PRACTICE 6 TOOL

ASSESSMENT: DO A PERSONAL ENERGY AUDIT

How are you doing with managing your prime sources of energy? Rate yourself in the following areas, with 0 as “never” and 10 as “always.” Where you come up short, commit to improve.

SCORE PER AREA:  0–6=PROBLEM AREA  7–15=AVERAGE  16–20=DOING GREAT

Assess your low scores—are there any immediate action items you could do to boost one of the drivers? It’s possible you could integrate some lifestyle changes tonight that could pay big dividends in the hours and days to come.

Low scores represent an opportunity to increase your energy. Here’s our best advice to improve each driver.

Sleep

• Understand how vital sleep is to your overall health, specifically your brain health. The renowned neuroscientist Dr. Daniel Amen likens sleep to “washing your brain” each night.^I Seven hours of sleep is the standard; don’t be shamed into believing the myth that four hours of sleep is sustainable.
• Create space between your active, full-on day and your bedtime. Find a routine that works for you. Personally, I turn off my phone and leave it out of reach from my bed. (I don’t have enough impulse control to have it within reach.) I prepare a cup of herbal tea and write a few lines in my journal, summarizing the day. Finally, I read if it’s not too late. I try to avoid reading business books that make me think about all the things I want to focus on the following day. Instead, I read fiction. A note of warning here: If the book is too good, it works against me, because I can’t put it down!
• Relaxing activities and routines, such as evening yoga and meditation, can also aid sleep. I try to avoid a late-evening run or workout, as that keeps me up longer. Identify what type of activities calm you.
• If it works for you, try a “go to sleep” app. But watch out for the temptation to use your phone to check messages.
• Your own best advice to yourself:
  
  

Relax

• Don’t confuse relaxation with numbness. If your idea of fun is primarily TV binges, gaming marathons, or long naps, your relaxation might be draining rather than renewing you. Note how you feel afterward. Do you truly feel better? If not, try swapping those “relaxing” activities for a hobby that actually increases your energy.

Recently after an exhausting week, I parked myself on the couch for a relaxing Friday night with a movie and a huge barrel of Hi-Chew candies. The next morning, I woke up in the same spot, surrounded by (and this is not an exaggeration for dramatic effect) more than one hundred Hi-Chew wrappers. I felt more tired than ever.

Are any of your go-to relaxation methods actually exhausting? Could you replace them with something creative, active, or social?

—TODD

• Take mental mini-breaks throughout the day. Before entering a meeting or making an important phone call, I try to remind myself to take a few deep breaths to sharpen my focus. Science backs me up: I’m getting more oxygen to my brain, and thus will have an easier time focusing. Many of us unconsciously hold our breath or breathe more shallowly during stress, and the more cognizant you are of that, the more oxygenated your brain and body will be—thus helping to sustain your energy.
• Be proactive about scheduling a longer mental break. I regularly plan what I call an “ego day,” which means going to a different setting to think and reflect. (Todd calls it a “me day”; Scott calls it a “corporate retreat for one.”) It doesn’t have to be at a luxury spa; my parents’ empty kitchen was once the site of a brilliant ego day. Check in with yourself: Are you on track with the goals and targets you’ve set? Are you headed in the right direction? If you’re heading into an extremely hectic period, try to proactively schedule an ego day afterward. That’s the key: if you don’t plan them, they won’t happen.
• Learn new things. Investing in yourself is not just about how you recover, but how you grow. Certain types of learning can be both relaxing and rewarding. Pursue a new interest or skill that might take some time to develop. This stretches your mental capability, making you more multidimensional in the process. Try learning the basics of a new language, writing a book, or taking a class. Scott once told me about a friend who attended a professional conference—only to realize that she’d gone to the wrong room and was accidentally attending a presentation on high-performance boat engines. She enjoyed this unexpected detour so much that she made it an annual tradition to attend a workshop on a new topic. What a fun idea—I’ve registered Scott for an anime conference in Moscow next winter.
• Your own best advice to yourself:
  
  

