Timestamps

00:00:00: Introduction

00:00:57: Idea for action 1: highest return on time

00:02:48: Idea for action 2: close your open loops

00:04:21: Expert insights

00:06:22: Final thoughts

Interview Transcription

Helen Tupper: Welcome to day 1 of the Squiggly Careers Skills Sprint. 

And in this episode, we're going to be talking about the skill of time management.

Sarah Ellis: And we all spend a lot of time at work, so it's relatively obvious why this one feels important.  But I also feel like it's one of those areas where maybe, there's a bit of pressure to always get better at it.  You know when you read those profiles of people of how they spend their time, and they always seem to be up at, like, 4.30am, 5.00am, then they've run 10k, and then they've read a book, all before breakfast, and they eat a really healthy breakfast. 

And I'm just clambering out of bed just going, "I can't even think straight".  So, I think everyone does this in their own way, but also I think we give ourselves a hard time that we're not spending our time well, we need to optimise more. So, I do think you have to find an approach to time management that works for you.  And I think it's fair to say that Helen and I's approach to time management is relatively different, so hopefully there'll be something for everyone in today's episode.  So, Helen, what's your idea for action?

Helen Tupper: So, the way that I find most effective for me to manage my time is to think about the highest return on my time.  So, what I recognise is that I can't create more time, you know that whole, "You can't get more hours in a day, you can't get more days in the week", so you're working with a finite amount of time.  But I think the variable is that there are some hours in your day that have a higher return, because you probably have more energy, you're more effective in those moments. 

So, if I think for me, the highest return for me on my time, when I get the most out of an hour spent on something, is in the morning because I'm much more mentally present in the morning, I think, before the day distracts me a little bit; and also, earlier in the week.  I feel like distractions accumulate in my brain.  So, by Friday morning, I'm a bit of a like, "Oh, this and this, I've got too much to do".  On a Monday or a Tuesday morning, I've got that clarity.  And so, if I spend an hour or two working on something important on a Monday or Tuesday morning, I get way more out of that hour than I would if I spent an hour on that piece of work on a Friday afternoon, for example. So, it's really about understanding which hours in your working week do you get the highest return on that time, and then the skill I think is matching the work to that window, and that's where you'll have a bigger impact, get a better output from the time.  So, that's what I do.  It's quite analytical really in terms of thinking about your time.  Would you be a Monday morning, Sarah, a Tuesday morning; is that your optimum hour?

Sarah Ellis: Absolutely not!  I'm definitely a slow starter, like slow to start the week.  I don't like starting early in the day.  End of day, early evening is always a good time for me.  And I think I gain energy as the week goes on.  So, that's always interesting because I feel like you and I are very good at different moments.  So, maybe we're a good team, or perhaps we clash -- Helen Tupper: I think we're a good team.

Sarah Ellis: -- depending on how you want to think about it.  So, my idea for action is to close your open loops.  So, this is an idea that was introduced to me by David Allen who wrote Getting Things Done.  And he says that, "Our brains are for having ideas, not for holding them", and I really recognise that challenge of, if you are holding lots of actions or unresolved or unfinished things in your head, you often spend your time worrying about those like, "Where are they; have I made progress on them?" and almost you're splitting your time and your attention in too many different directions, and also not giving your brain the opportunity to do its best work.  So, closing those open loops looks like putting those unfinished things all in the same place.  What's appealing is, you don't actually have to finish the things.  What's important really is just making sure that they are captured, so that then you've got them in one place and then you can think, "What do I need to do in what order; or, what does it look like to make progress?"

  But you're just giving yourself the chance to spend your time in the best way. I've been doing that probably for about six weeks now, so it's quite a new thing for me, and it has made a really big difference to how I feel in a day about the time that I've got, and to whether I feel like I'm spending my time well.  I think I feel more confident I'm spending my time on the right things in the right order, and I feel less worried generally about time management, because I feel like I've got a better process.  And I'm not a super-process-y person, so closing those open loops has really worked for me.

Helen Tupper: It makes me think about, effective time management is both a, you kind of need a process, but it's also the emotions that you attach to it.  I sometimes feel like when we get stressed or we're holding too much in our head, you end up telling yourself a story about, "I'm not working well with my time".  But actually having the clarity, like for you, closing the open loops, and for me just matching it, you suddenly feel a bit more in control and that emotional stuff goes away a little bit.

Sarah Ellis: So, our expert insights here are two quite different people.  So, do you want to talk about Laura first?

Helen Tupper: Yes.  So, sticking with the theme of efficiency and parity --

Sarah Ellis: Efficiency, yeah.

Helen Tupper: -- a really good book that I would recommend is by somebody called Laura Vanderkam.  It's 168 Hours is the book, and it's where she goes a bit more in-depth in this idea of time almost like a currency, and how you spend it, and how you invest it, and where you get the best return.  So, I'd highly recommend that.  I read it a while ago and found it really useful.

Sarah Ellis: And my expert is Oliver Burkeman.  So, he wrote Four Thousand Weeks: Time and How to Spend It, and it is a much more zoomed-out approach to time and time management.  So, I think if you are more in the space of thinking, "I want to re-evaluate, I want to redefine what time and how I spend my time, what does that look like for me", I think it is a brilliant place to start.  I think he will challenge you, he will make you really consider what matters to you in terms of how you spend your time.  And there is a great quote from him that I wanted to read out where he says, "The real measure of any time-management technique is whether it helps you neglect the right things.  What you say no to and what you don't do is probably more important than what you say yes to".

Helen Tupper: I like it.

Sarah Ellis: I do.  It's a good quote.

Helen Tupper: It's a good quote.

Sarah Ellis: And Oliver's writing generally on time and productivity is always really useful, because also I think he approaches it with a -- he's naturally quite attracted to productivity techniques, but he's also quite philosophical.  So, I think he almost has a tension that he's trying to resolve through trying these things out.

Helen Tupper: It's so, you, this mixture of psychology and then practical!  So, that is the end of the first day of the Squiggly Career Skills Sprint.  We'll be back with you tomorrow for day number 2.