There’s a blessing in that last bit.

Seriously, though, I know speaking on time management doesn’t sound exciting. It pales in comparison to things like, “I do product design for Apple.” or “I’m in marketing at Nike.” I get that, but unfortunately I possess a driving need to find better, faster ways of getting things done. In the bio I provide those tasked with introducing me at speaking engagements it says that at age thirteen I found the quickest way to vacuum the family store so I could spend more time fly fishing. It’s true. I’m afflicted. I’m okay with that. Let me tell you why.

What is Time?

In conversations about QuietSpacing® – my time management methodology – and the related programs I conduct, I often explain to people that the overarching principle of all my work is this:

Time is a limited, non-renewal source with an undisclosed expiration date for each of us.

This fact drives me personally and professionally. I want to make the best use of the time I have because I know that, at least in this life, when it’s over, it’s over. There’s no way to get more no matter how much money or power I accumulate.

The Potential of Time

But that’s only one aspect of this philosophy. Another is that time represents potential. The potential to use it well or not so well. It’s our time, it’s our choice.

Realizing that potential is the fruit of time well used. It is seen and felt as accomplishment, a sense of well being, the ability to truly relax or, in my vernacular, experience a quiet mind. This is the promise of fulfilling the potential of time.

Measuring a Life of Realized Potential

We humans are visual creatures. We think in pictures and our memories are stored pictures of events in our life. Thus, memories – snapshots of time – are the currency of life. As our days draw to a close, we will look back over our lives using our memories and we will assess whether we’ve made good use of our time.

My belief is that if we pursue our potential – personally and professionally – we will make good memories so that when we look back later, we’ll be able to say “Yes, I made good use of my time.”

Yet Another Holiday Season Lurks

As we enter another frenzied holiday season, remember this: Most of the gifts we receive will mean nothing in the end, except the gift of the present. Maximizing the potential in the present creates the wealth of memories that mark a successful life.

© 2011, Paul H. Burton. All rights reserved.

“Go stand in line!”  That’s what the diminutive overwrought 20-something hostess at Coop’s Place said to the semi-inebriated patron pestering her to seat his party in the amazingly authentic low-country tavern we were dining at in the French Quarter of New Orleans last week.  (Pic at right).

Now, before you go all customer-service on me, understand that this guest had walked past the growing line on the sidewalk outside the door with two (count them: two) very clear signs on those doors with large black arrows pointing down the sidewalk and with the following printed on them – Stand at the end of the line.  If there’s no line, stand here until you’re seated.  The message was very clear.  If you want to eat here, stand in line.

Waiting…Waiting

Most of us have stood in line somewhere, but it’s usually because the place we want to enter is “cool” or “up and coming.”  Recently, however, I’ve been experiencing a different kind of popularity (aka productivity, aka success) – popularity built on authenticity.

The authenticity to which I refer is not nostalgic.  It’s not a reproduction of something past or a reference experience of any kind.  It’s current, unadorned (which is not to imply inelegance or lacking in class), and easy to identify as “here, now, real.”

Bruce Turkel, a great blogger and marketing consultant to the travel industry, recently wrote about knowing what business you are in.  In the post he referenced a statement made by Tom Monaghan, founder of Domino’s Pizza.  In a conversation about his company, Monaghan claimed that he wasn’t in the pizza business.  Rather, he said that he was in the food-you-can-get-hot-in-under-30-minutes business.

The point he was making is that Domino’s isn’t the best pizza and it never aspires to be.  It aspires to deliver hot food within 30 minutes.  And by focusing simply on doing that one thing well, it’s both authentic to its mission and hugely productive (aka successful).

And while we’re on food examples, we recently had the pleasure of dining at Mrs. Wilkes’ Dining Room in Savannah, GA. The business model is simple.  It’s open from 11 AM to 2 PM, Monday through Friday.  That’s right: lunch.

We were told to be there no later than 10:15, at which we scoffed.  It was a Tuesday!  As we approached the address at 10:45, we could see the line stretching down the block.  Since it was our last day in Savannah, we waited.  There was no choice, because the front do was locked!  No one gets in until they’re invited in.

I don’t need to tell you that the food was unbelievable – in quantity and quality.  The food was served family style to our table of 10 (one of about eight in the restaurant, pic at left).  After forty minutes, we were served peach cobbler and told that it was $16 a head, to be paid as we left.  It was the politest dismissal we’d ever received.  And, of course, the line still stretched down the block as we exited the establishment.

Getting to the Point

These culinary experiences point to the same thing – being authentic by doing what you do best results in a productive result (i.e., that’s right – success).  In each case, the business disregarded most of the conventions of their industry and focused on the key elements that made up their unique value proposition.  By doing so, their authenticity rose above the chatter of competition resulting in high demand – the most visceral measure of productivity in the business world.

We often discuss productivity in terms of micro-actions – small things we can change to make things run more smoothly day-to-day.  The productivity focused on here is the big picture kind.  It’s the kind the looks both at what needs to be done today, as well as what the path to success looks like and what needs to be done to stay on that path.

Domino’s serves up hot food quickly.

Coop’s Place serves up unadorned low country food in a tavern atmosphere.

Ms. Wilkes serves up lunch just like Mom did.

