Success Secrets and Stories
To share management leadership concepts that actually work.
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Success Secrets and Stories
Innovative Approaches to Managing Time and Tasks
Unlock the secrets of time management and transform the way you tackle both your professional and personal responsibilities. Tune in as we explore how prioritizing tasks, setting realistic deadlines, and identifying your most productive hours can dramatically increase your job satisfaction and efficiency. We shared the insights from Sophie Lee Reiter of Culture Amp article , while Greg takes us back in time with a historical perspective, spotlighting Benjamin Franklin's timeless advice on the art of preparation. We'll also discuss Hiram W. Smith's Franklin Day Planner and how his values-driven seminars laid the groundwork for Stephen Covey's influential contributions.
Our episode doesn't stop at history; we dive into practical techniques guaranteed to enhance your productivity. From Parkinson's Law to the Getting Things Done method by David Allen, discover how these strategies can reshape your approach to work. Learn how Tony Robbins' Rapid Planning Method and the Pickle Jar Theory can help you prioritize like a pro. Plus, tackle your toughest tasks with the Eat That Frog technique. We also hash out the importance of teamwork and open communication in time management, sharing a personal story about charting management activities with a structured tool. Don't miss out on these insights that promise to redefine your approach to modern management.
Presented by John Wandolowski and Greg Powell
Hello everyone and welcome to Success Secrets and Stories. I'm your host, john Monoloski. I'm here with my co-host and friend, greg Powell. Greg, hey everybody. Greg Powell, greg, hey everybody.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so today we're going to be talking about a subject that I think is pretty interesting in terms of management, and it's time management. To give you a little bit of background, why is time management important? It's a very important skill. Sophie Lee Reiter from Culture Amp gave this interesting quote as a manager, you have a lot on your plate Between overseeing direct reports and attending meetings.
Speaker 2:You barely have time to work on deliverables, let alone address your personal and professional development. With all these competing demands, how do you perform the duties of a good manager while managing your own productivity and sustainability or your well-being? Effective time management can lead to increased productivity and efficiency. Very easy to say. Very hard to actually produce, hard to actually produce. So one of the keys is to prioritize the task and setting realistic delivery, realistic deadlines, that you can focus your energy on the most important and urgent tasks to accomplish them in a timely fashion. In this, you will increase your overall job satisfaction and you increase your productivity at the same time. Now an interesting concept in terms of time management is regarding the different priorities and scheduling and reminders and alerts and all the things that are coming to us every day in terms of a regular job.
Speaker 2:Typical time management tips for managers is to block off calendar time, like if you're going to go for lunch, then block off the time. Don't be surprised if people interfere with your lunch because you didn't block off the time. Identify the most productive working hours. Carve out time and space to decompress. Use the time. Identify the most productive working hours. Carve out time and space to decompress. Use the tools and, probably the most important element of it, ask for help when you're overwhelmed.
Speaker 2:More type of tips that are helpful is to set reminders for all your tasks, not the ones that you think are important, because there's nothing worse than being late for trying to get something done, especially a meeting. Create a daily planner. I remember I had a Palm Pilot and when they first came out and it was a godsend I was using the Franklin Planner long before the Palm Pilot, and these tips are really associated with that whole process of planning. Give each task a time limit. Don't have it as open-ended, block out distractions and establish a routine. Now, all these things are pretty common, but there's a place in time where they came from. Greg, maybe you can talk a little bit about the history of time management that is a little bit more relative to modern times.
Speaker 1:Thanks, john. As we do oftentimes on these podcasts is give you a history lesson, I'm going to talk a little bit about the Franklin planner phenomenon. Benjamin Franklin, that's right. He lived from 1706 to 1790. And he had a famous quote. He said by failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail. Very sage wisdom indeed. So this was back in 1726. Young Ben Franklin was returning from London to his home in Philadelphia. It was an 80-day voyage. During that journey he contemplated the direction he wanted to take his life. He wrote down his values, or virtues as he liked to call them, in a small black book that he carried with him, listing 13 virtues he wanted to develop. So I'm going to take you through some of those virtues, because I think they're really relevant to time management. One of them was silence. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself. Avoid trifling conversation.
Speaker 2:I love the terminology from that space and time, the 1700s. Yeah, so good luck.
Speaker 1:Thank you, john. Order, let all your things have their places. Let each part of your business have its time. Resolution Resolve to perform what you ought. Perform without fail what you resolve.
Speaker 1:Looking at the industry, lose no time. Be always employed in something useful. Cut off all unnecessary actions. One of my favorites moderation. Avoid extremes. Forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve. How about tranquility? Be not disturbed at strifefuls or at accidents, common or unavoidable.
