Short of time?
I guess so. We all are.
So, here are five simple ways to free-up time. You’ll know them all. But do you do them all?
- Focus on the DO first. Most communications are too long. Because they aren’t clear on the desired outcome. Which means too much waffling and irrelevance. So, when communicating, the first think to think about is what you want others to DO after it. Once you know this DO, ask yourself, ‘what’s the minimum I need to say, to convince them to DO it?’. This makes your communications better, shorter and more likely to work
- Shorten Ten people meeting for an hour is ten person-hours of resource. Does the agenda really warrant that level of investment? Shorten meetings. Reduce attendees
- Never read emails twice. Opening an email, reading it, closing it, leaving it in your inbox … means you’ll re-read that email again (and again, and again). To make sure you never read them twice, every time you open an email, do one of the Ds: Deal with it now, Delete it, Delegate it, or Diarise to act on it later. Then remove it from your inbox
- Use the right channel. A Teams call where twenty people listen to their boss have a one-hour, one-way rant.., well, that would have been a much better (and shorter) email. Always choose the right channel – don’t just use your favourite one
- Shut up. When you want someone to do something – and they say ‘yes’ – stop talking!
If you did these five things all the time, how much time would you save every week?
And if your colleagues did all five, how much time would they – and you – save?
At least hours. Maybe days.
Anyway, I’d better go. I know you’re busy …
Action Point
Identify one simple way to save time. It could be one of the above ideas; it could be something different.
Then do it.
Then embed it.