Connect

• Volunteer. Consider giving back to your community and those in need.
• Invest in your social network. Your social relationships help you grow and develop. Surround yourself with people who give you energy rather than drain it. Reflect on your “friend list”—maybe it’s time to declutter it.
• Create special moments. When someone in our family has a birthday, we always have birthday events rather than giving gifts. We’ve done a pottery class, horseback riding—anything we haven’t tried before. It becomes an opportunity to explore and see new things together. Could you do something similar with your family and friends—or even your team?
• Reach out to someone in need. When I’m stressed out or feeling down, I like to reach out to someone who might be in a more challenging situation than me, and ask how I can help. It puts my own challenges into perspective; but most important, it makes them feel better, and it might be a chance to rejuvenate a neglected relationship.
• Your own best advice to yourself:
  
  

Move

• Treat exercise as a luxury. It’s easy to think of exercise as a must. And you do have to do it, because your life depends on how much you move. But instead of thinking of it as a chore, I look at it in a different way: I get to do this luxurious, one-hour yoga session, or whatever it is. I changed my paradigm from “exercise is drudgery” to “exercise is my special time.” It’s a way to treat myself.
• Think outside the gym. Exercise doesn’t need to just happen in the gym. Research shows that it’s not how much time you spend there that counts, but how much movement you incorporate into your everyday life. So get up and move from your desk. During my client work sessions, I ask my participants to stand up in the middle of class to do ten squats. That is a true energy boost!
• Use technology. You can use some brilliant apps for a quick workout. All it takes is twenty minutes to feed your brain with focus, energy, and happy thoughts.
• Get your heart pumping. When it comes to mental and overall health, working out creates stamina and better results. Pick any activity you enjoy that increases your pulse.
• Find your people. Having a training partner increases the likelihood that you’ll actually work out. Combine exercise with your role as a friend, partner, or parent. I do yoga and badminton with my daughters, run with my friend (time that also doubles as peer coaching), and have been part of online communities when my training needed a little motivational push.
• Your own best advice to yourself:
  
  

Eat

• Remember the main purpose of eating is to fuel yourself with energy. We eat to boost brainpower, not just to satisfy hunger. The next time you’re choosing what to eat, ask, “Which of these choices will give me more energy?” For example, whole foods will sustain you longer than processed foods, fruits and nuts will keep you better focused than quick-hit carbohydrates, etc.
• Inventory your food choices last week. Generally, how much of your diet consisted of energy-sustaining foods vs. energy-depleting foods? If you’re not where you want to be, try one of the great tools and apps that track your nutrition.
• Make your own “fast food.” Store healthy snacks in your desk, locker, or bag. If you go to the trouble of bringing it and have it right in front of you, you’re less likely to sneak a bite of the leftover birthday cake in the break room.
• Hold healthy lunch meetings. If your Tuesday lunch is catching up with a peer over a hearty salad, you’re scoring a win-win of social connection and energy-boosting eating—much better than eating cold pizza alone at your desk.
• Prepare for the postwork hunger. You’ll likely be most tired and vulnerable to bad choices after work. At home, have healthy snacks ready so when you walk in the door, you don’t end up at the bottom of a potato-chip bag.

• Your own best advice to yourself:
  
  

Would you add another energy driver to your list? When you’re under stress, which energy driver do you crave the most? Which one is your go-to driver? Which one do you avoid?

Take a long-term approach to managing your energy. You’ll most likely have times at work and home that will be more hectic than others. Our colleague Roger Merrill, coauthor of the time-management book First Things First, calls these moments “seasons of imbalance.” You can probably think of a few: tax season for accountants, welcoming a new child for parents, back to school for educators. These can be some of the most exciting times in life—and they’re also exhausting. During those times, we cut out certain priorities and goals to survive (and gym time is usually the first to go).

After everything calms down, we often forget to bring back those other priorities. Before you know it, imbalance becomes your new normal, even though it might not be necessary or sustainable. Catching yourself as you transition out of a busy period is difficult but extremely important to reinstate your healthy habits. Go back to the gym, spend time coaching a certain team member, or eat a proper lunch away from your desk.

