We made the mistake of waiting until about an hour before formal dinner to try to iron my dress shirts. My DW said there were about 8 people waiting to use the iron.
When I travel on business, I'll often turn the shower on hot and close the bathroom door to get a good steam going. I then hang my clothes on the "zip" string that you usually hang your wet bathing suit on.
This worked great and my DW (who was at first skeptical) was amazed at how good my shirt looked after this trick.
Other than that, don't wait until it's too late to get to the iron.