What’s YOUR experience?
I’d love to hear your answers to 5 questions about the 'time culture' in your organisation. Participation is anonymous and I'll share the findings in late November.
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Frogs, celebrities and Gina Ford
17 November 2020
What do you notice when you reflect back on your career? Where might this lead you?
My first experience of the world of work started with clocking in.
As a management trainee at Harrods, I had to swipe in and out at the start and end of each day with my employee ID card. Our daily time records were scrutinised weekly by our line managers, despite giving no indication of how productively we spent our hours in between. That largely depended on whether we worked in a bustling, high-footfall department like the Food Halls or a sleepier outpost such as Lighting, or whether an A-list celebrity was in the store distracting us all with their glorious presence.
Goodbye swipe machines, hello timesheets.
I quickly learned the unspoken truth that there were ‘good’ time codes to use and other time codes to avoid. Billable codes (for client work) trumped all others. But if you weren’t 100% resourced on a project, caution was needed. The ‘admin’ time code could squash any promotion chances if it appeared too often on your timesheet. Far better to demonstrate that your time had been busily devoted to the more purposeful-sounding ‘marketing’ time code or better still, to the loftier timecode for ‘developing new intellectual capital’. Selecting time codes that would send the right signals about my contributions and ambitions honed my resourcefulness and creativity in my early career.
Old habits, new life
After accounting for my time on a daily basis at work for 17 years, this proved a hard habit to break. As a new mother, I enthusiastically embraced Gina Ford’s structured (and divisive) approach to looking after our daughter. I happily wrote out Gina’s daily routines broken down into 15 minute segments and stuck to these religiously. Our daughter thrived and we stayed sane (just). I loved the order that the routines brought to the chaos of those early months. As well as creating space for me to breathe, they enabled me to carve out small chunks of time when I could resume my professional identity and do some freelance work.
Fridges and frogs.
When I returned to work more fully, running professional networks in London, my experience of time changed again. I discovered that surreal phenomenon whereby child-free time ticks by twice as fast as time spent with your child(ren). “Seriously? Pick-up time already?” With this new two-speed time, success meant completing the most important tasks in the short fragments of time between daily travel, calls and meetings. Without being seduced by more urgent or easier tasks. Or knocks on the door. Or our fridge contents.
‘Eating the frog’ is an expression usually attributed to Mark Twain which advocates doing the most important and hardest task(s) first thing in our working day. This is far better for our cognitive functioning and our daily productivity than deferring it until later in the day or tomorrow. I’ve found it tough to stick to but like going out for a run in bad weather, I bask in my sense of achievement (and the warm glow of self-virtue) afterwards.
A new direction.
Reflecting back on the many organisations I've worked in and with, I’ve become fascinated by our attitudes and habits in relation to our time at work. Why are our working hours so much longer than in other European nations and yet our productivity is so much lower? Why are we fixated on measuring time as an input instead of valuing what we actually achieve? What drives our collective frenzy of cramming ever-increasing amounts of activity into our working hours? Surely there’s a better way of managing our time. Exploring these questions has led me, to my surprise, into a new career chapter.
I’m researching and writing a business book titled The Future of Time. In it, I’m explaining how our culture of time at work needs to change. We can find better ways of designing organisations and collectively managing our time that enable us to be more productive, make the most of our diverse talents and live healthier, happier work lives. It’s a complex challenge with no single, quick solution. But it’s achievable. Covid 19 has already proved that we can radically transform the way we work in a very short space of time.
Maybe we can finally ditch those time stamps and timesheets too.
Fast forward 2 years and as a management consultant, not having to clock in or out felt very grown up. Instead, our contributions at work were assessed via that staple of professional service firms, the timesheet. We had to account for every minute of our working day in 6 minute increments, logging these to various time codes. One of the biggest time drains of my early consulting career was the time I spent trying to figure out the right code to charge my time to. Part art, part science, this baffling activity merited a timecode to itself. Sometimes submitting a well-crafted timesheet seemed at least as important as delivering good quality work.
I quickly learned the unspoken truth that there were ‘good’ time codes to use and other time codes to avoid. Billable codes (for client work) trumped all others. But if you weren’t 100% resourced on a project, caution was needed. The ‘admin’ time code could squash any promotion chances if it appeared too often on your timesheet. Far better to demonstrate that your time had been busily devoted to the more purposeful-sounding ‘marketing’ time code or better still, to the loftier timecode for ‘developing new intellectual capital’. Selecting time codes that would send the right signals about my contributions and ambitions honed my resourcefulness and creativity in my early career.
