Practical Tools and Techniques For Rock Solid Time Management

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TIME MANAGEMENT

Get more done with less.

I just wanted to talk a little bit about time management and some of the keys that I’ve

used to get more out of less. Time is the most valuable asset that we’ve got. It goes every

second that passes and that’s why I’m honoured that you came to this workshop because

time being the most valuable asset and you’ve given me your time, so that’s why I want to

give as much back to you as I can.

Get it out of your head

If you haven’t read Getting Things Done by David

Allen, that’s a book that you need to read. I’ve read

a lot of time management books and, hands down

it’s the best book out there on time management.

Another really good one is The Effective Executive

by Peter Drucker as well. That’s another really good

one. I just want to give you some of the key

nuggets if I can from Getting Things Done.

The first thing I would suggest is that you carry a notebook and I always carry my notebook,

no matter where I go. Always you just write down everything. I got Richard Bandler to sign

my book after I took his notes but apparently he’s quite paranoid because a lot of people

have ripped him off in the past. He won’t sign a blank bit of paper, he wanted to sign over

my notes because that way I couldn’t take and replicate his signature. The moral of that

story was not so much about how paranoid he was but rather the importance of making

sure that you always carry a notebook just to get it out of your head.

Things float around, you’ll always have these ideas pop up into your head. It’s almost like

your brain is like a vacuum. It can only hold so much though and if it’s full, nothing new

will get in there. So you need to use your notebook to get all of your ideas out into a

notebook and that creates space and then new ideas will flood into it. So you should be

carrying a notebook with you wherever you go, just to get it out of your head.


The next thing, it’s important to use calendars the right way.

A lot of people use calendars for to do lists. The way that

you should use a calendar, I use Google Calendar and it is a

fantastic tool if you don’t use it. I’ll show you what it looks

like.

I always log in through Gmail because it’s got the links up the top. So here I’ve got SEO

workshops, I didn’t plan much the day before because I was just doing notes. You can

actually set up different calendars for different things. Green is my own personal things,

red is for work, I’ve even got a birthdays one as well and a few things like that. You can

even have team member calendars as well. I know when different team members are

coming into the office.

The way you should be using your calendar, and the good thing about the calendar as well,

when you use Google Calendar is, you can access it on your iPhone. So I’ve always got that

calendar on me. Rather than to do tasks, you should be entering in only appointments,

that’s what a calendar is for. A calendar is for entering appointments, here is an

appointment that I have at a later date and you’ll only enter in those. You need to create a

separate to do list for all of the different things that you do, otherwise you’ll find you don’t

get to your to do list and you’re constantly dragging things over. If you’ve got a written

diary as well, you’re constantly just moving things and rewriting them, that’s not what a

diary is for. A diary is for things that are on a certain day.

Then you can create to do lists which I keep separately. I use, I haven’t had as much success

with it as I first did, was Remember the Milk. That is a cool little tool for creating to do lists.

The way that David Allen talks about using them is, you make them area specific or person

specific. So I have a list of to dos when I’m at the office. I have a list of to dos or things that

I need to follow up on when I’m talking with Meagan. Or Ben will have a sheet, or Franz will

have a sheet where, basically, I’ll have under each person, here are all the things I need to

follow up on.

So that way, when I’m with them or I’m in that situation, I can grab that to do list that is

specific to that. So maybe you’ve got a set of phone calls that you need to make and you

create a list of, here are all the phone calls that I need to make and you have that list, so

you start to chunk things together. You might have half an hour free and instead of

breaking your day up making a phone call here and a phone call there, you say, right this is

the section where I’m going to be making phone calls and you power through ten phone

calls and it’s a lot more efficient to do it that way.


So I create these to do lists and I’m an absolute list maniac. I’ve just got lists everywhere

and hand written notes. It’s a system that I do to know I get it out of my head so I don’t

have to think about it and I come up with these new fantastic ideas and then I can process

that information later. I’ll scribble it down.

Usually I’ve got a couple of different stages. I’ll have notepads next to my bed, I’ve got that

notepad, I’ve got notepads in the car and I’ll scribble down on the notepad whenever

something pops into my mind, then I’ll rip that piece of paper off. Then when I get to the

office I have a to-sort pile. These are just all of my little scraps of paper.

It looks a little bit like a crazy person because there are just these scribbled notes but then

I’ll take those and I’ll process them and I’ll start to do things like I’ll put it into my calendar

where it’s a particular thing that I need to follow up on a specific day. Or I’ll add it to the to-

do list that is associated with a different person.

Remember the Milk is good because you don’t have to rewrite things. When I do my to-do

list, I’m constantly finding I’m rewriting it. Even though I tried to do Remember the Milk and

I used it for a long time, I still kind of use it but there’s something about writing for me, just

having it written down. So my actual to do lists I do that.