Remember my example earlier in this chapter of starting a new job and finding myself at the office too early? I did work intensively, even after the six-month mark, and cut out several tasks in my life to focus on the most important ones. But that didn’t mean I never went back to the gym. While it didn’t fit into my life during that period, I have since had much more time to invest in myself. My daughters are now teenagers, and I’ve been able to run half marathons and become a yoga instructor. Recently Scott interviewed famed fitness and goal-achievement expert Jillian Michaels, who reinforced the idea that people can have it all, just not at the same time.

Seasons of imbalance are okay as long as they stay seasons. The problem is when the season turns into a lifestyle. Keep an eye out for temporary periods of stress that have no end point.

SKILL 2: MANAGE YOUR TIME

We’ve noticed a huge shift in time management in the past decade. We used to teach people how to distinguish between high and low priorities and help them identify and cut deadweight out of their schedules. But now people are deciding between competing priorities, all of which are important. We at FranklinCovey have termed this new leadership competency “decision management.” Unfortunately, there aren’t many time-wasters to eliminate; rather, it’s about somehow choosing between landing an important project, coaching a distraught team member, and making it home for family dinner—all vitally important.

Many of us spend our time and energy reacting to whatever stress, demands, or urgencies come our way—whether or not they help us achieve our highest priorities. Todd calls this defeating tendency “the pinball syndrome” in his book Get Better. Managing time in this environment is as much about choosing what not to do as choosing what to do. You’ll need to discern what is important, then have the courage to say “no” or “not now” to what isn’t—which is uncomfortable and at times even risky.

Define the leader you want to be. To know what to say no to, you must first define your big yes—what’s most important to you. Years from now, what do you wish your team would say about you? What are your leadership values and priorities?

Choose your priorities—and share them. You’re probably not going to have a problem coming up with important ways to fill your days. Just reading this book has hopefully given you lots of ideas; but that may feel overwhelming if you don’t have a way to fit them into your jam-packed calendar.

Carefully pick your priorities and, equally important, decide what not to do. Once you choose your priorities, do your very best to stick to them. When you are in the midst of the whirlwind of day-to-day urgencies, you have to keep to your plan in order to achieve your goals. One of the downsides of being an effective leader is that your colleagues, boss, and team will come to you asking for input, support, and new projects. The only person protecting your own time is most likely going to be you.

I find that the easiest way for me to say no to things is if I’m 100 percent clear on what I’m spending my time on instead, and why. Being able to articulate that “why” to others will help you maintain healthy relationships.

Sharing your priorities and goals is a great thing to do, not only when being asked for help, but in general. Once said out loud, they become more real, to yourself and others. As we discussed in earlier practices, you don’t want your priorities to be a secret from your team. Many of your priorities should be aligned with their priorities in one way or another.

Stay flexible when urgencies arise. Even if you’ve carefully structured your time, the day will not go as planned and urgencies will arise—more or less depending on the nature of your work. So leave some space in your schedule for unexpected emergencies. The percentage will vary by your industry, role, and manager. But if you have taken the time to plan, you have a center line to return to after the fire is out.

Avoid the two ends of the spectrum: being so rigid that you can’t cope with a change in plans, or being addicted to urgencies—even creating them. Remind yourself to have nimbleness and fluidity so if your boss texts, you’re not so inflexible that it craters your day. On the other hand, don’t be too attracted to those urgencies; for example, treating any email with a red exclamation point as urgent when it might not actually be. We want to be malleable but not invite urgencies in. When a curve ball is thrown our way, we should consider our priorities and make a choice to respond either in the affirmative, or with a respectful “I can do that at a later time, but not right now.”

Make time for your priorities through weekly planning. It sounds counterintuitive to spend more time on planning if you’re already so busy you can’t even get your most important work done. But if you don’t plan your week, you’re at the mercy of the winds of change, reacting to what comes your way instead of deciding what’s important and what you want to accomplish.

