See Time in a Useful Way

by Bill Flury

You should really meet Anne. Anne is someone who used to think that a 24-hour day was too short. She never seemed to be able to get done all the things she had to do or should have been doing within the time available. She worked hard and long, ate at her desk while she worked and slept less than Mom always told her she should. Even with all that, she still couldn’t get everything done.

Anne did get a lot done but there were some important things she should have been doing to build her business that she never seemed to be able to get to. She needed to find a way to squeeze those things into her day. In her story you will see how she solved her problem by finding a way to see and seize the snippets of time she needed. You might want to do the same.

See Anne See and Seize Snippets of Time

Anne is a real estate agent who specializes in commercial sales. She learned her business by watching other agents. She was mentored by one of the older ones through the first several months. She did well but always felt rushed and always had a hard time fitting all the phone calls she had to make into her day. With the phone calls as a priority, she often had to work late to get all her other work done.

When we first talked, Anne said she desperately wanted to find a way to make better use of her time. She had been thinking about what she was doing and it was all sort of a blur. She was always busy (e.g., meetings, paperwork, calls, conferences) and she wasn’t able to see any “empty” moments. Anne felt that if she could find such moments she would be able to squeeze into them some of the things she now had to do after the end of her normal workday.

In our first discussion we talked about the importance of being able to actually see how she spent her time rather than just thinking about it. We agreed that that was the key to finding ways to make better use of her time. We both felt that when she could see the whole picture she would be able to spot some unproductive and wasted moments and would be able to put them to better use.

Setting the Time Trap

Anne agreed to take a few minutes each morning to prepare a “Today Sheet.” She would list her scheduled appointments, follow-up telephone calls and other planned tasks for the day in the order in which she expected to do them. She would also estimate the time she thought each task was likely to take.

Anne also agreed to take a few minutes right after lunch and at the end of the day to record the actual amount of time each planned task took and to record what she did with the “free” time if the task took less time than planned. Anne understood that is was going to require some effort but she resolved to do this for a couple of weeks and then we would take a look at the results together to see what was happening. We both hoped that when she could see the spare moments in her day, she could make better use of them.

Checking the Time Trap

As Anne got into it, she began to realize how often things didn’t always go as planned. There were variations. Sometimes some of the things she did took less time than she thought they would. A meeting might get cancelled or getting some rental documents ready might take less time than usual. Those situations seemed to yield what she was looking for – the “extra” moments that she might capture and use.

After two weeks of tracking we reviewed her notes together. We discovered several things:

First, there were many unplanned “free” moments that occurred every day. We called those moments of time “snippets.”

Second, she saw that what she was usually doing in those snippets was checking her e-mail and the latest news. Neither of those activities was very productive. She really did not need to do these any more than twice a day, and here she was, doing them every time she had a free moment. When she added up the time she was spending on those, the total came to almost an hour a day of time that might be put to better use if she could find a way.

We began to look for useful things that she had to do that were small enough to fit into those five to ten-minute snippets of time that she had discovered. She found a number of things that could be done at any time during the day and usually only took a couple of minutes each. She made a list:

• Next Day Prep – Reviewing contact sheets for the next day’s appointments
• Inventory Walk – Reviewing the list of available properties
• Lead Follow-Up – Calling new leads
• “Bird Dogging” – Prospecting for leads by calling friends and associates
• Making follow-up calls to clients to whom she had sold something

As we reviewed the list, we agreed that the first three things were so important that she should schedule time to do them. The last two items were the important things for which she never seemed to have enough time. Maybe we could find out how to fit those into her spare moments.

Preparing to Use Snippets of Time

The problem with trying to make better use of time snippets is that you can’t be sure when they will occur. They just pop up and you have to be ready to take advantage of them. You can’t predict when a meeting will run short, when traffic will be less than expected, or when any of the other “snippet producers” may occur.

Anne figured out that in order to be ready to do make use of the snippet time, she would have to have a handy list of potential calls that she could make when the opportunities arose. So, she added a few minutes to her schedule each morning to update her call lists for “Bird Dogging” and Follow-Ups with past clients. She kept those with her throughout the day and used them whenever she had a spare moment.

Over the next few weeks, Anne found that changing what she was doing was not as easy as she thought. The siren call of e-mails and news feeds was very strong, and she had to remind herself to go to her call lists first – before getting distracted. However, as she gradually worked into the routine, she began to see that she was making more calls and getting good results from that.

Anne was convinced. She continued to use her Today Sheet as a window into her activities. It helped her see what she was doing and understand where and how she could make what she was doing work better.

Seeing Time

At the outset, Anne knew there must be moments that she could capture and use more productively, but she could not see them. Anne had to find a way to make time visible. She did that by starting and maintaining a physical record of her time: how she planned to spend it and how she actually spent it.

Anne’s written “Today Sheet” was a tabular record. Her daily records provided snapshots of her activities and enabled her to see and analyze the details of her work patterns and habits. Once she could see “snippets of time,” Anne was able to change her habits and get prepared to seize and use those moments when they occurred. You could do that!

 * * *

Time is what we want most, but use worst. – William Penn

He who every morning plans the transaction of the day and follows out the plan, carries a thread that will guide him through the labyrinth of the most busy life. – Victor Hugo

What very mysterious things days are. Sometimes they fly by, and other times they seem to last forever, yet they are all exactly twenty-four hours. There’s quite a lot we don’t know about them. – Melanie Benjamin, Alice I Have Been, 2010.

If you want to make good use of your time, you’ve got to know what’s most important and then give it all you’ve got. – Lee Iacocca

You will never find time for anything. If you want time, you must make it. – Charles Buxton

There is never enough time, unless you’re serving it. – Malcolm Forbes

* * *

Full Course: Scope Definition and Management (1 day)

Click here for our full list of available courses!