Abstract
Time management plays an important role in our ability to participate in occupations. The ’Let’s Get Organized’ program was adapted to a vocational rehabilitation setting, and improvements were noted in time management and emotional regulation skills.
Primary Author and Speaker: Carrie Clawson
Poor time management skills affect job performance (Thomack, 2012), but also the quality of life (Sharfi & Rosenblum, 2016), occupational balance (Scanlan et al., 2011; PekÇetin & Günal, 2021), occupational participation (Alenljung et al., 2019), and occupational performance and satisfaction (Gutman et al., 2020). Let’s Get Organized (LGO) is a manual-based group intervention created by Suzanne White (2017). When implemented in psychiatric community-based clinics in Sweden, improvements in time management, organization/planning, and emotional regulation were noted from pre- to posttest; occupational participation and satisfaction also increased (Holmefur et al., 2019). This study adapted the LGO curriculum to the vocational rehabilitation setting and explored changes in time management and occupational competence. A pre-experimental, one-group pretest-posttest design was implemented. The Assessment of Time Management Skills (ATMS) and Occupational Self-Assessment, Short Form (OSA-SF) were used to measure perceived time management skills and occupational competence. The results indicate changes were noted in overall perceived time management skills, as well as the components of organization/planning skills and emotional regulation. Employers identify emotional regulation as an important ‘soft skill’ in the workplace (Albright et al., 2020). The incorporation of emotional regulation differentiates LGO from other time management interventions. In applying LGO to the VR setting, the focus on the regulation of emotions was expanded with sensory strategies that promote self-regulation; since emotional regulation plays a key role in employment success, the changes noted from the beginning to the end of the intervention is encouraging. This poster will discuss the crucial need to address time management and emotional regulation skills in adults with cognitive disabilities to promote employment and quality of life, and will describe one approach to meet this need.
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Holmefur, M., Lidström-Holmqvist, K., Roshanay, A. H., Arvidsson, P., White, S., & Janeslätt, G. (2019). Pilot study of Let’s Get Organized: A group intervention for improving time management. American Journal of Occupational Therapy, 73, 7305205020. https://doi.org/10.5014/ajot.2019.032631
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