What do you serve up?

© 2011, Paul H. Burton. All rights reserved.

I kept getting distracted by new and exciting topics – simplicity, lifestyle choices, Tenkara fly fishing.  Instead of focusing on my core business of developing solid content to help my clients solve their time management struggles, I was drafting tables of contents for new books and making lists of authors to read and people to follow.

Thank gawd for my National Speakers Association Master Mind group – Viki Hess, Jeff Civillico and Liz Weber.  During one of our monthly calls the resounding consensus regarding my efforts to cobble together these disparate objectives was that I was creating very muddy professional waters indeed.  And, as I once heard the famous speaker Mark Sanborn say, “A confused buyer buys nothing.”

My peers advised me to pursue new ways to communicate my topical expertise – time management and productivity – and to seek ways to incorporate my other aspirations into my own life.  In a way, they advised me to separate my professional focus from my personal focus.   Stated differently: Not everything needs to be revenue source, Paul!

Out of the mouths of babes…er…professionals.

Live Simply

Most people will tell you that I’m a bit of a slow starter.  Ideas take time to germinate in my brain before flowering into action.  The same was true for the advice I’d received.

In fact, it wasn’t until several weeks later, while driving from our winter digs to our summer digs, that clarity was achieved.  What I needed to do was to Live Simply.  As a “process guy,” I naturally pursue the most efficient way to accomplish the stated goal.  Many times finding that path results in a truly elegant or simple solution.  Thus, marrying my predisposition for process with living simply is wholly congruent. The congruence lies in my belief that that simplicity is arrived at ONLY after gaining an understanding of the complexity of the very thing we are attempting to simplify – in this case, my lifestyle!

Elimination is part of achieving simplicity – the removal of things that are unnecessary to the journey.  However, reduction is just the beginning of the journey to finding the elegant solution – that perfect intersection between the form of the “answer” and the function of the “answer” – again, true simplicity.

With the excess baggage eliminated, the challenging part begins.  Prejudice and judgment must be identified and removed.  Habit and custom must be acknowledged.  Information – useful and not – must be accounted for and incorporated or discarded.  True motivation must be ferreted out.  Self-honesty is mandatory and the discoveries made are as often displeasing as pleasant.

Over the last few years, I’d been reducing and eliminating things in my life.  I have stopped taking up new sports and now focus my time on the ones I really enjoy – golfing and fly fishing.  Not only did I stop spending money on new gear, I stopped breaking myself physically so much, which requires recovery time and its associated time away from those activities.  Moreover, I was no longer running up the often-stressful learning curve.  Rather, I was enjoying more time on the golf course and small water creeks engaging in activities that I was already competent at doing.  I had decided on the What.

We had also identified our long-term summer and winter spots.  This reduced the ongoing discussion and preoccupation with the Where question.  It also reduced the associated expenses with changing locations every year or two.

Interestingly, determining the Where and What drove the ability to reduce the stuff needed in my life.  Unused gear, clothing, furniture, etc. were all donated to charity.  In its place came physical and mental quiet. There were simply fewer things physically and intellectually with which to concern myself.

I was also free to pursue more deeply new ways to doing old things – rejoin the legions of golfers hitting the latest driver (having abandoned that effort years ago in favor of my 5 iron) and investigate Tenkara (radically simple fly fishing from ancient Japan.)  And it wasn’t just sports oriented.  We found more time to be tourists in our own towns – doing all the things the tourists do but we had never found time to do.  All these things where the How.

With the big questions resolved, I am focusing my ongoing Live Simply efforts on the way I work and the tools I use.  There is so much evidence that supports the idea that people work best (produce the most) in short, intense cycles with periods of recovery in between. This was, in fact, the underlying conclusion to the study Malcolm Gladwell cited in his book Outliers.  (Note, for those interested in a comprehensive discussion of this theory, as well as many related ideas, see The Way We’re Working Isn’t Working by Tony Schwartz.)

Not only am I looking at working shorter bursts followed by recovery periods, I’ve also reduced the number of technologies required to engage in my work.  Gone is the Windows machine that required so many peripherals – all plugged into sockets creating a fire hazard in my home office.  In its place is a MacBook Pro with a blue tooth keyboard and track pad.  Gone is the software programs installed on my computer.  In their place is cloud-computing – from Office 365 to MyERP with a shot of Dropbox thrown in for good measure.  Everything resides in a browser.  Big Iron, Thin Client.  What goes around comes around.

Living simply is hard but not in a deprivation sense. It’s hard in a conceptualization sense.  To achieve and maintain a simple life, one must dig down into the complex aspects of life and, with a surgical focus, ask whether each aspect is necessary and if so, whether it’s been accomplished in the most effective and efficient manner.  Only after a studied and educated analysis can simplicity in life be achieved.

The best question to start with is, “What is it that I really want?”

Work Passionately

Having separated my personal aspirations to Live Simple from my professional objectives to help people make the most of the time they have, I began to see numerous ways to re-engage with my subject matter expertise.  I attribute this refresh flood of ideas to freeing up my clogged brain from the angst of trying to tie it all together.  Ironically, once I quieted my own mind, engagement naturally took over.

