Easy Life Hacks for Getting To Work on Time

Does your company have a strict attendance policy that you have to stick to or lose your job? In this economy, risking it for the sake of sleeping in a few extra minutes would be a really bad career move.

Some companies might have been flexible in the past but are clamping down now, trying to get the most out of their employees. If an attendance policy is a new thing for you or something that you struggle with endlessly, here's some tips on how to finally get to work on time!

Getting out of the house on time starts with being organized and creating a routine.

Need to walk the dog before work? Hang the leash in the same spot every day somewhere near the door. Don't just take it off wherever the dog stopped running once you came in the house.

If there are multiple car owners in your home, chances are good that someone is going to get blocked in every night. Use the keys by the door to move the other cars around. Incoherent people shouldn't be moving cars.

Once your routine is in place and everything is where it should be, getting to work on time will be a piece of cake.

There's nothing worse than trying to pick out an outfit and ironing it when you're half asleep on a Monday morning. Get it ready the night before! Even better, spend a little time on Sunday to iron all the clothes that you are planning on wearing during the week. Ok, so you might change your mind on one or two days but that will still leave 3 or 4 outfits that you won't have to worry about ironing in the morning while you're rushing to get to work on time.

Did you ever have it in your head that you were going to wear a particular shirt or pair of pants and then you go to put them on in the morning and see a stain that you had missed? If you had taken the time to iron it the night before, you would have seen it and chosen something else while you were wide awake and thinking clearly.

You've kept to your schedule and you're ready to walk out the door. If you leave right now, you will punch in with 2 minutes to spare. Then it happens. You realize that you forgot to hang your keys by the door and now you have to search the entire house for them. Maybe you'll be lucky enough to remember where you left them last but in your panic, probably not. So much for getting to work on time today.

There's many styles to choose from - from functional to pretty. Simply pick the one that matches your decor. This may be the single most important thing to help get to work on time.

The later you go to bed at night, the harder it will be to get up in the morning. Spend a few weeks experimenting to find out what time you need to go to bed to have a great morning - the kind of morning where you wake up right before your alarm goes off and you're ready to jump out of bed. With enough sleep, that could be how every morning is for you!

This one really is a personal decision. Some people like showering at night so that they are nice and clean when they go to bed and others like a nice shower in the morning to get their blood flowing. If you are someone who prefers mornings, then take this into consideration when figuring out how much time you need to get ready in the morning.

Keep your body soap, scrub brushes, razors, shampoo and conditioners all together in one place in the shower.

An empty gas tank is not the way to start the day. Make sure you check it on the way home the night before and stop if you need to. You'll appreciate your efforts in the morning.

If you're already late most of the time, having an empty gas tank in the morning will only add to the stress. You'll have to stop.

Many times, I think that I'll try to make it to work and then to the gas station. I go to work on a busy road so it would be awful to run out of gas on that road. It would be so embarrassing!!

Avoid all of that and fill up at night!

If you're having a hard time getting to work on time, skip the eggs, bacon, and pancakes in the morning. You need something fast to eat. I know they're fast in the morning, but try to skip the drive-thru. There's a chance that something won't be working or the person in front of you will order breakfast for their six kids. Don't chance it. You already had your coffee because it was automatically brewing so all you need is a little protein. Breakfast bars, yogurt with fruit, or hard boiled eggs that you boiled the night before. Whatever it is, just make it fast!

It's way too easy to hit the snooze button when all you want to do is sleep. In fact, you can push it over and over until it finally stops going off. Or maybe you never even hear it in the first place. There's an easy remedy for that one - get 3 different alarm clocks all with different alarms. Make sure that they are set up in places where you have to get out of bed in order to turn them off. After a few days of this, you'll get up much easier.

If you're someone who prefers hot coffee in the morning, it would be wise to invest in a nice automatically brewing coffee maker. Have it start shortly before your alarm goes off and you will awaken to the wonderful aroma of coffee hot and ready waiting for you.

After you've done your due diligence and gotten everything ready in time, leave! Don't sit around the house for any longer than is necessary. Ready 5 minutes early? Resist the urge to check your email one last time. Get going. It's better to be five minutes early then risk being late because you had to read the email from Aunt Martha that ended up being a book long saga.

This one might involve a little TV watching in the morning. Your morning news show will have a traffic watch on it. They are usually pretty quick letting everyone know where all the accidents are. Avoid those areas. Everyone has to stop and slow down to see what happened. It's not worth it. Take a different way to work if you can.

Since it will take a little practice for the first few weeks, you might have to resort to running for the door to make it inside on time. No shame in that as long as you punch in before you're considered late. 30 seconds might be the difference between being on time and being late.