Managing Yourself, Not Time
Managing Yourself, Not Time
A timely piece on what it really means to manage time (hint: you can't)
If there’s one topic we’ll talk about until the end of time, it’s time management.
Effective leaders make time a priority in their lives and careers.
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Over the years I’ve read dozens of books, articles and tips on time management: managing it, hacking it, maximizing it, and saving it. I’ve tried every technique — from pomodoro to multitasking (what a disaster!). Yet, like you, I’ve always felt the pressure of running out of time — especially when I needed it most. So, are there any real methods for managing time better?
No.
But that doesn’t mean you can’t become more effective with your time.
In fact, we shared some pretty cool techniques recently on Monday’s Coaching Call #2 and Coaching Call #4, including:
Using time blocks to focus efforts and stay in flow, without constantly “starting, stopping and restarting” all day.
Controlling distractions like closing email and turning off the “dings” while we work, allocating specific periods for “gotta minute” requests and preventing “last-minute” crises by planning better.
Using the Decision Matrix (in our Leadership Handbook) to evaluate the importance and urgency of tasks, limiting ourselves to those with high importance and immediate urgency, while delegating, declining or deleting everything else.
Visualizing commitments by adding tasks directly to calendars, rather than separate to-do lists, and setting aside specific times to complete tasks.
All of these ideas, plus a few from some of our Coaching Call participants, will definitely help you be more productive with your time.
Time Management is a Myth.…
While the items above cannot control time, which passes whether or not we use it properly, they point us toward the solution:
Managing ourselves!
And that’s the key to improving our schedules, and effectiveness, as leaders.
We’ll never be able to control time, but we can control our choices.
Years ago, I remember complaining to my mentor that my Fall schedule was overwhelmed with travel and deadlines before the holidays. He looked at my calendar and agreed. “What a mess! It looks like you should fire whoever is filling your schedule like this.”
Ouch. (I was that person.)
His point was that effective leaders don’t manage, hack or trick time, deadlines or tasks. Rather, they get strict, intentional and careful with their choices when making commitments.
If I’m running out of time, it’s because I’m making poor choices.
The good news is that choice management is 100% within our control. The more we practice good decisions, the faster we find plenty of time to be the leaders we want to be.
Here are ten ways leaders make better choices about time:
Know where your time goes today. Start with data. Keep a log of your activities for 2-4 weeks, as accurately as possible. Track reasonable time units (say, 30-minute segments) using a journal, spreadsheet, or. your calendar/Outlook. Account for everything - even sleeping. When ready, ask a colleague to help you analyze and identify patterns to understand your current choice-making habits.
Sort the activities. Use categories, colors, percentages or labels like “strategic vs. incidental” to see tendencies in your choices. Are you pursuing easy or opportunistic tasks, or strategic and challenging objectives that only leaders can do?
Identify items to be eliminated. Divide the activities into three columns: Keep, Stop and Start. Separate critical/strategic (keep) items from better-delegated/deleted (stop) items. Then consider what items are missing — because they were never scheduled, or they keep slipping your mind. (Learn more about Keep/Stop/Start methodology here.)
Allocate time to your Most Valuable Contribution first. “Effective executives don’t ask what they want to do; they ask what must get done,” said management guru, Peter Drucker. To strengthen your choices, identify the most important contribution you should make as a leader to support the performance of your people, customers or organization. These “highest and best” tasks should align with your company strategy and growth priorities. Give them prime-time in your schedule; everything else will have to wait (or be delegated, see #10).
Make hard choices rewarding. Identify a reward for having a clean, focused schedule. Will you go home early, sleep late, have time for family, or pursue a passion project? What rewards will you enjoy when you achieve more market share, financial returns, and satisfying work? Highlight the benefits of making better choices, to sustain a commitment to better habits.
Measure the financial impact. What gets measured gets improved, the saying goes. So like #5 above, track the financial rewards for better uses of time. Next to every commitment, write the anticipated financial return. Will this 2X someone else’s contribution, or get a million-dollar project off the ground? Estimate the payoff as you schedule it — and put it within sight.
Manage energy. Time is infinite, but energy is not. You need to perform well within any commitments you schedule. So place your activities within the energy blocks that work best for you. Do you have better energy in the morning, afternoon, or evening? Purposefully arrange commitments into zones that match peak performance periods. Leverage the distinction between the work clock and your productive schedule.
Practice Saying Yes to Saying No. Not every task, to-do or meeting is for you, even if it’s a good one. Declining can be hard at first: You want to be a team player, helpful to others, and involved. You may be tempted to accept things that you do well, are fun, and interesting. Yet your people need an effective leader, not a busy one. Differentiate between servant leadership and service leadership. Leaders can’t be help desks if they wish to be truly helpful to their organization.
Minimize Meetings. Some meetings are vital, where decisions are made, plans are shared, and actions are taken. Yet few meetings rise to this level. Most are band-aids for organizational problems like poor communications, lack of direction, misallocated resources or ineffective delegation. Some are merely verbalized memos/emails. If a meeting doesn’t have a clear reason for a leader to participate, see #8 above, and decline. If a leader sees too many meetings in their organization, she should identify and tackle the root causes. An effective organization is a quiet one, getting work done, not talking about it.
Get Better at Delegating. Not just assigning tasks to others, but knowing who and why tasks should go to them. Carefully study your people’s talents and skills; delegate according to capability, not position. Define expectations, provide resources, empower, and let it go. Be available for feedback and coaching, but don’t be involved beyond what’s necessary. Good delegation is more than handing out tasks; it’s getting them into the hands of the right people with the right stuff to get them done.
With practice and diligence, these 10 techniques will help you improve the structure, and results of making better choices when it comes to allocating your time.
Keep leading!
— Matthew
Some of my favorite reads on managing choices / use of time:
The Four Disciplines of Execution, by Chris McChesney
Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less, by Greg McKeown
Productivity is for Robots, by Corey McComb
The Effective Executive, by Peter Drucker
Deep Work, by Cal Newport
