Protect your most valuable resource

 Does it annoy you when people waste your time? I have to assume the answer is a resounding ‘YES’, especially when you are working on important activities.

Have you experienced weeks when you wanted to wrap up an important task, only to have a coworker hijack your plan with impunity for their urgent tasks? This lack of planning on their part was a pet peeve of mine and that raised my sensitivity to the limited time of my colleagues.

In fact, year after year, in my annual performance self-assessment, I would include a line about the care and respect I showed for everyone’s time. I wore it as a badge of honor. We experience this lack of respect regularly when we spend more time than we should on comprehending poorly formulated emails, or sit through a meandering meeting with no agenda.

Sadly, time is the only thing in life that you can never get back once it’s gone.

How are you protecting your most valuable resource? Care to share?

I protect the first three hours of my day at all costs. I do have a very early start time! If I have a task I dread on my to-do list, it will be the first one I tackle, otherwise, my most creative tasks get those precious early hours of the day.

As Jim Rohn noted ‘ “Either you run the day, or the day runs you.” You get to choose.





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