The first half of last month was a bustle of activity for me and this dearth of time was seriously felt. It seemed that I wouldn’t be able to complete all my tasks in the seemingly very small twenty-four-hour day that I had. Firstly, I had my mid-term examinations. Then, on the fifth of the month, I had to fly to Islamabad to participate in the All-Pakistan Mathematics Olympiad 2014, organized by Ghulam Ishaq Khan Institute of Engineering and Technology (GIKI). Then, after returning, I had to retake those papers that I had missed due to my participation in the nationwide event. All these tasks, combined with teaching Additional Mathematics to my juniors, meant that I did not even have a second that could be considered ’free time’. Mostly, if not always, such situations bring a lot of learning for us— but only if we choose to reflect. In my case, I realized how very important it was to respect others’ time—thanks to an experience that I had, which I will cherish as an important learning experience.

This incident that I am narrating occurred just a day before my first paper, which happened to be literature in English. This subject is generally considered to be challenging to an extent that I am the only boy in my school who has opted for it. Since my mother teaches in the same school as mine, I often have to stay back after school for an hour, few days a week, waiting for her to get over with her meetings. This particular day was one of those days that I had to stay back. I had planned that I would utilize that time effectively and review the material for my paper. Fortunately or unfortunately, the course of the day and how things turned out were most tiresome. One of my classmates, who was struggling with his mathematics came to me and requested if I could help him out a little after school. Trying to live up to the legacy of the meaning of my name, I agreed to help, discarding my own plans to review my literature notes.

After school got over, I waited for him at a place where we had decided to convene. Five minutes passed. Then fifteen. When half an hour had passed and my friend had still not shown up, I took out my copy of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’, and began studying.

Finally, it was time to go, and the chap had still not turned up. I was greatly put off, as I’m sure anybody would be. Not only had he wasted my time but had also decreased the level of motivation and enthusiasm with which I would otherwise have helped him. Back home, I did send him a text message expressing my displeasure at his attitude.

Parents are a blessing. My mother guessed that something had gone wrong in school and inquired about it and I narrated the whole incident to her. Her words were food for thought for me, as I am sure they will be for others out there. It is also upon her words that this article is based.

Wasting someone else’s time is a sin. It is a woeful tragedy of our society that we fail to realize that whenever we make a commitment, that commitment becomes an Amaanat on us. If, for example, two people mutually agree to meet at a particular time, this time becomes an Amaanat of the other person. Failure to meet at the mutually agreed upon time is equivalent to breaking a promise—and that is a sin. We have sadly limited our understanding of the word Amaanat just to material goods while completely neglecting the spiritual aspect of our actions. We tend to forget that words and actions are also an Amaanat, and so are our commitments; whether they are related to material things or agreements pertaining to time.

Looking at another aspect apart from the spiritual one, the habit of devaluing others’ time also leads to deterioration of interpersonal relationships. Not only is it a source of distress for the person who had been promised a meeting at a particular time but on a more serious note, it dramatically reduces the worth of the inconvenience-causing-agent in the eyes of his counterpart. The willingness to assist or consult or include the other in bilateral discussions in the future reduces exponentially. Just as a good relationship is heavily dependent on stability of sentiments on both sides, a turbulent one can be achieved just as easily by creating even small vibrations at the base of these stable associations. There are enough precedents to prove how wasting others’ time plays a significant role in damaging good relationships.

Even if one is not very concerned about the spiritual drawbacks of inefficient time management, it is essential for him or her to value the time of others in order to maintain cordiality within his or her social circles.

Areeb Nafey Uddin Siddiqui is a Timelenders family member and is currently an A level student at Generation’s School, Karachi. He has attended the Strategic Visions, Strategic Time Management and Visions Retreat (Malaysia) workshops. He is simultaneously a poet, satirical writer, and also addresses serious issues like organizational and personal skills. He writes in both, English and Urdu. He has also conducted the Strategic Time Management training in his school for the domestic staff. Currently, he is doing an extensive internship with Timelenders.

Negotiating can be termed as the process of resolving issues big or small. This makes negotiations, quite possibly, the most commonly used communication technique. As soon as a child learns to talk, he starts to negotiate with his parents over even the most trivial issues. It is therefore no wonder that in their book Getting to Yes Robert Fisher and William Ury call everyone a negotiator. If the situation is assessed objectively, negotiation is an art that requires study, patience and a keen understanding so that dispute is avoided in attempting to reach decisions that keep both parties satisfied. In order to do this, one can either be the soft negotiator always willing to make concessions in order to avoid clash at all costs or the hard negotiator who is unwilling to budge from his preconceived notion of ‘success’. 

