Time Management

Principles

Pareto Principle
Nine-tenths of wisdom consists in being wise with time.
Theodore Roosevelt

80% of the outputs result from 20% of the

inputs
80% of the results come from 20% of the
effort and time
Which 20% of sources are resulting in 80% of
my desired outcomes?

Parkinsons Law
A task will swell in (perceived) importance
and complexity in relation to the time
allotted for its completion. Work expands to
meet the time allotted.
Since we have 8 hours to fill, we fill 8 hours.
If we had 15, we would fill 15. If we have
an emergency and need to suddenly leave
work in 2 hours but have pending deadlines,
we miraculously complete those assignments
in 2 hours.

Effective vs. Efficient

Effectiveness is doing the things that get you
closer to your goals.
Efficiency is performing a given task
(whether important of not) in the most
economical manner possible.
Being efficient without regard to
effectiveness is the default mode of the
universe.

Doing something unimportant well does not

make it important.
Requiring a lot of time does not make a task
important.
What you do is infinitely more important
than how you do it.
Focus on the few things that produce the
most benefit (80/20 items).

Urgent vs. Important

Emergencies are seldom that. People are poor
judges of importance and inflate minutiae to
fill time and feel important.
We have a tendency to spend more time on
urgent matters (firefighting, crisis, emails,
returning phone calls) vs. investing time in
important matters (planning, prevention,
relationship building).
If we are not careful we can waste entire days
being reactive to incoming calls, meetings and
emails.

Activity vs. Results

Being busy is often a form of lazinesslazy
thinking and indiscriminate action.
Most things people work on make no difference.
Respect results with the least possible effort.
Never substitute effort for accomplishment.
There is no necessary correlation between how
busy you are and how productive you are.
Being busy isnt the same as being productive.
Dont tell me how busy you aretell me what you
get done.

Pay vs. Non-pay activities

The overwhelming majority of our day should
be focused on pay-activities.
Guard your time militantly; every minute of
the day is potential for growing your
business/income
Non-pay activities: internal meetings,
internal emails, internal reports, wasting
time on the Internet, talking with low
potential brokers.

Pay activities: prospecting, phone or face to

face meetings with high potential brokers,
solving problems for high potential brokers.
Business owner mentality: if you were the
owner of this business how would you invest
your time this week?

Value-based Time Management

What are the 3 things that mean the most to
you in life?
Now next to each write down the amount of
time you spend on it each week.
Does our weekly time investment line up with
the things that matter most to us?
No amount of success at work can make up
for failure at home.

Focus
Dont allow your time to get eaten up with
responsibilities and projects that call for skills that fall
outside your core competencies. That is a recipe for
mediocrity.
Narrow your focus to increase your productivity and
expand your influence within your organization.
Identify the areas in which you are most likely to add
unique value to your organizationthen leverage your
skills to their absolute max.
Work only on things that make a great deal of difference
if you succeed.

Good is the Enemy of Great

Everything is a trade off. Doing one thing
means you can't do another.
Most of our time is spent on good things but
not necessarily the best things. The good
things in life are often the enemy of the
best things in life.

Most time choices arent necessarily between

good or bad but between good, better, best.
Invest as much time in making stop doing lists
as you do in making to do lists.
Great Question: In light of my past
experiences, my current responsibilities,
and my future goals, what is the wisest way
to invest my time?

Cumulative Value of Time

Investing small amounts of time over a long
period is similar to compounding interest
What you do every day matters more than
what you do once in a while
Life is a series of daily habits
Neglect has a cumulative effect

There is no cumulative value to the urgent

things that we allow to interfere with the
important things
Examples; exercising just 30 mins/day, eating
right, investing in relationships, reading
everyday

Loose Change Time

Successful people use small bits of time
better than the less successful.
Examples; leaving meetings first, listening to
podcasts while exercising, listening to books
on CD in the car, reading vs. TV, writing
down ideas when they come to you.

Business Owner Mentality

Self-employed mentality: the business owns
you; immersed in the minutiaecontrol freak.
Business owner mentality: you develop
delegation systems so that the business runs
itself.
Remove yourself as an information/decision
making bottleneck and empower others.

Ideas for increasing your effectiveness

1.The night before work or first thing in the
morning develop a list of 3-5 things that are
the highest possible priorities relative to the
greatest impact on your goals. This requires
critical thinking at a macro-levelthink big
picture.
2.Only check email a couple times per day. Email is the biggest time suck of our day.

3.Avoid time wasters; I have a meeting in 5

minutes, how can I help you?4.What are the
20% of your efforts that are yielding 80% of
your results?
Create a stop doing list with the efforts that
are not paying off.
Invest as much time in making stop doing lists
as you do in making to do lists

5.Delegate everything that can be delegated,

empower others to gain leverage.
6.Carefully qualify each prospect or account
and make sure they have enough potential
for you to invest your time in. Dont waste
time on unqualified or low potential
accounts. If you find yourself on a call with
a low potential or unqualified account, find
a way to get off the call quickly.

Questions to Ask Yourself...

...at least 3 times per day
Am I being productive or just active?
Am I inventing things to do to avoid the
important?
If this is the only thing I accomplish today,
will I be satisfied with my day?
The Law of Diminishing Intent: Time kills all
good ideas that are not acted upon quickly.