Old habits, new life
After accounting for my time on a daily basis at work for 17 years, this proved a hard habit to break. As a new mother, I enthusiastically embraced Gina Ford’s structured (and divisive) approach to looking after our daughter. I happily wrote out Gina’s daily routines broken down into 15 minute segments and stuck to these religiously. Our daughter thrived and we stayed sane (just). I loved the order that the routines brought to the chaos of those early months. As well as creating space for me to breathe, they enabled me to carve out small chunks of time when I could resume my professional identity and do some freelance work.
Fridges and frogs.
When I returned to work more fully, running professional networks in London, my experience of time changed again. I discovered that surreal phenomenon whereby child-free time ticks by twice as fast as time spent with your child(ren). “Seriously? Pick-up time already?” With this new two-speed time, success meant completing the most important tasks in the short fragments of time between daily travel, calls and meetings. Without being seduced by more urgent or easier tasks. Or knocks on the door. Or our fridge contents.
‘Eating the frog’ is an expression usually attributed to Mark Twain which advocates doing the most important and hardest task(s) first thing in our working day. This is far better for our cognitive functioning and our daily productivity than deferring it until later in the day or tomorrow. I’ve found it tough to stick to but like going out for a run in bad weather, I bask in my sense of achievement (and the warm glow of self-virtue) afterwards.
A new direction.
Reflecting back on the many organisations I've worked in and with, I’ve become fascinated by our attitudes and habits in relation to our time at work. Why are our working hours so much longer than in other European nations and yet our productivity is so much lower? Why are we fixated on measuring time as an input instead of valuing what we actually achieve? What drives our collective frenzy of cramming ever-increasing amounts of activity into our working hours? Surely there’s a better way of managing our time. Exploring these questions has led me, to my surprise, into a new career chapter.
I’m researching and writing a business book titled The Future of Time. In it, I’m explaining how our culture of time at work needs to change. We can find better ways of designing organisations and collectively managing our time that enable us to be more productive, make the most of our diverse talents and live healthier, happier work lives. It’s a complex challenge with no single, quick solution. But it’s achievable. Covid 19 has already proved that we can radically transform the way we work in a very short space of time.
Maybe we can finally ditch those time stamps and timesheets too.
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How to encourage this in a way that works for your business. There is a real and urgent need to address the creeping norm of employees working all hours, being contactable and available all the time. But Labour’s recent abandoning of a legal ‘right to disconnect’ in favour of a voluntary code of practice is probably the right move, in my humble opinion. Here are 5 reasons why, 5 ways to make switching off a win/win for you and your organisation, and 5 positive actions to put into practice now. Why legislation is too blunt a tool: Heavy-handed legislation will probably antagonise businesses, not secure their support. There's more to do first to spotlight organisations that are managing the boundaries well between working & non-working time well and proving the business benefits. It’s too early to say confidently how well similar legislation has worked abroad. Australia only adopted this last month; the longer-standing fine-based approach in France and Portugal isn't proven as an effective deterrent. Human-centred organisations are probably already paying attention to this, being creative about work boundaries and using their approach to enhance their employer brand. They'll be the ones who proactively adopt the code of practice and make it genuinely part of ‘the way we work here’ - and they'll win at attracting and retaining talented people longer-term as a result. ‘But clients will go elsewhere’. This is the defence I often hear in rejection of proposals like the right to disconnect. No, client won't IF you engage them in the change and show them that it means they get to access your sharpest minds working at their best,. When organisations see their early-adopter competitors living the code and still winning & keeping desirable clients - and nabbing theirs - they’ll swiftly follow suit. Let’s be clear: some people will continue to say yes to high pay/exciting work in return for ‘you’ll work whenever when we need you ‘. But it’ll be a transactional relationship lasting for as long as it benefits the individual (or employer) and no longer. Easy come, easy go. If that’s your philosophy as an employer: own it and be transparent. Don’t sign the code and pay it lip service. If yours IS an organisation that wants to do better at encouraging employees to switch off, try: 1. Using Labour’s shift to open up conversations at work about pressures to communicate or be available after hours. 