I was able to apply a lot of simple living concepts to my work efforts. Not only did I de-clutter my work space (fewer peripherals, cables, etc.) and less software, I also abandoned a number of efforts that I thought were helping me from a marketing stand point.  Out went Twitter and auto-submission services.  The people who make decisions about hiring me don’t spend much time hanging out in social media sites.  (Note, I’ve reduced my Facebook activity to just my friends – people I really to want to stay connected to.)  In effect, I re-focused my efforts to what made my QuietSpacing® practice successful in the first place:

• Creating Content
• Building Relationships
• Solving Client Issues with Time Management

It’s easy to get lost in the technology and the next great thing.  Most of us have to develop a basic understanding of how all these things work.  (I must go a step further and glean an understanding of how they positively and adversely affect my client’s day.)  Beyond that, it’s up to each of us to determine whether the bright shiny object actually adds value to our days and to our lives. If it doesn’t, it should be discarded and replaced with other things that do add value.

The net result of this cleansing and re-focusing of my professional efforts is a terrific sense of engagement.  Personally, I hate the word “passionate” as it relates to our work.  I used it here to get your attention since it’s the vogue concept to promote…this week.

My opinion is that it’s less about passion and much, much more about engagement.  Maybe I’m just mincing words, but I believe causes require passion. Work isn’t (and shouldn’t be) a cause.  Work, to be enjoyable, requires engagement. And, further on that topic, there’s no reason we can’t or shouldn’t like work.  Most of us will do it for a long time, so why not enjoy it!

You’ve undoubtedly noticed that there was a stripping down process in getting back to being engaged.  Again, what goes around comes around. There’s even more similarity between these personal and professional efforts.  To become engaged in my work, I’ve had to root around in its particulars to determine what about helping people with their time management struggles is so interesting to me.  It could be the process – finding an efficient and effective route to get through it all each day.  It could be watching them regain a sense of command in their day.  It could be the downstream feedback I get that they feel more successful or that they have received recognition of their efforts.

No.  All of these things are great, but they aren’t what engage me.  What engages me is the idea that we only have so much time and we need to make the best use of the time we have.  Taking this one extra step, we can say that memories – snapshots of time – are how we will measure the use of our time.

Thus, a successful life is one measured at its end by the one living that life.  Memories will be how we will measure our success when we ask the question, “Did I make good use of the time I had?”

In my case, being engaged means that I am making good memories of the time I spend working.

Stated most simply:  Memories are the currency of life.  The question to ask is, “Am I making good memories?”

Post-Script – Personal Experience is My Kernel

Over the couple of days it’s taken me to craft this missive, I’ve had the opportunity to spend time with three very important people in my life with whom I rarely get to hang out.  During the course of my discussions with them, the topic of engagement in work and personal life came up several times.

The great thing about meaningful conversation is that one is forced to put ideas into a linear framework (sentences) that make sense.  As Aristotle maintained, discourse is the true nature of being human. And it was during those conversations that I discovered an even deeper truth about myself.  That truth was that I am drawn both professionally and personally to Personal Experience.  Whether it’s the music I listen to, the movies I watch, the books I read, or the people with whom I wish to maintain relations, it always boils down to my interest in the Personal Experience being described.

Though opinionated (what lawyer isn’t!), I rarely care much about politics or social causes or sports or a host of other areas of the human experience.  What I most gravitate to is the personal experience of the individual.  This revelation is significant only to me in its subject matter, but it’s hugely relevant to the topic of this article because it’s what I’ve long referred to as the Kernel.

The Kernel is my way of describing – in one or two words – the thing that drives you forward.  Unlike “passion” which has a lot of puppies and daisies associated with it, a Kernel is at the core of your personality and motivation.  Discovering a Kernel takes a tremendous amount of patient introspection, fearlessness, exposure, and interaction with others on the subject.  It’s less about honesty, though that plays a role, and more about clearing out the layers that are built onto of the Kernel.

In my case, I always thought my Kernel was “time.”  Helping people make the most of their time and making the most of my time.  Then, over the course of these recent discussions, it dawned on me that time was a layer on top of “personal experience.”  What I really enjoyed hearing and what I really sought for myself were interesting personal experiences. Helping people make the most of their time was a means to achieving that end!

Take-Aways From This Tome

Having pontificated for over two thousand words, I owe the patient few who reached this point a concise and cogent conclusion. Here’s my best shot:

• Living simply is about stripping away the unnecessary and focusing on the intriguing.
• Working passionately is about finding ways to be engaged in your work so that you’re creating good memories from it.
• Relentless pursuit and discovery of your personal Kernel will drive more engagement and contentment in your life than every other endeavor.

An even shorter summation may be: Life Life On Purpose.

© 2011, Paul H. Burton. All rights reserved.

Once we can quiet the cacophony of the modern work place, the next point of attack is to increase productivity (and it’s cousin – sense of accomplishment) by making the way we actually get work done more efficient.  And, like most things, it’s all been done before.

Texting is Great Practice for Good Communication

Much lamenting is heard about texting.  How we are “disengaging” from our surroundings to remain digitally linked to persons distant.  We also talk about how our use of the English language is suffering from the cryptic abbreviations used in texts.  And let’s not forget the ~ping~ that sounds each time a new text arrives.