The single more outstanding reason why negotiations fail is because both parties bargain over positions. Referred to as positional bargaining, this is where one position is preconceived and it is specifically around the defense of this position that the entire process of negotiation revolves. The most common example cited for this is the haggling over prices. Positional bargaining is considered highly inefficient since it leads to rigidity and inflexibility, harms the relationships of the parties especially if there are more than two parties involved and distracts people from the fact that there could be a far better alternative.  Because positional bargaining garners an egotistical stance, both parties refuse to budge to an agreeable position even if it suits them. 

The alternative, as suggested by Fisher and Ury, is principled negotiation that is based on four key concepts. Referred to as The Method, principled negotiation first seeks to separate the people from the problem because commonly in negotiations, people become personally involved with the issues that they are negotiating. By avoiding rigid positions, there is no chance of damaging relationships. Also it helps to gain a clearer perspective of the problem at hand and improves communication. When emotions are not involved in the process, it allows for objective reasoning without undue, heated argumentation. 

The second concept is to focus on the interests rather than the positions. The reason why people are negotiating at all is because they are seeking to protect certain interests. These interests should therefore be the focus of the debate rather than the positions that they have taken up for them. Interests and positions are better defined in the words of the two authors: ‘A position is likely to be concrete and explicit; the interests underlying it may well be unexpressed , intangible, and perhaps inconsistent’. It is also important to realize that interests are basic human needs and that the negotiators are likely to have numerous interests. When interests are understood, the entire process of negotiation becomes more flexible than it would be otherwise. 

The third concept of principled negotiations is to invent options targeted towards mutual gain. Without options, negotiations become unyielding and start to lean towards positional bargaining again. Creating options is not easy and there are four obstacles likely to hinder this concept; prematurely deciding on an option without considering all possible alternatives, failing to consider all ideas and focusing on narrowing it down to just one solution without allowing negotiators to ‘select from a larger number of possible answers’, defining the issue in terms of a clear cut, win or lose situation where one party is clearly the victor and the other clearly the loser and each party relying on the other to come up with the solution to the argument at hand. 

In order to overcome these hindrances, the authors prescribe four solutions. The first is to isolate the invention process, or the creative act, from the process of evaluation, or the critical act. In other words you need to ‘invent first, decide later’. Brainstorming is highly encouraged in order to facilitate this process. The second solution is broadening all the options available. The parties should not believe that there is just one single resolution to the issue. Broadening your options means ‘you are developing room within which to negotiate’. The third solution is to seek mutual gain rather than mutual loss. This is done when both parties isolate their shared interests and focus on satisfying those. Shared interests should be treated as opportunities that make the entire negotiation process amicable. The fourth solution is to attempt to create ease for the other party rather than difficulties through pressure or psychological coercion. The mutual agreements should be such that they appeal to both parties. 

The final concept of principled negotiation discuses the importance of using objective criteria while attempting to negotiate. Objective criteria needs to be both practical and legitimate especially in cases where the interests of both negotiating parties are severely pitted against each other’s. Objective criteria needs to be planned ahead of the negotiation and should be based on fair standards and fair procedures. In addition to this, both parties need to remember to yield only to principle, not pressure. 

Considering the fact that there are often unusual circumstances in which negotiators find themselves, Fisher and Ury also discuss these in their book. In short, Getting to Yes is a comprehensive guideline on how to reach effective resolutions without ruining relationships and without feeling like you have been taken advantage of. The best thing about the book is that if you place even the simplest negotiations in your life such as ‘where should we throw the next party’ within the prescribed framework, you can reach a happier and far more amicable decision than if you attack the issue simply by treating it as a contest of wills. 

For the simple reason that Fisher and Ury teach us a better way to ‘argue’, this book becomes a must read not only at the corporate/professional level, but also for family members in any house for day to day issues. The fact of the matter is that Pakistanis are hot blooded people who love to argue for the sake of winning arguments and hence this is book is imperative not only to read once but also to have as a continual reference on our shelves. 

