11 Ways To Own And Protect Your Time You Can Implement This Week
By: Jon Dwoskin
Many of us are now working from home and no longer spend time commuting. While that gives us more time than we’ve ever had, it can actually feel like the opposite. We’re lacking those personal moments where we can shut off the world — those deep breaths in the car on the way to the next meeting or that morning ritual of stopping at Starbucks. As a result, we have to pay more attention than ever as to how we value and control our time.
Every day, we get the gift of 1,440 minutes. Here’s how to make the most of them by becoming a master student of your calendar.
1. Look at your calendar in chunks of five, 10 and 15 minutes. Viewing your calendar this way gives you a completely different day. Because of how calendars are traditionally set up, we tend to think in 30- and 60-minute segments. But there are, in fact, so many activities that could take 50% to 75% less time if we just prepped and organized how we put them in our calendar.
2. Color-code your calendar. Categorize meetings with one color, to-dos or follow-up calls with another, prospecting with a third and so on. Be very specific and measurable in every entry: what you’re going to do, who you’re going to call and where in your CRM you’re going to go to actually make those calls.
3. Group one-minute to-dos as a 10-minute time block. When you do this, you can quickly get through multiple tasks in 10 minutes between meetings or calls. You can enter it on your calendar as “Go to my to-do list, do all my one-minute to-dos.”
4. Block time to adjust your calendar. Make time to start every day reviewing your calendar, and end every day — as a nonnegotiable — reviewing it for the next day. Reshape as needed. Then do that for the entire week. I prefer to never go to bed without understanding, time-blocking, prioritizing and making sure that my next day is in sync.
5. Block a minimum of five minutes every day for think time.These days, it’s like business and life have completely morphed into each other and we no longer have the outlets just to unwind the way we need. Commit to taking time for yourself. Everybody needs time to think about nothing. Go for a walk with no iPhone, no music, no podcast, no nothing. Give your brain downtime.
Aside from mastering your calendar, there are a few additional practices and methods for protecting your precious time.
1. Conduct a tracking exercise. Track everything you do for three days so you can really understand where you’re spending your time and where you’re wasting it.
2. Try to get your meetings down to 15 minutes. The key is having an agenda for every meeting so there’s not so much time wasted on nonsense chatter. The agenda is especially important now when everybody’s scattered and working remotely.
3. Write everything down. Try it and you’ll be amazed. I’ll put something in my calendar and it seems very clear, but a week later I think, “Wait, what is this meeting about? What am I supposed to be doing?” People tell me all the time that I have the best memory, but I don’t. I just write everything down. Keep your thoughts organized — don’t use a stray scrap of paper — by putting it all into your calendar.
4. Lower your bar. Doing a little bit every day is better than trying to knock everything off at once and getting nothing done. I’m a big fan of grouping work this way. Consistency is key. Determine your three specific and measurable things that you need to do every day and your leading activities to get your business moving forward.
5. Manage your email flow. So many of us feel like we can never keep up with our inbox. Weekends are a good time to get your inbox down to zero. Email is one of the biggest time-wasters, so figure out what you don’t need to be copied on. At some point, you need to trust your people and know that things are getting done, so only get CC’d on the important things to help keep you out of the weeds.
6. Find an accountability partner. This is somebody you can talk to who will hold you accountable to do what you say you are going to.
If you’re going to keep up with this pivoting, adapting decade we’re in, you’ve got to be very conscious of your time. Remember, 90% of your day is all about how you structure it and then backing it up with systems, processes and routines. Look at yourself as a product and create all of this not only for yourself as an individual but also for your company.
If you can save just four minutes a day by being more efficient, that’s 24 hours a year. Double that to eight minutes, and you’re at 48 hours. That’s a lot of time. Enjoy your time — and always think big.
Jon Dwoskin The Jon Dwoskin Experience. Business Coach/Executive Advisor, Author and Speaker. I get clients unstuck and accelerate their growth.
