Time management practice and associated factors among employees working in public health centers, Northwest Ethiopia: a mixed method study

Abstract<br> Background While progressing towards universal health coverage, poor time management in the healthcare system<br> had significant effect on an individual such as imbalance, job dissatisfaction, and work ineffectiveness and finally poor<br> productivity of the organization will be resulted. Information about time management practice in the healthcare<br> system is limited. Therefore, the objective of this study was to assess time management practice and associated<br> factors among employees working in public health centers, Dabat District, Northwest Ethiopia.<br> Methods A facility-based cross-sectional mixed methods (quantitative and qualitative) study was conducted in<br> Dabat District from May 27 to June 22, 2022. A simple random sampling technique was used to select 413 study<br> subjects and for the qualitative data, six key informants were selected. Self-administered questionnaire was used for<br> the quantitative study, and an interview guide was employed for the qualitative study. Epi-data version 4.6 and SPSS<br> 26 software were used for data entry and analysis, respectively. Open Code 4.6 software was used for qualitative data<br> analysis. Variables with p-value of &lt; 0.05 in multivariable analysis were considered as significant associated factors.<br> Results A total of 396 employees participated in the study with a response rate of 95.8%. The result showed that<br> overall, 54.8% (95% CI: 49.5–59.6) of health employees had practiced good time management. The likelihood of<br> good time management was higher among those health workers who had planning experience (AOR = 2.04, 95% CI:<br> 1.22–3.4), low procrastination habit (AOR = 1.65 95% CI: 1.04–2.65), satisfied with performance appraisal (AOR: 1.7, 95%<br> CI: 1.05–2.81), and satisfied with organizational policy and strategy (AOR: 2.6, 95% CI: 1.6–4.3). The qualitative result<br> also showed that the existing performance appraisal practices were not linked to rewards or sanction planning.<br> Conclusion The overall time management practice of public health center employees was low compared with<br> prior studies. Organizational policies, prior planning experience, procrastination, and performance appraisal were all<br> significantly associated factors with time management practice. Therefore, health center managers need to set an<br> intervention to address all of the following factors to enhance employees’ time management skills at public health centers like evidence-based performance appraisals, sharing organizational policies, and engaging in capacity<br> building activities such as training in time management and planning.<br>