Make your minutes matter

Use time it would be easy to waste for things you need to do

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning,
This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
tip is to make your minutes matter. Use time you
would otherwise be wasting to do something you actually need

(00:26):
to do at some point, so your best time is
available for your most important pursuits. Everybody has moments of
running behind when everything takes longer than you reasonably expected,
But from time to time we also all have moments
when we are ahead of schedule. Maybe you need to

(00:49):
leave home at eight thirty for an appointment, but you
are ready to go at eight ten. At times like that,
it's easy to wander around the house tidying, But what
if instead use that twenty minutes to batch the little things? Hopefully,
As someone who listens to this podcast, you have a
running list of tasks you know you need to get

(01:10):
to at some point. Generally, you set aside a chunk
of time to do all of these, But when a
low opportunity cost chunk of time presents itself and you
know you won't be able to use this time for
other things, this is a great occasion to plow through them.

(01:32):
In twenty minutes you could fill out that permission slip,
order that birthday present, respond to those two meeting invites
for next week, and book a doctor visit through the
online portal, and hopefully still be out the door at
eight twenty five. To give yourself a little buffer. Now,
when you get back to your desk after your appointment,

(01:53):
the decks are clear and you can dive into your
highest priority project for the day. And now, to be clear,
I am not saying you need to clear the decks
in general before getting to your high priority stuff. One
of the reasons I tell people to batch the little
things and then designate a time for doing all the
little things is that I don't want people to feel

(02:14):
like they have to get through all the little stuff
before they get to the big things. If you tell
yourself you'll get through all the little things in the
morning before you start the day's important work, you will
likely run out of steam and then get to your
first meeting, and you won't have the focused time you
are hoping for. But I also know that small bits

(02:36):
of time are incredibly hard to use well. People check
email or read headlines, They check the comments on social
media posts. If you are just looking for the quick
dopamine hit that these things create. Then when you have
bits of time that are hard to use well, you
may as well do the things that you know you're
going to need to do at some point, so not us.

(03:00):
When you have one of these awkward gaps, keep a
list near you. Then you can make your minutes matter.
Don't try to cram in too much. I don't want
people to be late. If you have a tendency to
be late places, then don't do this at all, because
you are probably misjudging how much time you have. That said,

(03:22):
one of the reasons people wind up working later than
they want to is that they don't make the minutes matter.
During the day, small bits of time get wasted on
things that didn't really have to happen. As for things
that do have to happen at some point, the temptation
to clear the decks first during uninterrupted stretches of time

(03:43):
can be strong, So then there are no actual uninterrupted
stretches of time. For important work that requires focus, you
have to wait until all your meetings are done, and
then things take longer than you want because if very
few people are at their best at say five pm.

(04:04):
Better to treat your minutes like they matter. Use low
opportunity cost time for the things that must get done.
Then you can keep other stretches open for things that
move you forward. In the meantime. This is Laura. Thanks

(04:24):
for listening, and here's to making the most of our time.
Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas,
or feedback, you can reach me at Laura at Laura
vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia.

(04:54):
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