Speaker 1:For the rest of his life, benjamin Franklin worked on one of those virtues every week, of those 13, making incremental improvements in his personal character. The results showed in his historic life, where he is now revered as a philosopher, inventor and statesman life, where he is now revered as a philosopher, inventor and statesman. So let's build that Franklin Planner story from Ben Franklin, a gentleman by the name of Hiram W Smith. He said there is no chance, no fate, no destiny that can circumvent or hinder or control the firm resolve of a determined soul. Right, that's what we're talking about time management. Now just a little bit on Hiram Smith.
Speaker 1:About two and a half centuries later from Ben Franklin and this was in 1981, hiram Smith read Benjamin Franklin's biography and he was struck by Franklin's impressive self-improvement and time management systems, and so he created some seminars to go around the United States and, I think, the world to help people with time management. And the goal of those seminars was simple Help clients identify what they really want to accomplish, do the right things for the right reasons and stay motivated until they completed their goal. Word of mouth spread and by 1983, smith teamed up with Dick Winwood, dennis Webb and Lynn Webb to form the Franklin Institute, and during this time Smith accepted every opportunity to speak, blocking more than four and a half years traveling around the world. Smith introduced the Franklin Day Planner in 1984, right Isn't that about a year before the Bears won the Super Bowl?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was history. Yes, we're talking history here.
Speaker 1:But he wanted to help his seminar participants put values-based time management into practice. And as time went on, the success of values-based planning helped the Franklin Institute grow into an international business. Now let's take it one more step. Somebody, I think we all know and love Stephen Covey. So Stephen said stop setting goals. Goals are pure fantasy unless you have a specific plan to achieve them.
Speaker 2:So Durs said if you don't have a goal, it's a wish. Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and that is so true. And so Mr Covey said a couple of things. He did a book I'm sure most of you have heard about the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, and he built his own professional training organization based on the landmark ideas of personal growth and professional cooperation. But in 1997, franklin Quest merged with Covey Leadership Institute to become the famous Franklin Covey. So, 290 years after Benjamin Franklin wrote his book about virtues and how to get them accomplished, and then, 30 years later, after the creation of Franklin Day Planner, the practice of value-based planning still changes a lot. And if you can remember put this in your mind's eye those famous green pages, the famous Franklin Planner pages, on the left side you put all your tasks for the day and you would list how important they were, and then calendar notice, there in the middle and on the right you take notes so that all that information was in one easy to find place, john.
Speaker 2:And it was kind of interesting.
Speaker 2:John, and it was kind of interesting. Again, sophie Lee from Culture Amp, on September 6th of 2024, had more to her text rather than just the opening. Her first comment was take an honest look at your workload, you know. Consider exactly what it is that you're trying to get done strategically. Address the workloads in terms of breaking it down or, more importantly, how you can delegate. Take an honest look at where the workload is and where the stress is coming from in order to try to get those projects done. Her second key was to block off time in the calendar, like I was mentioning, lunch or whenever you have a break to decompress, that you're putting those times in so that you can pull yourself back together and move forward or at least have some private time. It can fall into the trap of saying yes, and then you never have that time to yourself. You put in the whole day and then you're basically arguing with yourself that you're not planning your time.
Speaker 2:Her third idea was identifying the most productive working hours and, if you've never done this before, writing down what you do during the day to understand when you're most productive, like keeping a list alongside your desks and just. You're not going to do that every day, but you do it as a sample and you do it as an idea of when you do more work and when you're more effective, and sometimes you set aside time for productivity, time to socialize. All those things are kind of like planning and they all fall into the same suit. But for me, if I really want to try to get something productively done, it was 6 am to 11 am. I could affect more people, I could talk to more people and I would be able to go from. Actually, I had the position where I had to go to multiple locations. I would communicate what location I was going to be, at what time of the week or what time of the month so that they could be prepared when I was going to visit and review their activities.
Speaker 2:There's a point here you have to identify your most productive time and then use it accordingly. That whole thing about planning is really what Benjamin was talking about and I'm going to repeat again carving out time for yourself, building in breaks, and the humor they also found doing the planning side of it is you have to put in travel time, because sometimes people think you're actually going from meeting to meeting and you're going from building to building. You have to also include things like travel time, and it helps other people when they look at your schedule which, okay, welcome to 2024. People can see your schedule, so use the tools. Use the things that can help you in terms of technology. Zoom meetings and electronics are a valuable tool that helps you with time management. Reserve things for one-on-one meetings and if you're comfortable with electronics, great. Maybe those are the times where you make that extra effort to actually have one-on-ones. That would be my recommendation. But you can plan your tools and you can use the tools that are available and, most of all, ask for help.
