How one manages their spare time can reveal a lot about their success. Laura Vanderkam talked to a number of successful people (including productivity expert David Allen and the former CEO of Pepsi) and found out their secrets. Here’s how you can get lot accomplished during the week, feel less stressed and even have more fun on the weekend.
1. Do A Time Log
After interviewing so many successful people, all seemed obsessed with one question: What else could I do with that hour?
They plan their time, track their time and are always thinking about the opportunity cost of their time.
The first question you need to ask is, “Where is my time actually going?” Not where you think it’s going, where is it actually going?
This does not involve leaning back in your chair and guessing about what you vaguely remember doing.
After writing down what you do for every hour of the day, seeing clearly in black and white how you spend your time can be sobering. Or, in some cases, downright depressing. But it works.
You can’t trust your head when it comes to time; you need to be accountable for the hours that pass, whether or not you’re conscious of them.
There are other benefits to doing a time log. It helps you figure out how long things really take versus your optimistic underestimates.
“It’s just a matter of observation and saying “What is it that I repeatedly do in my life, and how long did it really take each of those times?” If that regular Monday 10 a.m. meeting is scheduled for an hour but it has never taken less than 90 minutes, then you need to be realistic and stop scheduling stuff for 11:00.”
The other benefit that comes from doing a time log is you can see the optimal windows for you to accomplish certain tasks.
If you are mentally sharper in the morning (like most people) then you can schedule the hardest tasks of the day for that time.
What’s the next step? You need a plan. And not some little one either.
In a study of CEO’s, it was asked what correlated with an increase in sales. Turns out it wasn’t how much time they had, but how much time had been planned out.
“Preliminary analysis from CEOs in India found that a firm’s sales increased as the CEO worked more hours. But more intriguingly, the correlation between CEO time use and output was driven entirely by hours spent in planned activities.”
Georgetown professor and super-organizer Cal Newport agrees: To-do lists aren’t enough. Things need to be assigned hours to really get done.
How do you create your plan? Think about two things: what are you good at and what makes you happy?
Successful people spend as much time as possible on their “core competency” and ignore, minimize or outsource everything else.1
They spend time on that thing they’re best at which produces meaningful results.
Writers need to be writing. Accountants need to be working with numbers. And everything else (like email and meetings) just gets in the way.
Laura also suggests creating a long list of things that bring you joy. Yes, you need to write them down.
Might sound silly but by having an actual list it’s easier to remember them and slot them into your schedule vs. waiting for serendipity.
So you’ve putting your plan together, but what’s another secret of successful people that delivers results over the long haul?
3. Morning Rituals
Morning rituals are for those things that are important but not urgent. That is, the stuff we know we should do, but keep putting off. These things don’t have a hard deadline and nobody will shout at us if they don’t happen.
“The best morning rituals are activities that don’t have to happen and certainly don’t have to happen at a specific hour. These are activities that require internal motivation… The best morning rituals are activities that, when practiced regularly, result in long-term benefits.”
Research shows we have more willpower in the morning.
One of the successful people Laura spoke to said: “Every day I have a job but in the morning, I think I have a career.”
Mornings are the time to make progress on those vital long term goals.
4. Plan The Weekends Too!
Here’s where people freak out: they don’t want to plan their free time. But if you’re serious about your leisure time, then take it seriously.
I’m not talking about planning work or chores. I’m talking about planning fun — as in making sure you have some.
How many weekends have blown by where you didn’t get off the couch and, frankly, it wasn’t all that memorable? Exactly.
Research shows we’re happier when we plan our free time and that “doing nothing” doesn’t make us happy.
More importantly, studies have shown that you often don’t do what makes you happiest — you do what is easy. So you need to plan if you want to have fun.
What’s a weekend plan look like? Nothing draconian. Laura says you just want 3-5 “anchor events” to make sure you’re having a good time.
“Just three to five anchor events can really make the difference between feeling that a weekend was spent well, and that a weekend merely happened. And these don’t have to be huge things. It could just be, “I’m going to go for a run on Saturday morning. I’m going to try get together with this friend on Saturday evening. I’m going to go to church on Sunday morning.”
Looking to be happier? By planning fun stuff ahead of time you get to anticipate it. And research shows anticipation makes us very happy.
Best part is even if you don’t follow through and do the anchor event, you already got the anticipatory happiness. Happiness and laziness!
“One study by several Dutch researchers, published in the journal Applied Research in Quality of Life in 2010, found that vacationers were happier than people who didn’t take holiday trips. That finding is hardly surprising. What is surprising is the timing of the happiness boost… The happiness boost came before the trips, stretching out for as much as two months beforehand as the holiday goers imagined their excursions.”
Weekend fun is locked in. What’s the most vital part of insuring you’re ready for the work week to start again?
5. How To Conquer The Sunday Night Blues
You know the weekend is over and tomorrow it’s back to work. Instead of being filled with dread, plan something awesome for Sunday night!
“Even people who like their jobs can succumb to this: “Oh god, the weekend’s over!” One way around that is planning something low-key but enjoyable for Sunday night — anything you can look forward to Sunday afternoon instead of thinking about Monday morning.”
Research shows Sunday is the saddest day of the week. Plan something fun ahead of time so that doesn’t have to be the case!
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Written by Peter Rodgers
Tuesday, 23 September 2014
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