I just got back from the Chicago after presenting a session and a workshop at the Institute for Challenging Disorganization (ICD) 2012 Conference. The ICD is an international organization of Professional Organizers, and while I was there, I presented “Baby Steps 101/201: Radically Reducing your Clients’ Time Clutter.” It was an affirming, expanding and amazing experience. More to come on this in future posts.
Perfect Time Management – “The Book”
I am in the middle of the third draft of my upcoming book, “Perfect Time Management.” I am in the process of getting some input from a few friendly editors who know a thing or two about Time Management 2.0, and good story-telling.
Once the story holds together I’ll do some copy editing on my own before hiring someone to do a professional job.
It may all sound quite orderly, but be assured… this is my first attempt at a complete book and it’s an unforgiving process. Stuff that looks good today, magically turns into crap tomorrow and I am discovering how much of a “head game” a long creative process really is. It’s not like writing a whole bunch of articles at all…
Stay tuned to this space, as I’ll be passing on more updates as we get closer to the launch in January 2013.
Stupid Fans of Time Management
I wrote a rant this past weekend on the tendency of time management authors, trainers, video bloggers, podcasters like myself to talk down to our clients and readers… and to treat “y’all” as if you aren’t all that smart.
Now, reflecting on what I wrote, I can only hope that I haven’t been committing the same error here at 2Time Labs. I try not to post fluffy, cotton-candy-flavored tip and tricks that can be found anywhere on the Internet, and to get to the heart of things with new thinking. Now that I have ranted out aloud in this new post, I probably should try even harder!
Your thoughts? Here’s the post: Are Our Time Management Clients Stupid?
The Research that Supports Time Management 2.0
I have created a new page on this website that shows the support that I have found in academic research for the principles that are used here at 2Time Labs. It’s a page that I intend to update whenever I find new sources that speak to these principles (either positively or negatively.)
Not Using Time Management Behaviors
I have been catching up on my time management research by looking at some of the few published articles in the field. In some cases, I am re-reading papers that I first saw several years ago with a more informed, mature view than I had in the past.
That’s what I like to think anyway!
A few things are jumping out that never hit me before, that makes me yearn for the establishment of a “School of Time Management” at good institution.
1. Where are the Engineers?
The articles that I am looking at are published from departments of psychology in the main, and are written with a great deal of concern for the individual’s opinion about their time management skills. While I am sympathetic to this point of view, I am doubtful that, by itself, it makes much of a difference. Your opinion about your skills might be interesting to know, but it’s unlikely to produce a breakthrough in performance that can be generalized to all professionals.
It might be my bias as an engineer, as there is something impersonal about someone managing time demands, from my perspective. It’s a bit like shoving parts down an assembly line. Your opinion about the capacity of the line might be interesting, but there is something empirical happening on the line, and it cannot be ignored when we are trying to improve the way the line is balanced. I simply can’t find this kind of research anywhere as it pertains to time management. The engineers have left the building.
2. Everyone is a Time Management User
I noticed this underlying idea popping up in the research: “some people use time management and some don’t.” The researchers then attempt to make a comparison between the two groups in order to show that time management is useful, or not.
This mental model strikes me as fundamentally flawed.
Instead, my research tells me that every functioning adult engages in time management behaviors. If someone can understand what it means to “show up at 2:30pm” then they are engaging in these behaviors, even if they never actually make the appointment.
What varies are the levels of skill, and here at 2Time Labs we have distinguished these skills into Belt levels: white, yellow, orange and green. But it’s a mistake to assume that working professionals don’t do anything. Instead, I observe them acting in ways that are perfectly consistent with their established habit patterns developed over many years, even when they are unaware of them.
This mistake leads to strange outcomes in the research as the comparisons end up being invalid.
3. Training Makes (Almost) No Difference
This finding is probably based on the problems with the two points listed above. If you are not measuring the right things (opinions vs. capacity) and you are comparing apples to apples without knowing it, then it’s not likely that the research will yield too many answers that are actually useful.
As we’d say in business, the “so what” is sadly missing (in the research.)
This doesn’t help the trainers, writers, coaches, professional organizers, etc. who are looking for something that they can use to help people deal with real everyday problems. The research shows correlations between time management training/skills and feel-good constructs like “job satisfaction” but there is little research on the impact of time management on individual capacity or job performance, and the little that exists is mixed.
Obviously, something does make a real difference in the minds of people who are in this field, but it’s too bad that so very little research that’s completed actually sheds any light on what that might be.
And to think… this skill is one that every single working professional in the world uses!
Sources: A Review of the Time Management Literature by Claessens, van Eerde and Rutte.
The Inescapable Demands of ToDo Lists
I have noticed a wide and growing number of apps on the new iPhone, Android and laptop that attempt to improve a user’s personal productivity. They all seem to focus on the same thing: how to make better lists.
It’s a bit disheartening, because our research here at 2Time Labs shows that lists work fine for a small number of time demands, but after a certain point an upgrade is needed to using a single schedule instead. While many people repeat the mythology that “it can’t be done” based on a someone’s opinion, there are many professionals who pull off this trick, and many others who are curious to see if it would make a difference for them.
Some of the data comes from new high quality research conducted by Dr. Dezhi Wu. A great deal of the proof, however, remains to be established and while I’m hoping that another Dezhi comes along soon, here’s a comparison at the steps that take place in both fundamentals: Scheduling and Listing.
Imagine a conversation between you and your boss in which a new time demand has popped up. Your boss wants to know whether or not you are able to complete a new assignment – “The Smith Report” – due in two week’s time.
