In a previous post I talked about managing myself which I believe must
be done before you manage others, if only for the sake of leadership
One of the task that I put on my weekly goals, was to find out where I was spending my time.
So I wrote next to each daily tasks, how long I spend on the task. Using David Seah Daily Goal Tracker I filled in the 15 minute boxes and summed them up at the end of the week.
What I found was astonishing:
- I spent 2 hours a day on e-mails
- My most effective hours are between 10-12
- A few hours after lunch 3-4pm, I have the least effective hours (sometimes I found that at 4pm I didn’t do anything in the last hour)
- I spent 55% of my time in management tasks.
- 40% of my time was in meetings.
- I spend a small amount of time on unit testing and reviewing Typemock Isolator
This data is priceless and helped me refocus my efforts dramatically. I stopped wasting time on e-mails, I put the difficult tasks in the morning, and I try to eat a lighter lunch 😉