We like the “big rocks” and “gravel” metaphor originally popularized in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Many of you may have seen the viral video of Dr. Stephen R. Covey challenging an audience participant to fit all of their priorities (symbolized as rocks) into a jar of gravel. The larger rocks in the jar represent the most important actions you commit to weekly to achieve your key priorities. The gravel is everything else. At the beginning of each week, put the “Big Rocks” (your personal and professional priorities based on your values) in your schedule first and let the gravel (smaller tasks and minutiae) fill in the schedule around them. Otherwise, if you put the small tasks in first, they will fill up the schedule, leaving no room for the Big Rocks.

Having coached many leaders on how to make the best use of their time, I find that many don’t use the full potential of their planning system. Many leaders just use it for their meetings. An example of a typical manager’s weekly calendar could look like this:

What is the main problem with this calendar view? To me, it appears that you have quite a lot of free time and are available for urgencies (and more meetings!). But that’s probably not the case. I bet your week is pretty full, despite your calendar not reflecting it.

So, what should be on your calendar besides meetings? Your Big Rocks for the week, to start; then other important (but maybe not urgent) priorities like strategic thinking or industry research. Then you should add things that you know from experience will take time. For example, travel time for your client meetings, documenting your notes after you meet with your manager, and preparing for your 1-on-1s. Make sure you master the art of prepopulating your calendar with your commitments and priorities.

Think about when your best energy flow is, and proactively try to build that into your way of working. When would be the best time for meetings? When would be the best time for focused or introverted work?

A more effective leader’s schedule could look like this:

This second view gives a more accurate picture of how much time you have available for last-minute urgencies. And remember, putting renewing activities such as exercise into your calendar increases the likelihood of it happening.

You might be in an environment where you never need to work late: congratulations! But if you are, be proactive and schedule those evenings in advance. My mother gave me this advice early in my career: plan for a late night at the office once a week to finish off important tasks. If you don’t have to worry about leaving the office by a certain time, you can feel more in control. You can then choose to leave early another day when you are more needed at home or want to invest time for yourself.

Decide what you can say no to. Once you have this more realistic view of your week, it will be a little easier to say no. You won’t get ahead by addressing the gravel first and hoping you’ll get to the Big Rocks later. Instead, you must decide what is most important and plan your time around those activities. You have to say no to some of the gravel—and you might even have to choose between some of your Big Rocks.

As you go through the week, ask yourself these questions when deciding what to spend time on:

• What’s the potential payoff? If a task has significant long-term impact, address it now, even if it doesn’t seem urgent in the moment.
• Will this task help my team, company, or me meet an important goal? If helping a direct report speeds up progress on a strategic project, it’s probably worth dropping everything to do it.
• Can it wait? If it can, perhaps let it. But determine how long it can wait before it becomes a crisis. Address it before this point.
• Should I be the one to do this? If there’s someone with more experience or who could use the chance to learn, maybe it’s time to delegate. See Practice 3: Set Up Your Team to Get Results for more information.
• Is this on my schedule because it’s comfortable or easy? If you’re filling your week with quick-win tasks that make you feel like you’re accomplishing things, you might just be running in place.
• Is this my priority—or someone else’s? As with all innovation, there are upsides and downsides to our digital calendars. Allowing colleagues to view our calendars has created enormous efficiency in scheduling meetings for busy people. The downside is that many people can view your availability and send you appointments, making you feel compelled or culturally obliged to accept them. You may want to block out segments of time with titles that won’t be challenged by a colleague sending an invite.

Plan daily. In addition to thirty minutes of weekly planning, effective leaders invest at least some time each day to thoughtful planning. Take ten minutes to modify your plan based on current conditions. How are you feeling that day? What did you accomplish earlier in the week? Have your “Big Rock” priorities changed? Look at your goals for the week: What activities can you undertake that will change those from goals to accomplishments by the end of your workweek?

Daily planning protects those priorities you identified at the start of the week from productivity-killing minutiae. But even with the best intentions, you might get pulled away for an emergency or an important task that takes longer than anticipated. That’s why it’s important to revisit your priorities each day and adapt as needed.

Once you block out time for important tasks, fill in the rest of your calendar with the gravel, like updating meetings and answering email. Remember your energy and focus needs, and proactively schedule some breaks or time to chat with a colleague—that allows you to mentally refresh, while preventing your break from turning into a forty-five-minute speaking tour with the whole office.

