Walk through your morning routine with me. You get to work, put down your things, get a cup of coffee while your computer boots up, open your email . . . and then? Respond to emails? Get ready for a meeting? Go to a meeting?
If you’re a morning person, you might have already gone for a run, meditated, or read for an hour before even thinking about work. If you’re not … you might walk into the office 30 minutes after your alarm went off, prepared to spend the next hour or two shaking yourself awake.
The real question: Are you utilizing the most productive hours of the day?
Research shows that people are the most productive in the first few hours after they are truly awake . . . and yet this time is often spent driving to work, doing mindless tasks to prepare for later in the day, or in morning meetings.
“One of the saddest mistakes in time management is the propensity of people to spend the two most productive hours of their day on things that don’t require high cognitive capacity (like social media). If we could salvage those precious hours, most of us would be much more successful in accomplishing what we truly want.” – Dan Ariely, Co-Founder and Chief Behavioral Officer at Timeful
All of our “truly awake” times are different, but it’s important to figure out when that time is and then adjust your schedule so you have the time and space to get down to business. This might mean blocking off space in your calendar, scheduling meetings in the afternoon, or getting to work earlier to minimize distractions.
As a manager you want to maximize your team’s success, so it’s worth thinking about how you can make time for employees to get “real work” (aka the meat of their job) done when they are the most wired to focus and produce quality results. After all, you don’t want to be the one keeping your team from the work you assigned them. You might love having morning meetings because you are alert and focused, but is that the best use of your team’s productive hours?
All team’s are different, as are all people’s productivity hours (some people might not be fully awake until 11 am), so it’s important to pay attention and talk to your team about their productive hours.
Do you take advantage of your 2 hours? Let us know!
For more business and management tips follow us on Twitter @CareerPlug