These things are all true, but they’ve all been said before about other technological innovations.  What if we looked at some of the positive aspects of texting – specifically, at how it might be making us more efficient communicators?

The 140-character (soft) limit to texting is great practice for achieving the Keep It Simple Stupid (K.I.S.S.) philosophy of life.  It’s even more beneficial if we alter the K.I.S.S. philosophy slightly – Keep It Short & Simple.

Texting is a terrific way to communicate in one line and/or one sentence bursts.  So, if we look at texting as a practice ground for good burst-communication, we’ll find many applications in our daily work life where this skill can reap rewards.

Three Ways to KISS

Here are three applications of this newly reconstituted KISS philosophy as enhanced by good texting mechanics:

1.  Subject Lines. Subject lines appear in many electronic technologies; e.g., E-mail, Appointments, Tasks just to name a few.  If we leverage those one-line blank fields by creating robust Subject lines, we’ll be able to communicate very effectively in 140 characters.  For example, what if our e-mail Subject lines looked like this:

Big & Large – Firm Retreat – September 23-25, 2050 – QuietSpacing(R) Proposal – Executive Summary

or our calendar Subject lines looked more like this:

QuietSpacing QuickStart Demo – John Doe (206) 555-6666 & Paul H. Burton (503) 680-9872 – PHB Initiates

or our to-do Subject lines looked more like this:

ODP: Finance – Deposits – Cybersource thru 7/28 – Google Checkout thru 7/25 – PayPal – Amazon on 10th and 25th

Each of these Subject lines convey a tremendous amount of information without even opening the underlying e-mail, calendar event or task.  Moreover, they are easier to find and file which makes the workflow processing run more smoothly each day.

2.  New Style Short-Hand. We all take notes. Whether it’s in a meeting, on a conference call or when we’re working alone, there are numerous ideas and to-dos that get jotted down along the way.  You may use old school technology (pen and paper) or new school technology (laptop or tablet), but in the end, the notes get recorded in some fashion.  One way to make note taking more effective and efficient is to create a short-hand dictionary to avoid re-writing words most often used and to indicate items of particular interest by category.  Here are a couple of examples to consider adopting when taking notes:

• M = Meeting
• C = Call
• T = To-do

Just start a note with the applicable letter and jot down the subject matter.  Later, we (or our assistant) can quickly peruse the notes to pull out the actionable items before filing the notes away for archival purposes.

3.  Bullet Points and Bullet Points + Narrative. The final suggestion is to continue leveraging our newly acquired brevity skills right in the body of the communication through the use of bullet points.  Though bullet points may have led to Death by PowerPoint, it’s not their fault; it’s the fault of the PowerPoint user.  Bullet points are great ways to list the key points in any communication – if not be the entire communication.  The next time a long(ish) e-mail must be written, consider starting with a list of bullet points that identify the main points before launching into the narrative description below.  It might just be that the bullet points alone suffice!

Mick Jaeger Once Said

One of my favorite quotes is from Mick Jaeger.  Decades ago, he said (paraphrasing), “All the cords on a guitar have been played.  Now, it was just a matter of arrangement.”  Much of what we can do to “fix” the ills of modern technological over-connectedness and consumption is to apply some old behaviors in a new way.  Diligently remembering that technology is a tool and not a set of chains and seeking to Keep It Short & Simple will generate the kind of results that we all want – more done in less time.

© 2011, Paul H. Burton. All rights reserved.

Editor’s Note: This is a guest post written by Trever Cartwright.  Trever is co-founder of Coraggio Group, a Portland-based strategy and organizational change firm. You can reach Trever by calling 503-493-1452 or by email at trever@coraggiogroup.com. Visit his website at www.coraggiogroup.com

The year is half over. Many leaders and executive teams are taking their annual step back to do a deep-dive assessment of their organization’s progress against the goals and objectives of their strategic plans.

As part of your strategic progress review, consider including another area of assessment—one that will require a different kind of examination and be much more introspective in nature. Why not take some time to also consider how you’re progressing as a leader? It makes sense when you consider that an organization’s strategic performance is, in large part, a direct reflection of the effectiveness of the leader—and the leadership team—at the top.

If you’re reading this article, chances are you’re in a leadership position. Maybe you’re a CEO. Maybe you’re a vice president or perhaps a director of a department. Regardless, if you’re like most professionals in leadership roles, you likely believe you’re a good leader—or at least, good enough. But the truth is, if you’re brutally honest with yourself—you don’t know for sure. You hope you are. End of story, right?

Sure—for many leaders, that is the end of the story. And yet the optimist in me says that for many more leaders, their sense of humility tells them that being an even better leader tomorrow than they are today is possible. And this possibility is actually inspiring. As long as they believe this possibility exists, they keep striving.

Which camp do you fall in?

When it comes to leadership, are you a finished product? Are you as good as it gets? Or do you believe that leadership is more of a practice—something that resembles more of an art form that, over time, you hone and aspire to perfect?

Let me pose just one more question and ask you to sit with it for a few days before you leap to an answer. It’s a question that I believe is worthy of any leader’s full attention and the time it takes to actually appreciate its gravity:

Why would anyone want to be led by you?