Once you finish your daily planning, dive into your highest-priority tasks. Do it before distractions and urgencies fragment your attention.

SKILL 3: COACH YOUR TEAM TO MANAGE THEIR TIME AND ENERGY

Beyond your own quest for balance, you need to coach your team to create it for themselves too. Just as you are responsible for the results of your team, you are also in some ways responsible for the energy of the team. Leaders need to be mindful of when creativity has lapsed or when people simply need a break to recharge. Many leaders underestimate their impact on the team’s energy levels.

Perhaps you feel skeptical about your role in managing your team members’ energy. Isn’t it their responsibility to take care of their health and energy levels? Does the energy of your team really matter? Absolutely. You can’t force-feed your team vitamins, put them on a treadmill, or balance their lives. But you can model a healthy lifestyle and be mindful of when you’re depleting their energy levels with relentless demands for overtime, unrealistic deadlines, and saying yes to too many projects. You’ll have a greater influence on their energy by what you model and how well you live the skills in this section.

Here are our best practices for managing the energy of your team.

BE A ROLE MODEL

As a leader, your behavior by default becomes the standard for everyone else. If you come in early, your team is going to feel they need to beat you there. If you stay until 8 p.m., few people will dare to tiptoe past your office at 5 p.m.

Unless you deliberately, clearly, and repeatedly set expectations, your team will interpret how you work as how they should work. The problem is your habits might actually reduce their effectiveness. Your night owls (about 20 percent of the population, according to Daniel Pink, so possibly 20 percent of your team as well)^II will be yawning over their laptops at 7 a.m. Employees in a different time zone might be sacrificing personal time for meetings during your peak.

Last year I was delivering a keynote address to over a thousand people at a large, publicly held women’s clothing company. I’d talked with the CEO and her executive team weeks earlier to ensure the message I was delivering was what they needed. The CEO was clear that I had an hour and fifteen minutes, so I had organized my keynote around that time frame.

The presentation went well, and the audience was engaged. They were so engaged that some of their responses throughout the keynote ended up cutting into some of the time I’d allowed. With about three minutes to go, I said, “I have one final concept that will take about five minutes, so we will be about two minutes over. Is that okay with everyone?” I was confident that I would get a resounding yes. Well, whether they said yes or not, I don’t remember, because as I glanced at the CEO in the front row, she was subtly waving her finger and mouthing the word “no.”

I quickly made a joke and said, “On second thought, we are going to end right on time,” and everyone laughed while I finished the keynote.

Afterward the CEO came up to me and said how pleased she was with the presentation. Then the CEO demonstrated why she is such an extraordinary leader and responsible for such a successful organization. She said, “I’m sorry you weren’t able to go over the time allowed, but one of our core values is respect for our employees’ time. And one of the ways we model that is my commitment that all meetings will start and end on time, no exceptions.”

Wow, I was so impressed. I thanked her for the opportunity and how she truly led by example. No wonder everyone I spoke with at this organization commented on her extraordinary leadership. Managing your time really matters and makes a difference in your results. So does walking your talk!

—TODD

CREATE MORE ENERGY

Have you ever entered a meeting and noticed that everyone on your team seems drained? One person is recovering from the flu, another had a bad incident at home, and a third is struggling with a stretch assignment. And here you are, trying to kick off an important project. And on top of it, you didn’t sleep that well last night…

This is the moment you need to remind yourself that you are the leader. Do you want your team to walk out of this meeting the way they entered (or, horrid thought, even more drained)? Or can you use this as an opportunity to infuse some positive energy so that your team can go out into the world with renewed enthusiasm?

I try to see it as a positive challenge whenever I find myself in those situations. I might start with a quick celebration of how we’re making a difference, or some other good news. I also talk openly with the team about what kind of meeting we want to have, how our time together could build or drain our energy, and everyone’s role in creating that.

In your meetings, pay attention to the task at hand and your team’s energy level. If you sense a gap, set the tone, pace, and engagement level. Don’t think you need to be the cheerleader and muster up the energy for everyone. Instead, simple activities can boost energy, like beginning the meeting with quick life updates from volunteers, asking everyone to stand up, or getting into pairs to brainstorm about a solution to a key project.

