Bob Goldman
You’ve decided that improving your time-management skills is essential to reducing your stress, boosting your career and retaining what’s left of your emotional health.
Well, I’ve got news — you blew it!
Simply by reading this column you’ve proved that you have no idea of what a good use of your time is, but since you’ve gotten this far, you might as well continue. It’s a fairly benign time sink and much less likely to get you in trouble than if you actually did some work.
The issue of time management came to me when I was wasting quality time, reading an article on fastcompany.com by time-management expert Greg Smith, who promised to reveal “five tips to take back control of your time.”
Personally, I have always based my time-management philosophy on what I learned at Harvard Business School, or what I would have learned if I had gone to Harvard Business School, which I don’t think I did. You can get pretty far in business by following the maxim, “Don’t do what you can do today if you can put it off until tomorrow.” Agree? (“Work smarter, not harder” is another popular saying around the Harvard Yard, but it makes no sense. If you were to really work smarter, you wouldn’t do any work at all.)
The five tips follow, along with some slightly subversive commentary from me. Listen to my advice and you’re sure to be fired, something of a drag, I admit, but it is an outcome which will definitely give you plenty of time to work on your time-management skills.
No. 1: Be less responsive.
If you want to take control of your time, tell your manager and your co-workers to adjust their expectations. However puny, these expectations must be reduced below the sea-slug level of responsiveness to which they’ve become accustomed.
With technology working against you in this regard, the key is to let the people you work with know that “you aren’t always available.”
That’s right! You won’t be instantly replying to every email and promptly returning every phone call. For Smith, the key to implementing this new regime “means checking my messages only once a day.”
To make to this time-management tip even more powerful, I suggest you let everyone know that day is Nov. 15. Nothing ever happens on Nov. 15, not since the birthday of William Pitt the Elder in 1708, anyway, and his time-management skills were terrible.
If you experience pushback from managers and co-workers who mistakenly believe you have something to offer when disaster looms, tell them to cool their jets. By delaying your response, the crisis will eventually resolve itself, which is something not remotely possible when you involve yourself in finding a solution.
No. 2: If it matters to you, schedule it.
Stop thinking of your calendar as an “infinite to-do list.”
Instead of blindly letting the demands of imperious managers and demented co-workers fill your calendar with endless meetings and arbitrary deadlines, fill it up first with your priorities.
Makes sense. What national sales meeting could be more important than the start date of the new season of “Duck Dynasty”? What annual performance review could more affect your life than the resurfacing of Audra’s secret past with Holden on “The Young & the Restless”?
Once your calendar is filled with your essential dates, open up what is left to “important” work obligations, if you can find the time.
No. 3: Build in buffer time.
Everyone loves buffer time. That’s the time you allocate to scheduling nothing, so when you absolutely have to do something, you’ll have time to do it. Time-management expert Smith recommends setting aside up to 50 percent of your calendar for buffering. This seems reasonable to me, as long as you also earmark an additional 30 percent for not doing much and 20 percent for not doing anything at all.
No. 4: Work with a time coach.
Or use the money to buy a giant economy-size package of Ozempic or for a down payment on that genioplasty you’ve always wanted. You won’t improve your time-management skills, but you’ll look so good no one will care.
No. 5: Just say “no” more often.
It’s hard to stop being a people-pleaser, especially when the people you want to please pay your salary. Follow the “Just Say No” route and you will get little done, but what you do accomplish will be absolutely perfect, or, at least, pretty good, which can only be an improvement.
If you doubt me, ask William Pitt the Elder.
Bob Goldman was an advertising executive at a Fortune 500 company. He offers a virtual shoulder to cry on at bob@bgplanning.com.
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