Thinking about time management

Most executives find things getting on top of them and feel like there are not enough hours in the day. It may be time to take a step back and re-evaluate the situation and focus on the goals that are genuinely important.

In amongst the anti-climax of Barack Obama's brief stop off in London at the end of his European tour in July, was a very telling exchange.
Caught off guard by a nearby ABC News microphone, the US presidential candidate was over-heard talking to Tory Leader David Cameron. Cameron, himself just about to take a hard-earned break in Cornwall, asked Obama if he would be taking any time off from his gruelling campaign.
The polite, if a little mundane question, sparked the following exchange.
Obama; "I am going to take a week in August. Actually the most important thing you need to do is to have big chunks of time during the day when all you're doing is thinking. And the biggest mistake that a lot of these folks make is just feeling as if you have to be..."
Cameron: "These guys just chalk your diary up."
Obama: "Right. In 15-minute increments . . ."
Cameron: "We call it the dentist's waiting room. You have to scrap that because you've got to have time."
Obama: "And, well, and you start making mistakes, or you lose the big picture. Or you lose a sense of, I think you lose a feel . . ."
Cameron: "Your feeling. And that is exactly what politics is all about. The judgment you bring to make decisions."
Obama: "That's exactly right. And the truth is that we've got a bunch of smart people, I think, who know 10 times more than we do about the specifics of the topics.
"And so if what you're trying to do is micromanage and solve everything then you end up being a dilettante, but you have to have enough knowledge to make good judgments about the choices that are presented to you."
In all the words of wisdom that are spouted about time management and recommendations to prioritise tasks depending on importance, very little thought is given to, er, thought. Yet, one of the key benefits of a truly inspirational and focussed leader, is their original thought and problem solving ability.
Archie Norman and Allan Leighton famously issued senior managers with baseball caps during the revival of Asda in the 1990s. Anyone wearing the ‘thinking cap' was not to be disturbed while they devoted valuable time to mulling a problem over. It seems a blunt instrument today, but it got the message across.
Meetings are of course one of the greatest time sappers and, according to Allan Leighton, executives should plan their lives and time to keep them out of meetings.
He said; "I don't manage time, I manage issues. People should plan their time and diaries with activities that keep them out of meetings.
"Only after thinking about the things that really do count do I consider what time I have left for meetings."
According to time management guru David Allen, who has established a cult following with his ‘Getting Things Done' manifesto, the problem we all face is there is always too much to be done and never enough time to do it in. The stress we feel isn't because we're overwhelmed with tasks, but with "stuff".
He said; "That ‘stuff' is that amorphous mess of anything you have allowed into your psychological or physical world that doesn't belong where it is, but for which you haven't yet determined the desired outcome and the next action step."
Allen says, this collection of uncompleted actions and ‘stuff', does nothing but create stress and block thinking. The strain of modern business life putting out one corporate fire after another, answering emails, voicemails, and calls to meeting after meeting, means that the whole of the business day is devoted to the fight against the rising tide of distracting ‘stuff'.
Put simply, executives today are too busy trying to stay on top of what they have to do, that they don't really get time to do any of it properly. The net effect is business leaders are often too worried about remembering to do everything and, as a consequence, their brains are often too tired to think or be creative. It is a vicious circle - the more things to do, the slower we are able to do them and the more they pile up.
But, what can you do about it? Many time management consultants recommend prioritising your tasks, from A to D, for example, A being the most important. The idea is not to waste any time on the non-important stuff.
Yet, what does it mean to make something a ‘B' priority? If something needs doing, it needs doing. As one wag put it, how impressed would you be if your new car did not have wing mirrors because the factory thought the engine was more important than wing mirrors?
Ultimately, prioritisation is an avoidance strategy. It is no point having a category E for things that ‘would be nice to do if you get a moment'. You won't get a moment - you are too busy, remember? The truth is, if you have too much to do, you are going to have to reduce the tasks, not just reorganise them into a palatable order. Plus, you still need to leave some time for that valuable thinking.
The only way to do that is to seize control of your own diary and block off time for productive work, such as thinking. That means making sure that the meetings you do agree to are totally necessary and effective.
A good leader should only do the things that matter, otherwise they will not run the organisation well and will quickly become exhausted and demoralised. That rule is the same if you are running Widget PLC, or a Superpower.