Recently, Coraggio posed this question in a Harvard Business Review on-line survey that was taken by leaders around the world. The responses revealed an interesting mix of perspectives. Here are a few that we received:

• “Because I’m above average height.”
• “Because I’m willing to wash the feet of my followers.”
• “Because I can provide enough confidence for myself.”
• “Because they just do. I can’t explain it.”
• “Because my values are clear.”
• “Because I’ll bring out the best in them.”
• “Because I’m credible.”

We knew we hit a nerve with this question. What we found as we reviewed the responses was something very important to consider: Is it possible that many leaders honestly don’t know why anyone would want to be led by them?

If you were to Google “leadership” you’d likely find nearly 200,000,000 entries. Suffice to say, there are a lot of opinions on the topic. Mine is just one more to add to the heap. I think you’ll agree, though, that it’s a topic worthy of lengthy contemplation, especially given the role you fill within your company. And, what’s more, many would argue that when it comes to organizational performance, the difference between ordinary and extraordinary is excellence in leadership. So the stakes are certainly high.

If getting clear on why anyone would want to be led by you resonates and you think that it’s important for you to be able answer the question, consider the following thought-provoking perspectives that will help you focus and, hopefully, take the edge off the tension that our question often causes.

Truth #1: Leadership cannot be mastered.

Cut yourself some slack. Leadership is not a pass/fail proposition. Leadership is and always will be an aspiration—a concept of positive influence that has at its deepest roots your genuine desire to strive to be a better leader today than you were yesterday. The moment you believe you’re a finished product and there is just no more room for improvement on your behalf, you have crossed the thin, but very bright line that separates confidence from arrogance.

Truth #2: Leadership stands for something.

What do you stand for? If people don’t know what you stand for, they will not follow you. Instead they will be going through the mental gymnastics of trying to figure out who you are. In the eyes of your employees, the truest measure of what you stand for will always be their observation—and subsequent assessment—of the link between your actions and your behaviors. When your actions and behaviors are in alignment, the result is always integrity.

Truth #3: Leadership has its roots in a genuine belief in others.

If you’re willing to believe in your people—to actually see in them more than they might even see in themselves—they will reward you with their loyalty, their dedication and their followership. This means you have to take an active and genuine interest in them. If people believe you have lost faith in them, that you don’t respect them or you don’t appreciate them, they will not follow you. They will only comply with you. And compliance never lasts long. Think about it. Have you ever been willing to follow a leader who didn’t believe in you?

Truth #4: Leadership isn’t about you.

I know—it sounds a little counter-intuitive. But, I’ve never met a leader—a great leader—who didn’t admire someone else’s leadership and strive  to model aspects of their own style, principles and approach in the image of that person. Regardless of your level of leadership, whether you’re a CEO or the director of a department, be willing to admire someone else. Make him or her your mentor or role model, even if he or she doesn’t know they play one of these roles for you. The point is, aspirational leadership is bigger than you. You will become the great leader you aspire to become only when you have a clear understanding of a lousy leader. Open your eyes and find a role model. You’re never too old and you’ll never occupy a position too high to admire someone else for their leadership ability.

Truth #5: Leadership is about doing less of what lessens you.

Less truly is more when it comes to great leadership. The most effective leaders with whom I’ve worked are the ones who know their limits and aren’t afraid to simply say, “I don’t know.” or, “That’s just not my strength.” Further, aspiring to be a great leader means you’re consciously investing more in what strengthens you and less in what lessens you. When you feel at the top of your game as a leader, what typically has led you to that sense of accomplishment? Have you just read a great book? Have you listened rather than spewed? Whatever your answer—get clear and then do more of what makes you feel effective.

Truth #6: Leadership is about bilateral influence.

Influence is a two-way street: You influence your people. And you’re comfortable with them influencing you. How else would you know if they’re learning and growing as young leaders if you’re doing all the influencing? Leaders influence those who are inspired to follow them by helping them to learn and grow as individuals, to help them expand their capacity for critical thinking and, ultimately, to realize their innate strengths and talents. Taking control from your people by not letting them make decisions will lead your organization to a collective stall. Instead, consider that you can increase your influence, and, thus, their competence and confidence, by letting others influence you. In the book The Leadership Challenge, authors Kouzes and Posner share their perspective that people who feel capable of influencing their leaders are more strongly attached to those leaders and more committed to effectively carrying out their responsibilities. I’ve found this to be true in my work with organizations. I’ve also found that a leader who is willing to be influenced is able to learn a great deal more about their direct reports’ capacity for leadership.

These six truths haven’t failed me in my coaching work with leaders inside their organizations. And they haven’t failed me in my personal aspiration to be a great leader—a never ending quest to be sure.

The prevailing challenge I find in our consulting work is helping clients to be consistently mindful of the tangible link between strategic success and leadership effectiveness. The two simply go hand and glove. Intellectually, we get that leadership is a critical factor in any organization’s performance. And yet we often dismiss it as the soft stuff or the ethereal with no practical or tactical application.

As part of your mid-year progress review, make it a point to integrate a focused evaluation of how you and your executive team are performing as the leaders of your organization. Here’s the agenda item for your next executive team meeting:

I. Why would anyone want to be led by you?

© 2011, Paul H. Burton. All rights reserved.