CREATE A CHANCE TO CONNECT

In our discussion on the 5 Energy Drivers, we talked about how important it is to connect with others. As a leader, you can facilitate that connection—and that doesn’t necessarily require off-site retreats or elaborate team-building activities.

In many organizations, sharing anything personal with your team used to be frowned upon, but this is changing radically. Today’s workforce is much more integrated in terms of personal and professional lives. And in many cases, we spend as much time (or more) with our colleagues as with our family and friends.

So it’s increasingly beneficial to team culture and productivity to foster a deeper sense of connection between you and your team. Simple tricks at your office can make all the difference. Consider creating team breakfasts or taking turns letting everyone share a special interest each week.

CHALLENGE YOUR PARADIGM

When I was managing a large department, a talented new graduate joined my team. At our introduction meeting, she said, “Just to let you know, I’m not really a morning person, so it’s better if I come in after ten.” I was like, “Um… no!” I’m an early bird. I like being in the office at seven, so even though I never said it out loud, I used to believe that slackers came in at nine. I wish I could say that I was open to change, but I was completely inflexible with this new hire.

And now I ask myself why. She didn’t want to work less; she just wanted to work differently. She was probably brilliant in the evening. Of course there would be days when she was required to be there by nine, but other days, why not? Why was I so inflexible? Just because her style wasn’t mine didn’t mean I couldn’t accommodate it.

With a significant shift in the workforce, established organizations will be challenged to take into consideration the flow and best energies of their employees, probably to everyone’s advantage. So I would encourage you to challenge your mindset in how you and your team work to achieve highest results. Of course there are certain roles, like customer-facing ones, where you have to be at a certain place at a certain time. But customers change their preferences too. Could a new way of work even enhance your offering?

Leaders choose how they want to live their lives—and for some, work is their top priority. That’s fine, but they also expect that of their team, whether or not their employees have the same priorities.

You can say over and over, “You don’t have to stay late just because I do.” But your people will feel like they’re letting you down if they’re not doing what you’re modeling.

Have a frank discussion with your team about the importance of balance. While leaders should have expectations around results, your team achieves results in different ways. Some of us accomplish things sporadically throughout the day, and others get things done in a concentrated period of time. One of my employees, for example, attends his daughter’s soccer practice every Tuesday afternoon—no problem, because he always has his reports in by the end of the day. Stay focused on results, not necessarily the methods.

—TODD

FINAL THOUGHT: YOU DON’T BURN OUT WITHOUT FIRST BEING ON FIRE

We often expect disengaged team members to burn out, but more often it’s the opposite. It’s the engaged ones who are most at risk—people who feel so passionate about what they do that they can’t stop themselves from taking on too much. They start to lose track of what’s really a high priority, or their leaders haven’t given them direction about what to say no to.

I had an overachiever on my team who would excitedly share what she was doing during our 1-on-1s, and I felt that there wasn’t much I needed to do. But she suddenly went from super engaged to saying, “I’m not sure I can do this any longer.”

I realized she needed my support and coaching to identify her most important Big Rocks. We spent her 1-on-1s the following months reviewing her weekly planning and prioritizing. I’ve been lucky to have these brilliant, ambitious, hardworking people on my team, and it’s tempting to delegate to them because they gladly take everything on. But if you want to help them channel their passion and use it on the right things, help them prioritize: How are you going to use your limited time next week? Of all these great things you could do, which are most important? Which are your Big Rocks and what do you need to cut out—at least for now? That will prevent them from hitting the proverbial wall.

I. Rescue Your Brain Health [Interview by S. Miller]. (2018, July). Retrieved from https://resources.franklincovey.com/home/on-leadership-with-scott-miller-episode-08-dr-daniel-amen.

II. Mejia, Z. (2018, April 30). How to Time Your Day for Peak Performance, Based on Your Chronotype. Retrieved from https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/30/daniel-pink-how-to-time-your-day-for-peak-performance.html.