Also James Schramko talks about the idea of having to don’t lists as well – the idea that

there are certain tasks you shouldn’t be doing, so write down what those tasks are and

then don’t get caught up in doing them.

Creating rituals

The next thing is creating rituals. We’re all

creatures of habit and you need to make

sure that you build the right habits. The fact

of the matter is, you don’t get overweight

overnight, it is a gradual process. I think if

you went to bed one night and then you

woke up the next morning and you were

overweight, then that would be quite a shock for you and you’d do something really

quickly about it. But it’s a gradual process, it is these small steps, these small habits that

have built up over time but then cause that end result.


I just use that as an example but I mean that applies to absolutely everything. Long term

success is based on these small term rituals and these habits. A lot of people think, oh, it’s

ok, I won’t worry about sending that email now or going after that particular money task

now, I can do it tomorrow. But it’s when you build all of those little tasks up, find out what

your ritual is and what little tasks you need to do and make sure you’re building a set of

rituals, that is going to get you the outcome that you’re looking for.

Sometimes I do it and sometimes I don’t, but this is usually how I like to start a day. I’ve got

a person who I go and see, she is like my guru. She’s like, you know how in The Matrix how

Neo goes see the old lady and she’s baking the cakes and so on? I’ve got someone like that

on the Gold Coast who I go see every few months.

One of the insights she gave me last time is to create this ritual in the morning and I try

and do it. You wake up, you’ll just have a few moments, you’ll meditate or you’ll breathe or

whatever. You’ll just sit quietly for five or ten minutes and set your intention right for the

start of the day. Just give yourself a moment to breathe and think about what it is that

you’re going to do. Most people don’t stop and have a chance to think.

Your mind is so powerful and this is another thing that I learned from Richard Bandler. You

can create these systems in your mind to do things that you never thought were possible. I

was preparing for this seminar and what I did was, I created a system or a machine in my

mind. This is going to sound a little bit crazy but I created a machine in my mind that I

would set going just before I went to sleep.

What this machine would do, it would go through all of my past memories and pull out the

ones that are going to be important for me to be able to deliver what it is I needed to

deliver for today. I set this machine going so when I went to sleep it would be working in

my subconscious and then when I sat down to write the presentation, they flowed a lot

more easily. I know that sounds really crazy and a bit hokey but there’s something to be

said for crazy and hokey sometimes.

Start by meditating and breathing and you can do a little bit of exercise. It’s very good to

start off a day by doing a little bit of exercise. Then I’ll get ready. Try to eat healthily. If you

can start the day eating healthily, it’ll set you up for the rest of the day.


I’ve got this thing I got from Anthony Robbins at Unleash the Power Within. It’s this juice

thing that I make and I make it about three or four times a week. It’ll have carrots,

tomatoes, beans and celery and I’ll cut it up in the morning, I’ll put it in a blender and I’ll

add a bit of chili so it’s got a bit of taste and I’ll squirt a bit of lemon in it and I’ll put some

almonds in at the top and I’ll eat it. It’s so thick you have to eat it with a spoon and it takes

about twenty minutes or half the day to eat it. Meagan’s probably seen me eat it

throughout the day and I’ll eat that throughout the day.

These are the types of things, you put them into play, these are those long term things that

will have long term effect. If I start my day that way, I tend to eat a little bit better for the

rest of the day. I tend to try and take a little bit more care of myself because I’ve set the

intention right at the start of the day.

Also, before you get to work as well, before you even start a session of anything, it’s good

to plan out what it is you’re going to do. Get clear what you’re going to work on for the

day. When I get into work, the first thing I’ll do is, I’ll try and hold off, even though

sometimes it is very hard, I won’t open my emails and I’ll sit there and say, what am I going

to work on first? I think that’s most important, otherwise you can get lost in doing your

emails.

Day planning tips

When you make that plan, do the most important

things first. That comes from Stephen Covey, Seven

Habits of Highly Effective People. If you haven’t read

that, it is an excellent book. This reminds me, there

is a website, if you haven’t signed up yet, it’s

audible.com and that’s well worth checking out.

There are a whole lot of books, spoken. You can sign up for $30 a month and you get two

or three credits and you can download books. You want to be constantly flooding your

mind with as many of these things as you can.

You hop in the car with me and I’ve always got audio playing on my player. I don’t really

listen to music that much and I’ll listen to different courses, I’ll put them in two speed

which is another little tip that I’ll come to in a little bit.


Start off by doing the most important things first when you plan out your day. Go for those

things that make your money. That should be where you start your day. Don’t start with

email and get caught in that trap. Don’t get caught in the to-dos. As much as I do write

these to do lists, always, when you can, stop, take a moment, think about what your

outcome is and then refocus and then make sure that you’re working on achieving that

outcome.

Do the brain dead things at the end of the day. If you can, hold off doing emails.

