Your Calendar Reflects Your Priorities

Since hard choices are unavoidable, what matters is learning to make them consciously, deciding what to focus on and what to neglect, rather than letting them get made by default.?

- Oliver Burkeman,?Four Thousand Weeks?

Two questions:

1. What is your time management system? 2. What is your process once your daily plan implodes???

We have the privilege of working with a range of construction?pros:?executive leaders and boots-on-the-ground management, smart men and women in the field building—and those selling to those who build.

We work with English speakers and Spanish speakers.?

The insight we’ve earned is that around 90% of the construction industry struggles with time management.?

Age. Race. Gender. Ethnicity. Education. Title.? Marital status.

None of these variables seem to matter much.

Humans struggle to manage their time well—especially so in the fast-paced, get-‘er-done, time-is-money, schedule-is-king world of construction.??

And this is probably not surprising to you.

And if it’s not surprising, is it odd then . . . that we collaborate with each other every day knowing we’re inherently poor at managing our time . . . and yet we’re not making much improvement?

Come to think of it, does it ever feel like all these communication tools (Slack! Trello! Just text me, bro!) designed to save us time make us even more distracted and stressed?

Have you ever read Hofstadter's Law—It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter's Law—and thought, “Ha. So true. Love that.”?

Let’s revisit our two questions:

1. WHAT IS YOUR TIME MANAGEMENT SYSTEM?

It’s not a To Do List. That’s a smart activity for emptying a cluttered mind, but it’s not a system.?

It’s not Outlook. That’s a helpful digital calendar that makes it easy to make and accept appointments, but also not a system.?

It’s not a notebook. “A short pencil is better than a long memory,”?I was told my first week on a job site. Yes, it’s a useful tool.?No, it’s not a system.?

It’s not OneNote / Evernote / iPhone Notes, et al. Those are digital note taking apps. See above.

2. WHAT IS?YOUR PROCESS?ONCE YOUR DAILY PLAN IMPLODES????

The candid answer for most is,?“Well, I simply run like hell and put out as many fires as I can . . . and then check email before I go home—or at home. Or both.”?????

Over the past decade we’ve been helping construction folks manage their time better and answer these two questions with intentionality and confidence.?

We call it the?Weekly Game Plan.?You can?download it for free here?using the password hartmann.?In the video below?we explain how it works (and there's a?link to?the?podcast episode?below where Erik The Producer and I discuss it as well).

The defining feature of this system is the?quick, deliberate process to execute when your day blows up.?

And your days always blow up! It’s construction—managing chaos is what we do.

The Weekly Game Plan allows you to document how your day blew up and learn from the negative—and the positive—patterns that emerge.

Learning from your past mistakes is always optional, but the?Weekly Game Plan?provides you with a daily opportunity to do so.?

Watch the video.? Download the file.

Help yourself—and your frantic teammates whose time management system?involves writing notes on 2x4 cutoffs?and the palms of their hands. (Could be elements of a system, but?not a good one.)?

Yes, we sell a paper version, but you can?download it for free here. (And yes, we teach this—and include it—in our?Sales Fundamentals Workshop. If you're leading or executing sales or business development efforts, you should absolutely attend.)?