The Organized Executive
Bruce Breier
ORGANIZATIONAL TIME MANAGEMENT Quiz
To assess your organizational status, answer the following questions with a “yes” or a “no. “
- Do you and your management team have too much to do and not enough time to do it?
- Is there too much paper and not enough place to put it?
- Are there too many projects and not enough uninterrupted time to work on them?
- Are there too many meetings that are disorganized, unfocused, and run too long?
- Is the day filled with too many interruptions?
For how many questions did you answer “yes”? See below for your score:
- 0: Excellent. You are a time management expert.
- 1: Very good. Your time management system only needs a minor tune-up.
- 2: Good. You are probably more productive than most, but could still use improvement.
- 3: Avenge. You could use some tuning up in all five time management areas.
- 4: Poor. You probably need major tuning up in all five time management areas.
- 5: Disaster. You are in constant crisis management. Your time management systems need a complete overhaul.
FORMULA FOR SUCCESS
Today’s formula for managerial and executive success is based on three elements:
- Passion: Passion includes two components — loving to work and loving what you do.
- Discipline: Discipline requires having an effective system of managing these five key areas:
- Time
- Paper flow
- Projects
- People
- Strategic planning and managerial goal setting
- Implementation: Implementation is the follow-through, the putting into action of the first two points.
It’s essential to have all three elements working together. If you are passionate but undisciplined, or if you are disciplined but lack passion, you will probably have trouble following through on what you hope to accomplish.
Organized executives are very pleased and delighted (not just satisfied) with their systems, methods, and procedures for time, paper flow, project, and people management and the strategic planning process. They are very pleased and delighted with how effectively their systems and methods perform on a daily and weekly basis.
In the ‘90s, your goal should not be just to satisfy customers, but to delight them. If you aren’t very pleased or delighted with how organized you are, how will you please and delight your customers or clients? It’s difficult to delight customers if you feel disorganized at any level.
The Top 10 CHARACTERISTICS OF An ORGANIZED EXECUTIVE
- An organized executive is acutely clear regarding the description and definition of success for his or her position, and is technologically literate to ensure success on a daily and weekly basis.
Job descriptions are often ineffective in helping managers be successful. In the first place, they are typically not done for CEOs or senior level executives. When they are, they get reviewed so infrequently that they become meaningless documents.
More useful are managerial or executive goal programs, lists of priority goals that clarify the expectations of your position. Unfortunately, for lack of time and motivation, goal programs are rarely put in place at the top and middle levels of management. Crisis management has become so habitual that there is no lime to strategize the position. A success description is vital for any management person to be organized on any level.
There are many tools available today to increase the control we have over time, paper, and projects. Yet we have so little time to learn how to use them. Personal computers, software, voice mail, and electronic mail are all great tools, if we know how to use them. The organized executive knows how to use these efficiently and effectively.
- An organized executive is timely and responsive with all requests because he or she has adopted a personal policy of under-promising and over-delivering.
Responding to requests in a timely manner is critical for achieving and maintaining high levels of integrity within an organization. People who over-promise and under-deliver destroy trust and morale. A good organizational technique is to say ~yesu to the things you are assured of delivering, and to commit to realistic target dates or time frames for those things you might have difficulty delivering.
- An organized executive consistently allocates 30 minutes a day to perform daily planning.
During this 30-minute planning time, three things must happen:
- A recap of the day
- The processing of all the paper that came in that day
- The planning of tomorrow
Daily planning is best done the night before. Allocating the last 30 minutes of your work day to recap that thy, planning tomorrow, and processing paperwork will reap a number of benefits:
- You drive home slower and arrive in a better frame of mind.
- You relax more and sleep better.
- You wake up better and arrive at the office in a better frame of mind.
- Things tend to go smoother and more efficiently.
You also reduce overall stress and chronic preoccupation, which is an obstacle to effective communication, especially as it relates to listening. The daily planning meeting with yourself clears the mind, clears the desk, clears the spirit, energizes for evening leisure activities, and helps the next day start off effectively.
- An organized executive is uncluttered and stack-free in the working environment.
In the past five to eight years, the amount of paper coming into our lives has overtaken the amount going out. There is so much coming in that we have literally run out of space for it.
The “computerized society” was supposed to be a paperless society. Instead, we have become an automated society with more paper than ever. The avenge mid-size company receives 300 pages a thy from the fax machine alone. When combined with how infrequently we purge file cabinets, desk drawers, bookcases, and closets, we quickly run put of space. This leads to stacking and piling which causes clutter in the workplace.
There are many consequences to clutter. The main consequence is “subliminal screaming,” the feeling of being grabbed at all thy by the clutter that is constantly clamoring for your attention. Clutter can sap your passion, drain your energy, and reduce your productivity and effectiveness.
Allocate time to purge your office at least every six months. Start in the northeast corner and work your way down. Go through everything. You’ll be amazed (especially if you haven’t done it in awhile) at how much stuff there is that you no longer need.
