“Everything requires time. It is the only truly universal condition.”
Peter F. Drucker
Time is the most valuable resource we have, and I am very good at telling myself little stories about why I am using it well.
Some excuses are just stories with better branding.
Some of those stories are useful for a while. Some are just excuses with better branding. These are a few time management lies I have caught myself believing, and still have to watch for.
Lie #1 I Have Time To Do Everything
Fact: There isn’t enough time in the day to do everything.
No matter how much we finish today, no matter how productive or efficient we are – we can only accomplish a limited amount of things and have a limited number of experiences every day.
Rather than trying to go in a million different directions every day, it’s better to pick a reasonable number of things we can do well – and enjoy.
Lie #2 This Will Just Take a Minute
Fact: Nothing ever takes just a minute….
And even if it does, I’ve seen estimates that say an interruption can cost you anywhere from fifteen to forty five minutes.
One lie we tell ourselves every day is how we can squeeze little things in here and there because they’ll take “just a minute”
Lie #3 It’s Faster/Better If I Just Do It Myself
Fact: This is almost always a lie. Properly trained, an assistant can be more effective at a specific task than you ever were. Even more important though, is it’s not about today: even if you are better than your assistant today, you may spend only a few hours a week on certain tasks.
Suppose you hire somebody part time, like someone to handle your accounting, and they might be honing that same skill for forty to sixty hours a week – with your tasks only a small part of their overall work. They will absolutely outperform you in that skill in the long run, if they don’t already.
Lie #4 I Just Don’t Have Time
Fact: We all have the same amount of time.
When you don’t have time to do something, it’s usually a problem of
- Over committing (having too many things on your plate)
- Wasting too much time.
Instead of saying “I don’t have time” – try saying “it’s just not a priority” – because that’s the truth. As Gandhi said: Action express priorities.
Lie #5 I Just Need To Find The Right System
Fact: No time management/productivity system will be able to give you infinite time every day if the problem is ineffective follow through on tasks, or simply having way too much on your plate.
Of course, if you have a productivity system that’s not working for you, but that you’re still spending time maintaining – that’s going to cause more time management problems than it solves.
Really, ultimately I don’t think it’s about the system – it’s about habits that encourage productivity.
Lie #6 I Can Manage Time
Fact: This is the biggest time management lie of them all.
The truth is, we can’t manage time – we can only manage our own use of it and how we spend it.
We cannot manage, save or otherwise control time.
As Stephen Covey put it:
“Time management’ is really a misnomer – the challenge is not to manage time, but to manage ourselves. The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities. “
Start With What You Can Control
I do not think the answer is to squeeze more out of every hour. The better answer, at least for me, is to be more honest about what matters, choose deliberately, and stop treating every interruption as if it deserves equal weight.