We help small businesses with technology, strategy, and leadership and have a passion for sharing what we have learned. Subscribe to our newsletter to get helpful weekly content.
Calendar Energy Audits
|
Most people manage their calendar by time. Very few manage it by energy and that’s a missed opportunity. Your calendar more than a tool to tell you want to do next, it’s also a record of meetings and tasks that can be used as a map to determine what fuels you and quietly drains you. That’s where the weekly calendar energy audit comes in. At the end of each week, look back at your calendar and answer one simple question about each item on it: Did this give me energy or take it away? Every calendar entry gets one of two marks:
So go ahead and block 10-15 minutes at the end of your week. Friday afternoons work well for me. Then open your calendar for the week and review each entry. How did you feel after them? If energized and clear, add a +. If drained, frustrated, bored, or tense, add a -. Next, step back and observe it. Look for patterns. Ask yourself:
Try it this week and let me know how it goes! I’d love to hear! PS: At The Outlier Team, we host workshops that help build work systems that give energy instead of taking it. For more information, reply to this email. Perry Myers |
The Outlier Team
We help small businesses with technology, strategy, and leadership and have a passion for sharing what we have learned. Subscribe to our newsletter to get helpful weekly content.
The Cost of Silence Several years ago, I went through one of the most difficult experiences of my professional career. A few weeks before Christmas, our CEO informed my boss that an outside IT consulting firm would be coming in to help evaluate our technology operations. At the time, I was the IT manager. The announcement raised a lot of questions. Why were they being brought in? What were they evaluating? What would happen afterward? Unfortunately, very few answers were provided. Weeks went...
Over the last two weeks, we’ve discussed meetings that run the business and improve the business. Today, let’s examine the third category: meetings that build the team. Before we do, I’d like to share a story. One summer morning at 2:00 AM, our team received an email that would turn into one of the largest technology incidents the world had ever experienced. Nearly every server and computer at our organization and others throughout the world would not power on. As people woke up, they began...
Meetings That Improve the Business Several years ago, our team was dealing with a frustrating login issue. About one person each week would be affected, and the disruption typically lasted only a few minutes. The team responsible for resolving the issue was actively working with the vendor. We held problem-solving sessions, investigated possible causes, and provided daily updates through email and Teams messages. The work was being done. People were understandably frustrated and wanted the...