Prioritizing Time the Polymath Way
Let's get started. My goal today is to focus on prioritizing time effectively. I think that where most people make the biggest mistakes and time management is simply not having a time prioritization plan to begin with. My premise is that 80% of the impact from allocating your time will come from focusing outward in the following ways:
Production - taking action towards important goals
Cultivating relationships
Serving the world by helping others
This is where you focus on the what, who, where, and when to create impact.
The other 20% of the impact will come from investing in yourself by focusing inward in the following ways:
Investing in your dreams
Keeping your personal gas tank full
Identifying and strategizing around growth opportunities
Mitigating any identified risks
This is where you focus on the how and the why around creating impact.
There is a challenge that I want to warn you about when trying to optimize time or anything else: The major focus areas tend to go from 80% to 100% of your time if left unchecked. The 20% investment areas trend towards 0% over time.
The result if you are productive is usually burnout: you run out of gas in your personal gas tank and your contributions become diminished as you operate on fumes.
To execute against this priority every week, I sit down every Sunday and allocate every single hour of my week. I do this for the following reasons:
The ‘inside’ investments are vital to consistent performance - so I make sure to block out specific time to meet my 20% investment goal
The best methods of maximizing energy are sleeping 8 hours a day and eating the proper food; so I make that a priority so that I don’t defeat my own efforts unintentionally
The rest of the time is allocated for ‘outside’ investments; most importantly, when new opportunities arise that are important (and they will), the trade off will be clear and i can make an educated decision as well as reset expectations with others quickly when needed
In order for this to have maximum effect, you have to make clear decisions about what you want to do and rank order them. Let me give you an example from personal experience:
Every week has 168 hours (24 hours a day times 7 days per week)
8 hours of daily sleep consumes 56 hours - so 112 hours left
I allocate 3 hours a day for refueling (exercise and eating); 21 hours total; 91 hours left
I allocate 11 hours as wild card time - both to account for unknowns and to get to a round number of 80 hours left
That leaves the following investment plan:
64 hours for outside work
16 hours for inside work
Outside work
30 hours for serving existing clients
20 hours building relationships
10 hours meeting new people
10 hours for family and friends
10 hours creating new content (articles, videos, social media, etc.)
4 hours helping those in need
Inside work
4 hours in taking my online course of the week to learn
4 hours playing online poker (it’s what i like to do for fun)
8 hours dedicated to unidentified inside work (you never know when you just need a break or have to read a book or something)
I think that’s a pretty good plan - and all plans are pretty good until life punches you in the mouth. So I have a rank order of what I am willing to postpone in case better investment opportunities come up. So here is my order for this week (it changes every week):
10 hours of serving existing clients
2 hours of playing online poker
4 hours of meeting new people
3 hours on unidentified inside work
1 hour of creating new content
1 hour of online coursework
3 hours of unidentified inside work
1 hour of online poker
2 hours of service
3 hours of family and friends
5 hours of serving existing clients
3 hours of creating new content
4 hours of meeting new people
That allows me to restructure 50% of my time if absolutely needed. That is normally enough of a back up plan. I get real specific early in the week so I don’t have to think about it later.
At this point, I create blocks on my calendar and I color code the block that I am willing to sacrifice and the blocks that I am not (blue for keep, red for sacrifice if you were curious). My goal here is to know what times everyday are flexible versus rigid.
I’m sure many of you think this is overkill. This time management process has been a game changer for me, even when I don’t execute perfectly. Have an open mind and try it out, hopefully it will bring you some peace of mind, focus, and structure.