The tools of purging are simple: trashbags for the papers you no longer need and want to recycle and Kleenex tissues for the tears that come out when you find things that you haven’t seen in awhile that bring back fond memories.
An organized executive believes that clutter and stacks produce a chronic feeling of demoralization, one that reduces passion for the job and the work thy. Being uncluttered and stack-free allows you to work without distractions and interruptions from screaming papers.
After purging, set up good filing systems so there is a place for everything. You should be able to access any piece of paper within 20 seconds.
- An organized executive is acutely clear regarding what constitutes a justified interruption, and only interrupts others when it is important ~j~4 urgent.
Most managers cite interruptions as the number one reason they aren’t as productive as they would like to be. Interruptions can be managed effectively by using the following process:
Diagnose the interruption. If it is important and urgent, interrupt. If not, use voice mail or E-mail. If those aren’t available, write down the issue. When you have three or four of these non-urgent messages, interrupt the person once and cover all the issues. The key is to be clear about the consequences of interruptions and develop a good system for managing them.
- An organized executive allocates time to prepare for meetings and appointments, and never leads an unprepared meeting.
A meeting that is unprepared should be postponed. Time is too precious these days; people don’t like to sit in meetings and feel their time is being wasted. A meeting leader should:
- Organize an agenda
- Clarify the purpose of the meeting
- Take good notes
- Prepare summations
- Have everybody who attends participate on some level
- An organized executive consistently allocates time to meet one-to-one with direct reports.
Provide each direct report with 15 to 30 minutes per week of your undivided attention. Allow them to bring progress reports, questions that need answers, problems that need solutions, and offer you an overview of the next seven to 14 days. Direct reports who get 15 to 30 minutes of your undivided attention will feel a sense of calm, control, clarity, and confidence for the days ahead. You can accomplish a great deal in a half-hour as long as you schedule it consistently and allow no interruptions whatsoever.
- An organized executive is an active goal-setter who understands that, once goals are finalized, they must be converted into projects that need to be managed.
Having a good project management system to manage goals is essential. An active goal-setter understands that goals are actually projects in disguise. They also make use of the software available to help manage projects.
- An organized executive is very clear as to when project overload sets in.
Busy executives tend to have very little uninterrupted time to work on their own projects. Overloading on projects can be demoralizing, causing people to work nights and weekends and try to fit in things whenever they can.
To manage project overload, meet with people every week to get a status report on their projects. This helps to keep confidence and motivation levels high and stress levels low.
- An organized executive is passionate, motivated, and enthusiastic about his or her position within the company.
The organized executive loves work and can’t wait to get to work in the morning, but not to the point where burnout and high stress levels are characteristic of what they do. If you aren’t feeling that passion, if you can’t wait to go home, it might be because your systems of organization need to be restructured.
RECOMMENDATIONS FOR BETTER ORGANIZATION
TIME MANAGEMENT: Either rejuvenate, or start, a system of daily planning. Allocate 30 minutes a day, preferably at the end of the day, to recap the thy and plan for tomorrow.
PAPER FLOW MANAGEMENT: Purge the office and then set up an effective filing system so there is a place for everything and everything is in its place.
PROJECT MANAGEMENT: in software or systems to streamline the tedious process of task management. A new software program called “Manage Pro” is a good project management system.
PEOPLE MANAGEMENT: Audit all standing meetings to determine which can be simplified, reduced in frequency, or eliminated altogether. Make sure that every meeting has a clear purpose and an effective agenda that allows participation from all who attend.
Strategic PLANNING: Timing is critical. All strategic plans should be finalized by the 15th of the month prior to the beginning of the fiscal year. It makes no sense to be strategizing for the year when the first quarter has already started.
There is no such thing as not enough time for a priority. If you find yourself buried in paper, projects, interruptions, or meetings, it could be that your priorities have become loosely defined. Take the time to determine the mission of your company, the purpose of your position, and the expectations and priorities of each management position. Then look at the effectiveness of your systems of time, paper, project, and people management. Take the time to improve; the time benefit can be tremendous.
THE TOP 10 CHARACTERISTICS OF THE ORGANIZED EXECUTIVE
(IN A NUTSHELL)
- An organized executive is acutely clear regarding the description and definition of success for his or her position and is technologically literate to ensure success on a daily and weekly basis.
- An organized executive is timely and responsive with all requests because he or she has adopted a personal policy of under-promising and over-delivering.
- An organized executive consistently allocates 30 minutes a day to perform daily planning.
- An organized executive is uncluttered and stack-free in the working environment.
- An organized executive is acutely clear regarding what constitutes a justified interruption and only interrupts others when it is important and urgent.
- An organized executive allocates time to prepare for meetings and appointments, and never leads an unprepared meeting.
- An organized executive consistently allocates time to meet one-to-one with direct reports.
- An organized executive is an active goal-setter who understands that, once goals are finalized, they must be converted into projects that need to be managed.
- An organized executive is very clear as to when project overload sets in.
- An organized executive is passionate, motivated, and enthusiastic about his or her position within the company.
The Organized Executive An Organizational Time Management Quiz by Bruce Breier