Time To Manage Your Purpose

Time is a great luxury and equalizer of people. King Solomon, although not exactly writing about time management, takes this concept a further with his words, “there is a time, or season, for everything in life” (Ecclesiastes 3:1). But many leaders I know seem to never have enough time. In fact, time-management or personal efficiency is a perennial top three consulting request here at HLA. Since it comes up so often, I thought I would share some of my experience with the topic.

Let’s begin with interviewing as many of you are in the midst of some hiring event. Everyone wants to hire self-motivated, organized, and efficient people, correct? And since these personal characteristics apply to just about any type of position, questions on time management and personal productivity are part of my standard first-round interview. One of these go-to questions is worded something like this:  “Being able to stay organized and manage your schedule is a given in the workforce today. Can you share with me some of your own personal tips for staying productive and using your time effectively?” When the interviewee answers the question, I evaluate it on a one to five scale with the following anchors.

1 – No real system. Keeps everything in his/her head. States, “I’m really organized/efficient” without providing examples. “I just go with the flow,” responding to what comes up or “I just do what my boss tells me to do.”

3 – Average system of personal management. Uses some calendar or organizing method. States, “everything is in my phone.” Mentions list-making or Post-it notes with an average amount of detail.  Demonstrates how he/she uses Outlook, Trello, or personal list system without prompting.

5- Focus on priority and involving others. Includes personal management examples at the 3 level above, plus emphasizes need to begin with prioritization or purpose.  Provides example of doing the right things instead of just transactions completed. States, “I figure out if I should do this or would it better if someone else did it.”  Clear evidence of a strategy and focus to personal productivity.

In addition to being helpful in evaluating the job candidate, a side benefit of asking this question is often I’ll hear something new or be reminded of a personal management practice that I should renew. Proof again that interviewing others is a great way to learn!

How I score this question reveals my own approach to time management and productivity. It’s not about the transaction of keeping organized or on top of things – it’s about working on things that matter and involving others at the right level. Let’s look at three P’s of personal productivity and then we’ll move on to discuss some methods and how to involve others.

Purpose – knowing your purpose and/or the mission of your organization helps everything else fall in place. Do you have a purpose statement for yourself and your family? When did your company last review its mission?  What is your vision for your future? These aren’t academic, consultant-revenue-generating questions. These are important life-focusing questions. Working though them and developing realistic answers can be challenging but they provide a return and personal reinforcement each day. Over the past year, I’ve refined my own purpose quite a bit. My most concise purpose statement is: “to assess, support, and develop leaders and their organizations.” This is a plumb line for me personally as I use this statement to determine where I invest my time and which projects to accept and which to pass along to someone else. It provides focus to what I read and who I interact with daily and in the long-term.

Plan – you’ve likely heard the quote attributed to Dwight Eisenhower, “Plans mean nothing. Planning means everything.”  As someone who worked in corporate Human Resources for many years, I think I know what this means. Plan for the week in perfect order on Monday, but the first phone call of the day rearranges that order. Plan on how to implement new overtime regulations but have them stalled via court injunction at the eleventh hour. I’m certain that’s true in most professions, not just HR – only the examples and projects change! But the discipline of planning, of thinking things through, committing to paper (or digitizing) and interacting/talking with others is always time well spent. And, you may simply take this week’s plan and move it into next week if your priorities get changed.

Priority – flows from purpose but interacts with the plan. In an ideal world, priorities are always driven by your purpose, but that’s an overly-extreme requirement. Other people, like bosses, spouses, and children shape our priorities. Yes, it is acceptable that sometimes our sole priority is to satisfy our boss, spouse, or someone else important in our life! Often, allowing others to shape our priorities is helpful in the long-run, but in the short-term we see this as an intrusion or interruption. The challenge is we don’t know the long-run when we’re in the moment! Conventional wisdom tells us that nothing gets done without focus or ruthless prioritization. And that’s correct to a large extent and certainly a viable approach when launching a website, completing a project, or juggling the many tasks which face us each day.  Prioritization becomes fuzzier when you are trying to grow a leader or build relationships. Again, priorities must always be plumbed against your purpose, and respectful and reactive to the environment (which includes, boss, spouse, other relationships).

Systems and Methods – I’m always looking for new techniques and systems but I realize they aren’t likely to be life altering or significantly boost my productivity because they are just tools which support the purpose and manage the priorities and plans. But tools are necessary! I’ve used a number of tools that were extremely helpful. The Post-it note is a tool but is it the best tool for productivity management? Probably not as we’ve all seen that guy/gal in the office who runs their life with Post-it notes stuck on their monitor, workspace, and steering wheel. It might be the appropriate tool to bookmark a section in a book or dash off a love note to your significant other, but it’s really not a system to plan a project, your week, or formalize your purpose.

The first real system of personal productivity that many of were exposed to was the Franklin Covey approach which appeared in the mid-1990’s. I taught those classes for a while and they were truly impactful for many. Not because of my teaching style or all the different sizes and colors of paper, but because they used a system based on priority and purpose. For many leaders, it was the first time they were exposed to that level of thinking. Figuring out a purpose and mission in life; using an A, B, C system to set priorities for the day. This was a tremendous improvement over paper calendars and list making.

I’ll gloss over my experience with Palm Pilots and other digital organizers and simply comment they are tools and methods which were popular and useful for a while, but technology and fads march on. It’s important to be flexible enough to adapt, pick out the good stuff, and abandon the old when something better comes along. Also, having a methodology is an individualized decision, which means what works for me may not work for you, partially as a function of the type of work we do but more importantly, based upon who we are and how we think.  Maybe the Post-it system does have merit for some people!

I know people who absolutely love Trello, but it just doesn’t work for me and the type of work I do. But I encourage all of my friends to keep trying to convince me otherwise and introduce me to new methods! Currently, I prefer, Getting Things Done (GTD), perhaps because I like flowcharts and the nomenclature used. The GTD approach was developed by David Allen in 2001, and like everything else, there are myriad books and apps available if you’d like to try that approach.

But whatever system or approach you use, it pays to be intentional, focused, and it must align with your purpose. The final observation I have to share on this topic is the need to involve others in your personal productivity. Yes, it sounds a bit like an oxymoron but you won’t be productive as an individual unless you consider the involvement of others in this process. Delegation, as described in the 5-point answer is part of this process. Should you give this task to someone else? At the lowest level this is a good management practice. Delegate to others so your time can be invested to higher-level tasks. The next level is to delegate in order to train or develop that person, which is a primary role for you as a leader – to replicate and improve upon yourself. But taking this concept a bit farther, what if you truly engaged with others to help determine what you should be doing and what they should be doing in order to fulfill both individual and group purpose? That’s collaboration and community and it may take you a bit outside of your comfort zone but I believe it has the highest potential of benefiting you and those with whom you interact.

Let’s wrap up with this challenge – are you courageous enough to audit your time, that is to peek at your calendar, or whatever and truly figure out where you spent the last 90 days? This is a practice I do with just about every consulting client at some point in our relationship. It’s also something I personally do each quarter, just to ensure my time spend is plumb with my purpose. Sometimes it’s like pulling the Band-Aid off; it can definitely be unpleasant. But I guarantee you’ll “find some time” through this practice, but my real hope is that it will help you better determine your priorities and purpose.