Sometimes you have to do it in the morning, but if you can, hold it towards the end of the

day. Any other menial tasks leave until the end. The morning is when you’ll have your most

creativity. I know some people differ. Some people work best at night, other people work

best in the morning but I’ve found at least for myself, I work best in the morning,

preferably when no one is in the office because then that is when I’m at my most creative

and I don’t have any distractions.

The other important thing is, you want to make sure that you take lunch and take breaks.

It’s funny, I had a guy who came and worked with me. He had an apprenticeship. I thought

I’d get myself an apprentice. He came in and he worked four days with me and this was

early on. He just thought it was normal that people didn’t take any breaks, didn’t have any

lunch and would just work solidly all the way through. Then we started to realize how

important it is. When we take a break, we jump out the front and play Connect 4 or play a

little bit of Uno and it will take your mind off whatever it is you’re working on and then

when you come back in you will be a lot fresher. That’s really key, having those breaks.

Tools

Some of the tools that I use that will make sure

that you’re more productive. If you haven’t got

yourself RoboForm if you’re on a PC, get

yourself RoboForm or One Password. It’s a way

where you can enter in one password and it

will log all of your other passwords. So rather

than having one password that unlocks everything, I know some of you are guilty of that,

where you’ve got that one password and it unlocks everything, it’s probably not very good

security.


You can use programs like RoboForm and One Password

to log all of your passwords and it makes it a lot easier

to log into things as well. Basically it just stores

everything, you enter in one password. When you want

to log into something, you press the button, it’ll

automatically take you to the page, enter the details in

and log you in. It’s just one of those time savers.

Using your iPhone, I think that is a fantastic tool. I know there’s the Android, that’s another

one. Some of these new phones just mean that you can make use of time that otherwise

would have just got lost. So I look at RSS feeds when I can. When I’ve got a spare moment,

I’ll be looking through to see what is going on in my industry. I can also use it for taking

video, audio, photos, all those sorts of things.

Then we come to the idea of Faster Audio. Faster

Audio is another great tool that I use. It will speed up

your audio two fold. If you have got an iPhone 3Gs, it

has got an option in there to play your audio books

in two speed. You will be surprised at how quickly

you adapt to listening to everything in two speed.

Just be careful though, if you start to listen to everything in two speed, you’ll start to talk a

lot faster and then that’s how you can motor through everything that we’ve gone through

today. That’s what I’m used to hearing, so this is the internal dialogue that is going on.

It means you can consume twice as much information in half the time. So it’s definitely

something worth checking out. Skype, I mentioned those Call Recorders, it’s a really

important issue to be recording all of your calls. A couple of other little time saving things

I’m checking out are TextExpander and Simplenote and SendOutCards.

TextExpander is this cool little application for Mac

where you can type in some shortcuts and, for

example, you might type in AAA. Every time you

type in AAA next to each other, it will then replace

that text with some pre written text that you’ve

already done. So it might be a signature at the end of your email. Rather than typing out

the same signature every time, you can use TextExpander. Maybe you’ve got a question

that comes through quite frequently. You can program it into TextExpander, assign a little

character to it and then it just makes it, you don’t have to rewrite it.


Just these little tips, if I’m saving you, with some of these things, if I buy back for you one

or two hours’ worth of your time each day, or an hour, you multiply that over a week, or

you multiply that over a year, then you multiply that over your lifetime, you guys owe me

big.

Then you’ve got Simplenotes, that is another one as

well and SendOutCards. Actually Simplenotes is just a

way you can sync it with your iPhone and it’s a way to

be able to write in little notes, have it synced up in one

place. It’s almost in the Cloud, so no matter where you

are, you always have this noting system. So rather than me scribbling on my little bits of

paper, I’m going to try and do it in the Cloud and then it all syncs back up so when I get to

the office and it’s really searchable.

SendOutCards is another thing as well. Pete Williams,

who you might see in the video as well, he’s somebody

who introduced me to SendOutCards. Just write it down

and have a look into it, it’s something that might be

good.

80/20

So the 80:20 of this is, get a Mac. I used to be a

PC person for maybe 25 or 26 years of my life.

The last couple of years I’ve been using Mac and

I think they’re better machines. You’ll get more

productivity out of them, yes, get a Mac.

Unsubscribe from a lot of gurus as well. You can

unsubscribe from everyone bar me and then maybe pick one or two other people who you

want to follow. It’s really easy to get caught up in the email thing. I was talking about you

constantly feel like the new product is getting launched and you’re getting caught up in

whatever the next greatest offer is.

Sometimes you just need to focus and you need to shut all of that off. I talked about gurus

there but that should be the same with anything. Find one or two people in your niche

who are doing what it is that you want to do really, really well. Sign up and consume as

much of their content as you can and then throw everything else to the side. Make sure

that you focus on one or two projects at any one point in time.

Business

Practical Tools and Techniques For Rock Solid Time Management