Irum Sarfaraz is a freelance writer/editor settled in the San Francisco Bay Area, USA. Her published credits as writer and web content developer include well over 2,000 articles in both American and Pakistani publications. Her notable work is the translation of Harun Yahya's epic Atlas of Creation-Vol 1 and Evolution Deceit from English to Urdu. Sister Irum has a master's degree in English Literature and will be writing the Book Review for Envision every month. 

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Assalam-o-Alaikum,

Here we stand on the first block of year 2015. Last year, we have been honored to assist individuals and organizations in Malaysia, France, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Pakistan to make their lives meaningful. 

In 2014, we did total 128 workshops and facilitated over 2500 people towards life with meaning, purpose, productivity and character. The last event of 2014 was Vision Retreat in Pakistan that has finished on 28th December 2014, in which participants have worked extensively on developing and refining their visions all the way from ultimate purpose and vision, and breaking it down to current year’s vision. 4 of the 18 participants have presented amazing visions of this retreat and rest of the participants worked with them in groups to refine the vision document, hence contributed greatly in Timelenders vision of helping individuals and organizations develop meaningful existences and lives. The next Vision Retreat is going to take place from March 20-23, 2015 in Malaysia and I encourage you to seriously considering attending it. The existing Vision Retreat graduates are also encouraged to revisit the visioning framework with much improved and powerful visioning process. 

In our post Vision Retreat meeting, we have further refined the vision facilitation framework and sure that the next retreat would be another step ahead of past retreats in terms of learning that will take place in’sha’Allah.

I am, on behalf of Timelenders, truly grateful to all Timelenders family members who have contributed in our vision in 2014, the new family members and the family members who have been assisting us in the expansion of our vision for many years.

At the beginning of 2015, I would like to share with you couple of comments that our participants made at the end of their respective workshops. This will give you an idea of how people think after learning the meaningful life framework.

“Had I attended this workshop earlier, I would have not lost my family.” A participant from Europe admitted that how not having a comprehensive visioning framework for all roles of life had affected his life.

“I was pushed by my brother to attend your workshop as I was reluctant. Only after understanding the whole framework, I got to understand that why my life has been truly meaningless, the blunders I have made in life destroyed my relationships and I couldn’t do anything worthwhile. Today I am making an intention to bring myself back to life and that too meaningfully.” A  young participant commented who wasted number of years in his life and took some drastic negative steps under severe depression, which was the result of not having a solid life management framework.

By the blessings of Allah (swt), 2014 was also the year when number of strategic projects initiated for the well being of the community and the Ummah and people we were managed to influence with our ideas includes influencers from all walks of life. 

My dear friends, another year from the bag of our life has gone and this is the time to reflect upon the mistakes and shortcomings we had during 2014 and targeting the same in the planning for 2015 for improvement. The flip side is that we should be thankful to Allah (swt) who has provided us with another year, which is another opportunity to review our intentions, better equipped ourselves for new challenges and connect our lives with worthy and powerful visions.

My one statement message in the beginning of this year is that life is short and you just have one opportunity. Unlike many computer games where you could press F2 to restart the game just before the game ends, the real life does not provide you with such F2 option. So, unleash true value of your life as it is melting like an ice cube, and a big portion of it has already gone.

Please remember me and all Timelenders family in your prayers.

Wassalam,

Yameenuddin Ahmed

The Editor

Strategic Time Management 

Quetta

02 - 04 December, 2014

Strategic Time Management 

ADGAS, Abu Dhabi

07 - 11 December, 2014

Strategic Time Management

IBA Main Campus, Karachi

11 – 14 December, 2014

Strategic Time Management

Al Jawhara Gardens Hotel, Dubai

12 – 13 December, 2014

Stress Management

ADGAS, Abu Dhabi

14 – 18 December, 2014

Strategic Time Management

Pak Suzuki Motor Co. Ltd., Lahore

16 – 18 December, 2014

Stress Management

Marriott Hotel, Karachi

17 – 18 December, 2014

Strategic Visions

Best Western Hotel, Islamabad

19 – 21 December, 2014

Strategic Visions

Buraq Camp, Islamabad

20 - 22 December, 2014

Strategic Time Management

Indus Hospital, Karachi

22 - 24 December, 2014

Understanding Sound Ideology

Arabian Sea Country Club, Karachi

25 December, 2014

Vision Retreat

Arabian Sea Country Club, Karachi

26 - 28 December, 2014