Speaker 2:Sometimes, no matter how strong your management skills are, there's just too much to do. You need to understand, when you are in the organization, who you can help, who you can ask for help and how they can take some of the things off your plate. Be prepared for that conversation. If you're going to walk in and ask your boss for help, you want to be a little bit more specific so that they know what it is that you're trying to accomplish, so that when you don't walk out of the room saying I don't think he gets it. You never spelled it out. Spell it out. Help them to help you Probably one of the more important tips. Greg, I think you have a few other things to add to that idea of helping.
Speaker 1:I do indeed, John, Thank you. I've got nine types of time management techniques, tips, et cetera, whatever you would like to call them. I got a lot of this from the University of St Augustine for Health Sciences, and some of the folks that contributed to that information were Jennifer Allen about the 10 methods of time management at work, Daniel Tay, the 10 popular time management techniques, and Eric Johnson full Q&A. Tesla and SpaceX CEO, Elon Musk, on recode decode. So achieving work-life balance is possible when effective time management is in place. Learning time management tips will not only help you manage your time better, but also boost personal productivity. With that said, here are some time management strategies, tips, techniques that you can use, so let's talk about some of these tools. Now. Some of you, especially the engineers, have probably heard about the Pareto analysis right, the famous 80-20 rule.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man.
Speaker 1:Right. 80-20 rule is a technique created by an Italian economist by the name of Vilfredo Pareto. It's the idea that 20% of actions are responsible for 80% of outcomes, and the goal of Pareto analysis is to help you prioritize tasks that are most effective at solving problems. I can remember years ago I was in a sales position and we used to say the 80-20 rule for sure, that 80% of our profitable business came from 20% of our clients, and so, even though you might have those other counselors or nice folks to talk to and whatever, they weren't generating the big sales. So you have to put in that technique and that thought about what is the bang for the buck.
Speaker 1:The next technique is called Pomodoro technique. It was created by an entrepreneur and author, francesco Cirillo. This technique uses a timer to break down your work into intervals. Each interval is known as a pomodoro, named after the tomato-shaped timer that Mr Cirillo created. So again, a way of breaking things into bite-sized pieces. Remember the old joke about how do you eat an elephant? You dip them in chocolate and eat it in pieces, right?
Speaker 2:I'm just glad this guy didn't invent some clock that looked like a potato.
Speaker 1:Yes. So now there's something that's called the Eisenhower Matrix. So before Dwight Eisenhower became president in 1953, he served in the US Army as an Allied Forces commander during World War II. He was faced with difficult decisions all the time, every day. That led him to invent what is now called the Eisenhower Matrix, and it's that famous two-by-two box what's urgent, what's important and you come up with that model to help you decide what should you be working on now and what can wait till later. So not everything is both urgent and important. So you have to put some mental thinking into figuring out what that is, what those differences are. The next one's called Parkinson's Law. British historian Cyril Northcote Parkinson became famous for the phrase work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. Let me say that again. It's interesting. The phrase is work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. In other words, the amount of time you give yourself to complete a specific task is the amount of time it will take you to complete that task. Not illogical, right?
Speaker 2:That make some sense, oh yeah, yeah, I've also heard it that if you don't restrict the time, they'll just consume the time if you don't put a deadline on it. So that's forcing that concept of deadlines, yeah.
Speaker 1:That's right, john. The next one is called the time blocking method. So inventor Elon Musk is known for being very productive, right? He manages his time so efficiently that he can work over 80 hours a week and still make time for himself. What's his secret? Something John talked about earlier time blocking. Blocking out on your calendar because, like he said, everybody can see your calendar these days, whether it's a lunchtime or you need some quiet time or some creative energy or strategy time. You've got to make that time and get that cemented in your calendar.
Speaker 1:The next one's called getting things done GTD. This method was created by author David Allen. This process helps you get things done by recording tasks on paper and then breaking them down into actual work items, right, so it's kind of a, you know, divide things up and divide and conquer, but it helps for those that think that way there are folks that that's the best way for them to accomplish things Right. Rapid planning method RPM is another technique. It stands for rapid planning method or result purpose. It's a massive action plan. It was developed by motivational speaker Tony Robbins as a way to train your brain to focus on a vision of what you want to accomplish so you can make it real. All right, here's one of my favorite titles. Number eight is the pickle jar theory. This theory helps you figure out what's useful and what is not useful in your daily life. It allows you to plan tasks with time to spare and set priorities for your day.
Speaker 2:But the next one is my favorite.
Speaker 1:This is John's favorite Number nine eat that frog technique. So this technique is named after a Mark Twain quote Eat a live frog the first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day. Start your day by doing the most onerous tasks first and getting them out of the way. So we got a visual with this one, right? You could probably see this 8 am you're eating frog, right?
