How to Create the Time You Need?
The executives we work with are usually 120% booked over the short term. A common concern is how they free up time for the strategic things that are critical to their long term business and personal success.
Even more challenging is they find that on most days a bunch of critical issues arise and they have to juggle key commitments in order to forestall disaster.
In our executive time management program, Success@30 (how to get your operational work done in 30 hours a week), we introduce a concept of always keeping white space in your calendar. White space is time that is not allocated in advance and can be used to handle new urgent topics or extend focus on issues that need more time to complete. Although everyone is a bit different about 20% seems to be the right amount.
Of course this is a nice theory and the typical executive has a lot of trouble putting it into practice.
So I was very interested in a story from a General Manager client. You see his administrative assistant left on maternity leave and because she planned to return relatively quickly he was living without anyone formally in the role. Suddenly he discovered he had lots of white space on his calendar. More surprisingly he did not feel he was missing any important or strategic meetings. Rather he felt liberated, could focus on the key things he needed to accomplish and had the ability to handle crises as they arose.
So what were the lessons here?
- An overly efficient and effective admin will ensure your calendar is full.
- Smart subordinates know how to effectively leverage your admin to get your time so that they can achieve their goals.
But, the most important learning might be: If you don’t measure your admin on maintaining white space on your calendar, it won’t be there when you need it.
What could you do today to ensure your calendar is your asset not your liability?
image courtesy of vincentvanderpaus
Well, to me, it doesn’t really matter if you call it time allocation or time management. Actually, it doesn’t matter what we call our time but what we do with it.
I personally enjoy doing things by priorities. If something isn’t a priority, I skip it and get on with things that are important
Indeed, the use of our time is the most important part of any kind of time management, and prioritizing is the first step to any such process.
Great comment.