MM#143--Drucker's Discretionary Time

Welcome to the theory to action podcast, where we examine the timeless treasures of wisdom from the great books in less time to help you take action immediately, and ultimately to create and lead a flourishing life. Now, here's your host, David Kaiser.
Hello, I'm David and welcome back to another Mojo minute. Recently, we have been chatting about time management, I thought this was extremely relevant to our conversation when I came across just how the great Peter Drucker, the author of the super modern classic, the effective executive, when I came across how he manages his time, and how he helps other executives manage their time. Let's go to his classic text for our first quote. Quote, effective executives in my observation do not start with their tasks. They start with their time and they do not start out with planning. They start by finding out where their time actually goes. Then they attempt to manage their time and to cut back on unproductive demands on their time. Finally, they consolidate their discretionary time into the largest possible continuing units. This three step process is one recording time to managing time and three consolidating time it is the foundation of executive effectiveness. Effective executives know that time is the limiting factor. The output limits of any process are set by the scarcest resource. In the process we call accomplishment. This is time and of quote. Ah, so one of the most effective executives in our day and age does what most of us does not do. And that is the real key, isn't it? He does not out the he does not start out, planning his time. Rather, he starts out by recording his time and he finds out where all the time is going. Which makes total sense. It's kind of a moment, isn't it? Then once he finds out where all the extra time is going, he begins to manage that time finding those areas where he is rather unproductive in his work, then he consolidates this, quote discretionary time into the largest possible continuing units. To how about you? How's your time management coming these days? Could you perhaps become more effective with manager time with directors discretionary time method if so, super. Just to recap, it's a quick three step process. Step one, record your time. Remember, to not plan your time, we want to avoid that we want to record our time. First. To do this, you can jot down timestamps into a journal, or on your phone or perhaps a daily planner, I use an app called a bug tracker Pro on my phone, which has helped me get better in this area of life, I would recommend doing a week or two just to see where all the time is going. Moving on a step to manage your time after tracking and recording your time for a week or so you will immediately notice those areas where you're not nearly as productive as you could or should be, and where your resources could be better used elsewhere. So be sure to cut back on those unproductive areas. And then you can pivot to step three, consolidate your time. If you're able as Drucker suggest, try to consolidate these into bigger time blocks. When I'm most successful, and most productive in my own work, I get huge times. Huge, huge chunks of time together. And those are super good and they're super effective. Remember back to our mojo minutes on deep work, numbers 8182 and 83. Practically I would suggest your goal is to try to get an hour of focus time as your number one priority that day. And then build those up. If you can get an hour different spots here and there. Whether that's time with work or just maybe time with the family doesn't have to be work. Those consolidated chunk times are very, very effective no matter what it is. So you're goal is to try to get to an hour to an hour and a half. Like I said, these time chunks, if you can group them together is what Drucker talks about as being most effective.
And plus, we know it works because Drucker helps to coach executives. And he's done that for the last 25 years and how to manage their business and more importantly, on the only precious resource, we will never get back. And that is our time. If you think about it, we can lose money. And we would hate that. But if you do lose it, you can always earn more back. We can't replace time, it's the most precious resource we have. So much so that later in the chapter drecker tells us this going back to the book, quote, time is also a unique resource of the other major resources money is actually quite plentiful. We long ago should have learned that it is the demand for capital rather than the supply thereof, which sets the limit to economic growth and activity, people the third, limiting resource one can hire, the one can rarely hire enough good people. But one cannot rent hire by or otherwise, obtain more time and have quote. So very, very good stuff there. And today's Mojo minute, if you are ready to manage your time with greater effectiveness, be sure to try out directors discretionary time method. It's an easy one to three step process. And if you do, I think you will agree it is quite a nugget of wisdom. Plus, for sure you will be living a flourishing life because you will be flourishing with your time.
Thank you for joining us. We hope you enjoyed this theory to action podcast, be sure to check out our show page at T Mojo academy.com where we have everything we discussed in this podcast as well as other great resources. Until next time, keep getting your mojo on.
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