With a single schedule: You pause for a moment to check your schedule to see whether or not you have the space to allocate the 10 hours that are required.
With multiple lists: You pause for a moment to scan your personal memory, because a list of all the to-do’s that you need to do doesn’t tell you if you have the time to complete the report by the due date.
This happens over and over again when you use multiple lists – you must use your memory to try to remember what you planned, and for when. This is not a problem when the number of demands on your time is small, but if you have a great number of commitments, the chore of remembering a mental schedule quickly becomes burdensome.
Imagine, that if have multiple lists, that you can easily make the mistake of telling your boss “Yes,” only to discover that you have other deliverables that you placed on your mental schedule, but simply forgot for the moment. That might be an indication that it’s time for an upgrade.
The problem is that ToDo Lists force you to use memory – this is an inescapable demand of this particular technique.
The Time Management System You Need
One of the ideas that we promote here at 2Time Labs is that each person needs a time management system that effectively allows them to handle the number of time demands that show up in their life on a daily basis. The corollary to this statement is the idea that each person doesn’t necessarily need a system that can handle more time demands than they’ll ever get.
The underlying notion is that one size doesn’t fit all, and we have decided to distinguish the different “sizes” in terms of their capacity to deal with time demand volume. While the technology doesn’t exist to measure these differences, we have described them in relative terms, with the belt system of skills.
At the top end there are Green Belts who have the most advanced skills and can handle the most time demands, and at the low end there are White Belts who have the most basic skills and can handle the least time demands.
Now, there is some evidence showing up in new articles that there is a different way to think about these differences. It backs up our direct observations gained from programs and coaching sessions.
The idea in a nutshell is that the most time-pressed individuals have so many time demands that consume so much of the day/week, that they only have a few extra hours to play with each week.
In other words, when they add up all the things that they are committed to doing, or must do “or else,” the number of hours left over each week add up to les than 20. Or 10. Or even 0.
Think President Obama. Or a CEO or business-owner. These are the hyper-committed professionals who have what we call “A Green Belt Life” (even if they only have White Belt Skills.)
Unfortunately, living with skills that can’t handle the number of time demands that come into one’s life is often stressful. The result of a severe mismatch between volume and skills is that stuff falls through the cracks, appointments are missed or started late, clutter accumulates, sleep is lost, etc. By definition, there is a cost that must be paid.
Here is an article from Lifehacker in which the author describes a Green Belt life at a time when he was a Project Manager. He describes just the kind of life that we have in mind. How to Focus and Stay Productive When You’re Expected to Always be Available.
Here’s an excerpt:
When I was a project manager, I had meetings every single day. Even worse, I was responsible for scheduling most of them. I learned pretty quickly that the only time I could truly tell people I was “unavailable” were the times that were blocked off on my calendar (and even then, they’d ignore it, but that’s another problem entirely.) So I started scheduling my work—or times when I was head-down and wanted everyone to know I was busy. Then I started specifically scheduling my breaks so people would know when I wasn’t around and when I’d be back.
Here’s he’s using the advanced Scheduling skills that we associate with an Orange Belt – his schedule has become the main focal point of all activity. Also, here’s a video from Microsoft Outlook that gives a pretty graphic picture of a soccer Mom that also has a Green Belt life. The juggling that she must do with her schedule is quite typical of someone who only has a few spare hours here and there in her life, and is always moving stuff around in response to what shows up. (BTW, we don’t advocate the habit of interrupting your Yoga session to check email!)
Interesting Piece of Data
I took the following notes from a source that I seem to have lost:
Professionals over-estimate what they can get done in a day, but under-estimate what they can get done in a week.
Has anyone ever heard this quote before? Does it ring true from your experience? Any evidence to back it up?
As my skills at scheduling improve over time, I find that I’m able to make better time estimates. Doing it in my calendar on Outlook/Gmail/BB is vastly superior to trying to do it in my head, which reflects some of the research findings in the post I wrote last week.
Some Newly Discovered Academic Research
I did a little digging over the weekend and found some great research in time management that we’ll be highlighting here at 2Time Labs. What’s interesting is that, along with Dezhi Wu’s work, the articles prove that all the interesting work in this discipline is being done by women: Macan, Francis-Smythe, Gibson and Claessens.
Here are the articles:
Time Management: Test of a Process Model by Therese Macan
Will you remember to read this article later when you have time? The relationship between prospective memory and time management by Therese Macan, Janet Gibson, Jennifer Cunningham
On the Relationship Between Time Management and Time Estimation, by J.A. Francis-Smythe and Ivan Robinson.
I’m still reading and assimilating them, but if you’d like to jump the gun and share what you think, please go ahead and do so by shooting me an email.
P.S. The good news is that their finding support 2Time Labs’ Time Management 2.0 principles.
An Uncanny Resemblance
A new set of videos showed up in my feed today entitled “How to Be More Productive.” They are sponsored by http://howtobemoreproductive.com
What’s remarkable is that their videos have an uncanny reemblance to the 20 videos that we put together here at 2Time Labs: the Top 10 FAQ’s and SAQ’s About Time Management.
Take a look at this video from their site which talks about the fundamentals: Capturing, Emptying, Tossing, Storing, Acting Now, Scheduling and Listing.
Coincidence, perhaps? I signed up for their mailing list and sent an email, but I’m not too optimistic about getting a response.
I imagined that this would happen at some point, and as I expected, I’m feeling a bit flattered!