Maybe you’re like this – I definitely am. One of the most common “issues” for people is not having the time to get everything done. If you talk about this, you’ll find that people think that if they had “more time,” like more hours, during the day, that would solve their problem, but I just don’t believe that’s true and here’s why:

At this point I have surveyed thousands of folks asking them how much “high productivity” time they send during an average work day – high productivity being time when they are increasing the value of their businesses. The answers average about two and one-half hours, and this despite how much time they actually work. In other words, this same 150 minutes holds true for an seven-hour day or a twelve hour one.

Part II

So this critical idea got everyone’s attention, and a bit later in the presentation another participant wanted to know something very important. “Since,” he said, “we’re all hard working and pretty lazy at the same time, what does it take to make this kind of change and to make it last?”

My answer is simple. You’ve got to have a big goals and an inspiring vision if you want any kind of meaningful change. Otherwise, why bother?

Part I

Yesterday I was speaking at one of our 37 Fatal Business Mistakes workshops.  I was talking about the kinds of changes a business owner needs to make if he or she wants to quickly speed up their business’ growth.   One of the most powerful recommendations I make is that you to figure out where you are continually spending your time, and lump those activities into things that make a big difference, and things that don’t.

If you shift your time and focus from one group to the other, the results will be huge.  For instance,  one CEO (we’ll call her Dana) told me that she spent about 8 hours a week out of 55 on accounting and payables issues.  Of course there is no excuse for this, but since recognition is the first step on the road to recovery,  knowing where the time goes can be very good thing.  I asked what she would do with the 8 hours if she freed herself from “payables.” 

I just read this following passage in Gary Kasparov’s new book, “How Life Imitates Chess.” He has been writing about the phase of a chess game called “nothing to do,” and how greats such as Petrosian and Karpov used this time to eke out small positional advantages.

“In life, there is no such obligation to move. If you can’t find a useful plan, you can watch television, stick with business as usual, and believe that no news is good news. Human beings are brilliantly creative at finding ways to pass time in unconstructive ways. At these times, the true strategist shines by finding the means to make progress, to strengthen his position and prepare for the inevitable conflict. And conflict, we cannot forget, is inevitable.”

It’s been a very distracting few weeks, and I keep telling myself that I have to post, otherwise the blog might get stale. Perhaps it’s a time management problem, but of course, that can be fixed. Perhaps business is just too good, and I certainly don’t want a fix for that!

In any case, I was reading Jerry West writing about… what else, blogs…

He referenced something that I feel should be pasted backwards on my forehead so that I can see it every time I look in a mirror. It’s an old Chinese proverb:

Since the publication of Be Unreasonable, my consulting and speaking activities have multiplied dramatically.  While I didn’t have a ton of “free time” before the book came out, I seem to have less and less at an increasing rate.  This is not a complaint, just an observation.  I’m finding that my time is at a premium, and my goal is to use it as effectively as possible. I wrote a while ago that “time management” was a myth, and that you couldn’t really manage time per se.  I still agree with this.  But without a doubt you can have a great effect by choosing what you do with the limited time available. 

I just had a fast lunch at Panda Express (you know, you can substitute steamed vegetables for rice or lo mien, making this almost healthful). At the end, I cracked open my fortune cookie which said:

Counting Time Is Not So Important As Making Time Count.

I had to re-read it a few times to be sure, but I find it profound. Perhaps not the first part, but Making Time Count. That’s my new time management mantra.  Make sure that the time I have available, whether it’s 4 hours a week or 60,  is well used and never squandered.

How many times have you said, “This (fill in the blank) still isn’t perfect…?”

I’m not guiltless – I find myself saying such things and try to stop myself in mid-sentence before the P-word gets out. I find that perfectionitis — as it’s called in the medical profession — is the number one impediment to my writing. I don’t mind speaking “imperfectly” but I struggle with publishing words that aren’t perf…. Argggghhhh, I can’t say it. P-P-P…

It doesn’t just slow writing, but marketing, product development, seminars, new ideas — it slows down everything.  Dedicated perfectionists would say that’s a good thing.  I say it slows down progress.

To say that time management is a huge problem could be understatement of the century. Except for Tim Ferris, the author of The Four Hour Workweek, I don’t know anyone who feels they have enough time for everything they’re supposed to do. Full disclosure: neither do I – expanding Axcelus (our international business acceleration consulting company) definitely takes a ton of time. But that’s the key word — supposed. The ultimate secret to time management is this: only do things you want to do, and only do things you are pretty sure will help you accomplish whatever it is your care about.