The Call

Me (seeing it’s my mom on caller ID):  Hi!  How are you doing?

Mom:   Not so good.

Me (sitting straight up because (a) this is never the response I get and (b) my father is 86):   What’s going on?

Mom (sounding very discombobulated):  They’re admitting your father to the hospital because they don’t know what’s wrong with him.

The remainder of the conversation covered the events that led up to my father’s admission to the hospital.

The Situation

Turns out my father had gall stones and one had become embedded in his digestive tract causing an infection.  This is a painful condition but not generally life threatening, unless you’re in your mid-80s.

Over the next 24 hours the doctors stabilized his condition and determined that removing his gall bladder via a minimally invasive procedure was the best course of action. Though not a complicated procedure, it is one requiring full anesthetic.  Again, at 86 years of age nothing is simple.

Surgery was scheduled for the next day and Mom was still ping ponging around during every phone conversation I had with her.

Priorities Clarified; Time Management Easy

When your aging parents are in distress, your priorities become very clear quickly.  My next steps were to clear my calendar of all meetings and activities.  Next, I jumped on the phone with Alaska Airlines and Budget Rental Car and made arrangements to get down to them. 

Twenty-four hours later I was with Mom at the hospital waiting for Father to be brought back from Recovery.  The procedure had gone well.  I stayed overnight talking with Mom about next steps and helping her get a firmer grip on her expanding role as the primary caregiver in their relationship. 

The next morning we picked Father up and took him home.  After getting him settled in his favorite chair and confirming with Mom that she was feeling “up to it,” I headed back to the airport and flew home. He continues to recover well and my Mom is feeling stronger every day about her new role.

The Moral

Time management is easy once you’ve prioritized the things you need to get done.  Focus on the prioritization process and stop wasting time by trying to manage it.

© 2011, Paul H. Burton. All rights reserved.

 Editors note:  This is a guest post by Chris Tuttle. Chris is an avid cyclist who focuses his intellectual property legal practice on cycling and the outdoor recreation businesses.

I just got done with a great read – Hamlet’s BlackBerry by William Powers.  Every page is filled with QuietSpacing® wisdom.  Before sharing specifics, a couple words on terminology.  This book is about the often dysfunctional relationship we have with the “screens” in our lives.  Desktop PCs, handheld smartphones, laptops, iPads, etc.  Any electronic device can be a “screen.”  The unexamined axiom of our times is that we and our screens should be connected as much as possible, all the time.  Connection = good, disconnected = bad.  But when we are connected, there is no quiet, there is no space.  If our lives and screens are connected 24-7, the promise of QuietSpacing (a more productive and happier life) will forever be out of reach. 

The central premise of Hamlet’s BlackBerry is that we need to cultivate distance, disconnection and solitude in order to be truly happy and productive, and to make the best use of the times when we are connected.  The subtitle of the book is “A Practical Philosophy for Building a Good Life in the Digital Age.”  In explaining this philosophy, Powers turns to some of the giants of Western history – Plato, Gutenberg, Shakespeare, Benjamin Franklin, Thoreau and Marshall McLuhan.

Plato: The principle discussed in connection with Plato is the idea of distance.  In other words, put some distance between yourself and your screens.  Put your iPhone in your desk drawer and take a walk.  Go away for a weekend and leave all of your devices at home.  For those addicted to screens, this will certainly be unsettling at first.  But if you stay with it, a little bit of magic might happen.

Gutenberg: The principle here is using technology to move your focus inward.  Prior to the development of the printing press, reading was an “outward” activity. Almost all reading was done out loud for an audience – at church for example.  Reading quietly to oneself is a relatively new activity, and when we do it with a disconnected mechanism (e.g., a real book made out of paper), it can be an opportunity for quiet contemplation and reflection. And no,  your Kindle does not count!

Chris Tuttle, Esq.

Shakespeare’s principle is to use old tools to ease your information/connection overload.  The author’s example is to carry around a paper notebook in which you jot ideas and other thoughts.  Because the notebook is not connected, you interact with it in a more focused and less distracted way.  The mind is calm and you can breathe and think.  You’re at the coffee shop with your moleskin journal and without your BlackBerry — thus you are temporarily liberated from the Tyranny of Email (book by John Freeman).

Benjamin Franklin:  The principle here is to employ positive rituals in order to improve your life and phase out bad habits.  The example cited in this portion of Hamlet’s Blackberry is to set aside certain times of day when you will be disconnected.  Turn off Outlook for two hours every morning and you will be amazed at what you can accomplish.

Thoreau: Walden was a grand experiment in actualizing a disconnected utopia.  But it is important to remember that Thoreau was not a hermit.  Instead, he consciously chose to create a physical environment that was screen-free (screen-free being used more generally here to refer to a setting free from connection to the crowd).  Powers takes this lesson and has applied it in his own home – some rooms are entirely screen free, and serve as places where his family can gather and interact in a more intimate and satisfying way.  This type of enriching retreat allows us to return to our connected lives with renewed energy and purpose.

And Marshall McLuhan: The famous coiner of the phrase “The Medium is the Message.”   The lesson of McLuhan is that we have the ultimate control of our inner mental life.  We control the points of entry and the quantity and quality of what is allowed to enter into our consciousness.  Perhaps you should turn off your television.  Is the information that you’re receiving enriching your life?  Is it making you happier and more productive?

