. This means putting the biggest tasks in your diary first and then fitting the smaller ones around them. Just like the way you put luggage in the boot of your car.

7. Check As You Go. A time management system should be a living, dynamic system rather than a dull, repetitive one cast in concrete. That's why you should inject into your system room for surprises, room for learning, and room for doing what you enjoy. In this way, you'll not only like the system, you'll achieve your goals much more quickly than you thought possible at the start.

Tip: Why not create your version of the Daruma doll, an image of an Indian prince that Asian executives use to chart their goal progress? When you set your goals, you colour the prince's eyes white. When a goal is achieved you colour them in.

Follow these 7 steps on all your goal-achievement work and you'll astonish yourself at how reaching your goals becomes second nature to you.