Speaker 2:Well, that's it. But I mean that kind of falls into for me from going through company and going through the planning process and going through MBR. They had the A, the B and the C priorities Right, everybody wanted to do the C priorities because you know there was that satisfaction. You did the easy ones but you did three of your priorities, or you did eight of your priorities today, none of them was an a priority. That was the eat the frog one. Okay, it's the hard one. It's the one that takes more of your effort, more of your resources, more of your time and it might not get done in a day. It might take you three days, four days to get that a priority off your list. A day it might take you three days, four days to get that a priority off your list. But the only way the a priority gets off your list here's a hint is you have to work on the a priority. So eat the frog, take, take, take the hard one, get the hard one out of the way.
Speaker 2:What I found is that I would. I would do my list and I would have a weekly list and anything that was a B priority turned into an A priority of the following week, but I had to have no A priorities that made it from week to week. If I could, if I get minimized or eliminated, that was my key to time management, and I used. I used these concepts throughout my career and are really critical in order to try to do multitasking working on different priorities at the same time, being able to possibly segregate or prioritize. I would do things like on a certain day I would do construction, another day I would do facilities work. There's many different ways to slice the pie. Have a plan, though. That's the key.
Speaker 1:All right.
Speaker 2:John. And then the other component of it is when I was in construction, I was responsible for $500 million worth of construction, but it wasn't me, it was my team and we all looked at the team priorities. We looked at the A priorities. We all talked about the same language. That's the other element of what we're talking about. The team should be able to see your activities, to see your plan at the same time, to understand that if it isn't on their calendar, it's going to be because you're expecting them to be able to communicate to you on those subjects. It's a wonderful way to keep them engaged with what you're trying to get done at the same time, and they have the ability to alter your schedule. That whole thing about open communication and that's how it kind of interacts. That whole thing about open communication and that's how it kind of interacts. Time management isn't just a one-way street.
Speaker 1:If you're listening, you know how to adapt, greg. Thanks, john. I got a story from maybe 10 years ago, maybe 12 years ago, about a time management activity. So my manager had his team use a tool that was designed to chart our management activities for one month, for 30 days, and it was based off the premise of a 40 hour week. We all know that we work more than 40 hours a week. Just a way to get a baseline, so this chart included weekly business meetings, strategy time, employee development and hopefully some personal development in there, team building exercises, reflection time, project time and, yes, the ever-famous firefighting time, because that's going to happen as well.
Speaker 1:So did our best to record all that for a month and we assumed that most of our time was spent on things like developing our people and prioritizing projects that would be more effective for the organization, those outcomes. But guess what? The analysis was definitely different than what we thought. So we took a hard look. You could do things like color code department meetings yellow and project time meeting red. Whatever.
Speaker 1:It turned out that we didn't spend the time on what we thought we spent time on. We all thought people development that's where we're spending our time. Mentoring, coaching, engaging team building. That's what we're doing. We're spending our time on that and, yes, task work. But what really we found out was we weren't prioritizing as well as we thought and our schedule quickly got filled up with unplanned low value, some of those things John's talking about that you just you know, they're easy to say, I got them done, but they don't provide you a lot of value and a lot of satisfaction and didn't really reflect what you thought your focus was on. So you have to be very deliberate about your time management practices, review the results and change course when needed. And, as engineers and others have said, that which gets measured gets done.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and the thing that I found when I was going through that whole keeping track of my time how many hours I was burning between accounting, purchasing and HR that actually pulled time away from my schedule and how effective they were and it drove other people's requirements. But only until you start documenting how much time that those kind of activities were pulling away from your core responsibilities did upper management start to understand how those things actually interacted and how they were affecting the organization. Especially in my case, in a three-year period we had four, I'm sorry, in a four-year period we had three different software systems for accounting. You're learning these processes over and over and over and none of it is really effective because you need time with any of these things to understand their nuances. So, yeah, understanding time management and understanding what those results mean really affect you as an individual and it really you can use it to be more an effective group, more of an effective organization.
Speaker 2:So, if you like what you've heard, yeah, my book Building your Leadership Toolbox Tools for Success is available on Amazoncom. Success Secrets and Stories podcast is available on what you're listening to, thank you. It's also available on popular podcast formats like Apple, google and Spotify To learn more about Dr Durst and his MBR program. It's on successgrowthacademycom. If you'd like to get a hold of Greg and I, you can get a hold of us on the website wwwauthorjawcom. And. The music is brought to you by my grandson, so we want to hear from you. Drop us a line, let us know how we're doing. Well, greg, it's been fun.
Speaker 1:Thanks, John, as always Next time.
Speaker 2:Yeah.