Thanks for reading – pull the plug and see what happens! You can always go back.

Editor’s Second Note:  Chris also provided this link to a related NYT story on children’s attention spans and A.D.H.D.

© 2011, Paul H. Burton. All rights reserved.

Incessant Noise Makes Johnny Less Effective

The most insidious feature of most alert systems is the “snooze” option.  Disguised as a benefit, snooze buttons really only allow us to defer the inevitable.  And, in doing so, distract us from what we were focusing on BEFORE the alert sounded.  This may seem like no big deal, but here’s an illustrative example of why we should stop availing ourselves of the snooze option.

Many people use an alarm clock to wake up each morning.  Most who do set the alarm clock so they can hit the snooze button once … twice … thrice … ?  The oft-stated reason for this is that we can semi-consciously linger in the warmth of our bedding gradually preparing ourselves for the coming day. How idyllic. 

Here’s a different view of that same situation.  Most snooze buttons are set to re-sound the alarm every nine minutes or so. Thus, we if set our alarms for 30 minutes prior to the time we need to get up, we can hit the snooze three times.  In effect, then, what we’re really doing is robbing ourselves of 30 minutes of Good Sound Sleep!  And most of us aren’t getting the recommended eight to nine hours of sleep as it is!

Quit Deferring and Start Commanding Your Life

The message here? Stop relying on snooze.  All it’s doing is distracting you from getting something more important done.  The best practice here is to set the alert time for the “right” time, whether it’s for getting up in the morning or for the pre-meeting time you need to prepare for an upcoming calendared event.

You control many of the distractions you suffer.  Snooze is one of them.  Give yourself a break from the noise and see if you don’t just get more done and enjoy it more along the way.

© 2011, Paul H. Burton. All rights reserved.

Leo Babauta, creator of Zen Habits, who focuses on the very simple (and clear) ways to get things done.

Michael Perry, author of several books, Population 485 among them, who focuses on the very precise things that matter.

Ken Ammann, my best friend for 25 years, John Trujillo, my business partner and intrepid adventurer, and Tom Nitopi, my unwitting mentor and close friend, who all only know one direction – forward.

There are numerous other people, events and things that have influenced my success in achieving my objective, but the people listed above provided particular inspiration for this effort.

149 Pounds

That’s what the scale said this Monday morning, April 18, 2011, Tax Day, when I climbed on it to weigh myself.  I’d reached my goal – to drop below 150 pounds.  At 149 pounds, I have lost 31 pounds since I started trying to lose weight some months back.  Here’s the post I wrote that describes the details of what I’ve learned in the process, so I won’t re-hash old subject matter. However, the one thing I will relate is a deep sense of satisfaction with both my inner and outer self. 

Yes, all my clothes are too big.   And yes, I have to learn to keep the weight off, which is why I’m just going to keep the clothes I have for now and buy a belt. 

More importantly, though, is the tactile and emotional confirmation that I could reach the 150 mark again after years of allowing myself to believe that I was “stockier” than my younger brother and that “everyone adds pounds” as they get older.  The simple truth is this – It’s all bullshit.  The only real barriers to achieving goals like I have are a persistence of commitment and an honesty of self.  The rest is just execution, which ain’t as hard as most would like you to believe. 

30 Years Past

That’s how long it’s been since I weighed less than 150 pounds. When I graduated from high school over 30 years ago, I weighed approximately 145 pounds.  I’d just finished lettering on the varsity track team and headed off to the rest of my life.

Within months of reaching college, I had politely declined the track coach’s offer to run for the college team, joined a fraternity and proceeded to party until well after the cows came home. 

As I rounded the corner of my final year in law school seven years later, I had “grown” to about 190 pounds.  The odd thing was that I didn’t look heavy.  I had filled out, but I carried the weight reasonably well.

Once I entered the real world of work, I got back into exercising regularly, which dropped me down to 175 pounds or so.   That’s the weight I hovered around for the next twenty-some years, bobbing up to the low 180s occasionally and down to the low 170s when the stars aligned correctly.  That weight range is what I considered a normal adult weight for an average American white guy in his 30s, then his 40s. 

6 Months Ago

That’s when I started this little weight loss experiment using a new tool a client told me about – MyFitnessPal.  For years I would look at my brother, who’s four year’s my junior, and ask myself whether I could be as thin and fit as he was.  The answer that echoed in my brain was always, “No.  He’s more like Grandpa and you’re more like Dad.  Besides, he’s way more active than you are.” 

Then one day I had lunch with a client who had visibly dropped a huge amount of weight – 85 pounds!  He told me about the app, which I promptly forgot about.  A year later, this last fall (of 2010), I saw him at a conference and he still looked pretty good.  He confessed to having added back about 10 pounds, but the other 75 had remained off.

That little fact stewed in my brain along with the questions about what was possible if I really tried.  Just before Thanksgiving of last year (2010), I downloaded the app to my iPhone and began fiddling with it.  Without going into the details, let me just say that it’s brilliant in the way it looks things up (using the internet) and gives you credit for the cardiovascular exercises you do (like golf!).

