3 Areas of a Leader’s Time
This first appeared on The Resilient Leaders Podcast.
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Every leader must be asking themselves this question: how should I think about how and where I invest my time?
Well… I’m glad you asked.
There are three primary areas of a leader’s time.
Think time
Face time
Admin time
Resilient leaders think carefully and strategically about their time. If you think about a pie chart, your time as a leader can be divided into these three areas. Now, there is no magic formula for how much time you should devote in each of these areas. In fact, it fluctuates, depending upon what is happening in the world and in your life. That’s part of resiliency. Being aware of and committed to your principles, but adapting to the situation.
Every leader needs some think time. Time to reflect. I do these in three specific ways:
Daily
Weekly
Every 6 weeks – I get away and look back on the past 6 weeks and ask, “What happened to my time? Where did I invest it? What did I do – and how does that inform how I think about the next 6 weeks of my life and leadership? What goes do I want to set? And I use a matrix I learned from another leader: called 6 things in 6 weeks – what are the six things I want to accomplish – 6 stretch goals – to occur in the next six weeks?
Leaders who just do, react, act – are full of frenetic activity but don’t invest in quality time of reflection. It may seem noble that you are busy, but if its not purposeful you’re just running on a treadmill. Lots of activity, but you aren’t going anywhere.
You have to fight for this in your schedule. Fight for it. Plan it. Schedule it in – and don’t let anything interrupt that time because it is crucial.
Every leader also needs face time. Leaders don’t lead organizations or institutions or churches or companies – they lead people. We need to spend time with people. You can’t build trust with others or a team of people if you don’t spend time with them.
Face time with others includes: the people you lead, learning and interacting from and with others. As a Christian, face time also includes time with God. I also spend time each morning in prayer and Scripture reading. I spend time with God and I want to learn, listen, and pray.
And every leader needs to invest in admin time. I know, I know… this is the dreaded administrative and logistical elements. Some leaders like this… but most leaders I know dread it. We need some organizational elements. Email, returning calls, setting up meetings and booking flights and filling out that paperwork that is crucial.
Some leaders have the opportunity to have administrative help, which can help provide support in this area even more.
When I know I am feeling off as a leader is when these three areas are out of whack.
If I have spent a lot of time with people and working on administrative elements, but not a lot of time thinking and reflecting, I can lose sight of what’s important to me. I can be going so fast I lose my focus, I forget why I am doing what I am doing. I need think time to ground and center me.
If I have spent time in reflection and get buried in administrative detail, but fail to spend time with people, I can lose touch with others. I can lose the pulse of what is going on with my people. This can be dangerous.
If I have investing time in think time and time with people, but no admin time, the details can get away from me and things slip. I miss a meeting, people stop emailing me because I never respond, I am in a constant state of stress because I haven’t planned ahead.
Again, this is not intended to be static or formulaic. We need the wisdom and discernment to know what is needed this week or this month or this season. Sometimes you need to major in one area and minor in the other two areas. But we need think time to assess what is needed in this season or this week or today.
Let me tell you about one of the habits I developed several years ago that has dramatically impacted how I lead – and it only takes me 10 minutes a week. Every Sunday night I sit down with my calendar for a few minutes and engage in some think time. I assess the week ahead and plan it accordingly. At the beginning I used to color code my calendar – think time was yellow, face time was blue, admin time was red. I don’t do that any more, but it was a helpful way to visually look at my schedule and see how it was being divided up.
This is an important principle: know yourself and your role.
You may be an extravert and need others to fuel you – so your face time may be more than someone who is an introvert.
You may be wired to handle administrative details - and you may enjoy it (which is hard for me to grasp!) – and that may be what gives you life.
You may love think time and want to journal and sit in coffee shops and think about the future and process life for hours each day. That may be a strength, but don’t neglect the other two important areas. You may want to spend more time there – but not all your time.
All this to say, find a balance – the balance that works for you and your specific role.
And recognize seasons, when the balance will shift. And adjust to those. Doing so helps you build your resiliency muscle.
So, as you think about your week, sit down for 10 minutes on Sunday evening and on a piece of paper write out three categories (or maybe you want to draw a pie chart) with the three areas: think time, facetime and admin time. And map out your week.
Try it this week and see what happens.