Within the first 90 days, I had reached my initial goal of weighing 165 pounds – down 15 from my starting point.  By then, using the app and being conscious of what I was eating (nothing really “different” just more conscious of “how much”) was a habit.  So much of a habit that I set a Big Ass Goal of getting below 150 pounds for the first time since high school! 

That effort took another three months, but here I am today, baggy pants and all.

Big Focus Meets Little Focus

In the beginning, I had this vague Big Focus idea – the vision of myself at 150 pounds.  However, I didn’t have the Little Focus part – the constant effort required to achieve that Big Ass Goal. Once I got started down the path and maintained a persistence of vision, along with a strong dose of daily self honesty, the results started to show.  Over the course of 6 months I dropped 31 pounds and achieved a weight of 149 – a number I haven’t seen on a scale in over 30 years. 

Much of the credit for achieving this goal goes to me.  Hell, I’m the one that had to do the time, so to speak.  However, I will also say that the work of Leo Babauta, Michael Perry, and mi tres amigos – Ken Ammann, John Trujillo and Tom Nitopi, were instrumental in providing me guidance and examples of excellence to which I could aspire.

© 2011, Paul H. Burton. All rights reserved.

•  Adopt. Give the suggestion a try; see if it works for you.
• Adapt.  If the suggestion isn’t working for you, but you like the idea, try to Adapt it to your way of working.
• Reject.  If you can’t Adopt or Adapt a suggestion, toss it out and go to the next one.  We’re just looking for one or two ideas to help you regain command of your day.

With that said, here are my Top 10 Time Management Tips:

 1.  Create a Designated Work Space.  Identify a defined physical space – like your entire desktop - that you clear of everything (I mean EVERYTHING) except the one thing you need to work on right now.  Your DWS should look like a newborn conference room table.  It will help you eliminate the effects of peripheral vision which can be very distracting when piles of other work and your computer monitor are within that scope of vision.

2.  Use Robust Subject Lines.  Be very descriptive in the Subject line of each e-mail.  This will assist the reader determine how important your e-mail is in relation to the others in his/her inbox, as well as assist their ability to find and file it quickly in the future.

3.  Face Away From Traffic.  Facing the door – what I call the Command Central office setup – has the disadvantage of allowing your 120 degrees of peripheral vision affect your focus.  You look up every time someone walks by and, worst case scenario, you catch their eye and in they come!  Though not Feng Shui compliant, facing away from the door eliminates this self-inflicted distraction from your day.

4.  Conduct Regular Core Dumps. One of the leading causes of “noise” in our lives is the self-talk going on inside our heads.  “Gotta remember that.”  “Oh yeah, can’t forget that.”  These mental reminders cause our focus to ping pong around all day long. When you hear these ruminations going on, take a moment to jot the information down on a physical or digital sticky note.  Quell the internal symphony by capturing all the to-dos in a recorded form so you can focus on the exigencies of the day.

5.  Turn off new message alerts.  I can’t say it enough – turn new message alerts OFF!  These self-inflicted interruptions are riddling your ability to focus and be productive.  Just check your e-mail, texts and voice mails periodically throughout the day (even every 15 minutes if necessary) to remain responsive to those who need your attention.

6.  Pick Today’s One Thing.  A great way to feel productive and in charge of your workload is to pick ONE thing each day that you WILL get done.  At the very least, this one thing will move off our plate.  (Note, for you over-achievers out there, I said ONE.)

7.  Reduce Meeting Length by 25%.  Work fills the time allotted.  Thus, if we schedule meetings for 60 minutes, they’ll take 60 minutes.  However, if we schedule them for 45 minutes, they’ll take 45 minutes.  Shazam!  We just found 15 minutes in the day to get other stuff done.

8.  Take Short Breaks Throughout the Day.  Contrary to popular believe, this “life thing” ain’t a marathon. The brain just don’t work that way.  It’s more like a series of sprints.  Cater to your brain’s preference for sprinting by taking short breaks throughout the day.  Even a five minute walk around the building or a quick read of the daily newspaper allows your brain to take a much-needed breather before jumping in to the next big effort.

9.  Schedule Only Four Hours of Work Each Day.  We are all optimists.  We tend to think everything takes less time than it actually does.  As a result, we over-commit our time and end up begging for extensions from those to whom we owe work.  Begging for extensions is a waste of time – what I call activity with no corresponding productivity.  One solution to this conundrum is to only schedule yourself for four hours of work each day.  This means that when you are giving others an idea of when you can get something done, base it on a four-hour workday instead of an eight-hour workday.  That leaves four hours each day to deal with the inevitable emergencies that come up.

10.  Do One Thing at a Time.  Multi-tasking is an inefficient way to work.  There is a growing body of science that supports this conclusion, but just trying having a conversation with someone who is checking their e-mail at the same time to confirm this proposition.  Doing one thing at a time means you can be laser focused on that one thing.  Laser focus delivers all your brain’s resources on this one task resulting in increased efficiency and effectiveness.

There they are.  Ten of my most recommended time management tips.  Take them.  Leave them.  Pass them along.  Most importantly, though, consider each of them to determine where there’s a nugget of value in there for you.  After all, it IS all about you!

© 2011, Paul H. Burton. All rights reserved.