2. Adding ‘we support the right to disconnect’ in your recruitment material and having examples to share with candidates during interviews. 3. Supporting selected managers and their teams to trial different experiments around switching off. 4. Asking people ‘how can we help you do to your best work within your normal working hours?’. ‘What gets in the way of this?’. 5. Setting up an industry-wide collaboration to trial different ways of achieving the same outcome. Asynchronous and flexible working are here to stay and bring many benefits to individuals and their employers. But they can make it a challenge to co-ordinate and communicate within teams and across time zones. Here's what you can do personally to uphold the right to switch off and respect other people's non-working time: Add an email footer like: 'I'm sending this now because it suits me but I'm not expecting a response outside of normal working hours'. Work offline if you're working late evenings or weekends, so you're not visible on Teams/whatever channels you use, and schedule your emails to send the next day to avoid the ripple effect of people responding immediately. If people on your team have repeatedly worked late or sacrificed home lives to help reach a deadline, then give them some time back straight afterwards. It's simple and effective. If you're a manager, find out people's preferences around being contacted - or not - during out of hours or when on leave. Everyone's different, so make it your job to know. See annual leave as an opportunity for a colleague to step up and have some stretch experience by covering for you, with support beforehand. Then switch off properly and don't muddy the water by dipping in and out unasked. Listen to my podcast conversation with Ben Higgins, Global CHRO of Wholesale Banking at Societe Generale, about how he does this. These examples are about applying #timeintelligence. If you want to know more about my #timeintelligence sessions for leaders, teams and individuals, get in touch . And if you're making good progress in your organisation on switching off - or at least trialling a few changes - then I'd love to hear more. During normal working hours, of course.
Managing the school holiday juggle and announcing book 2!
What does it cost us to be always rushing ahead? What are we missing by not pausing to look back?
When sticking stops. A barn owl perched observantly on a post in front of me, a heron gliding by like a feathered Concorde with its wings tucked in. Just two of the birds I’ve spotted today whilst working at UK’s only family-owned and managed National Nature Reserve, at Elmley in Kent. I’m not working in the sense of checking on wildlife and mending fences, I’m working in the sense of enjoying an indulgent writing retreat in glorious isolation, tucked away in a definitely-not-roughing-it wooden cabin complete with outdoor tub overlooking meadows and marshes (more pics here ). This retreat is both a long-anticipated birthday gift from my family and the official starting point for writing my second business book. It’s been brewing in my head for months and is now begging loudly to be given some proper love and attention. So here I am, off-grid in every sense with nowhere else to go and nothing else to do for 24 hours than plan and write. Write what? I hear you ask…
What does time off mean to you? How well do you 'not work'?
I waved a Minion off to school yesterday for World Book Day. At least my 12 year old daughter now sorts out her own WBD outfit thank goodness, and there’s now another 364 days before WBD rolls around again. But we’re not done for this week because it's International Women’s Day today! In recognition of this global celebration of women’s contribution to work and society, every day this week I’ve been sharing a statistic on Linked In that describes how women are impacted by our 'time culture' at work. If ‘time culture’ is a new expression to you a) you obviously haven’t read my award-winning business book The Future of Time yet and b) it means our attitudes, behaviours and expectations around the way we spend our time at work. What gets valued and rewarded, what doesn’t. What we spend much of our time on, what we don’t spend so much time on (but ought to). Because surprise, surprise, women are disadvantaged by our ‘time culture’ in several ways. Here are my top five.
Making change stick. Recently, I’ve been tuning in regularly to the 'Just One Thing' podcast by Dr. Michael Mosley. In each 15-minute episode, Michael delves into a single, manageable change that can enhance our health and extend our lifespan. Thanks to him, I’m keeping up my green tea ritual (that was a quick win), incorporating daily planks into my exercise routine (right after my morning run - oof) and reheating leftover carbs. I’m a bit of a podcast butterfly and I’m wondering why this podcast has stuck firmly now as a favourite. Besides Dr. Mosley's warm and reassuring tone, I think it boils down to 3 things. Firstly, focusing on just one thing feels refreshingly attainable. Let's face it, we're bombarded with complex self-improvement strategies daily. Who wants a whole industry of new ‘to do’s to implement, remember and track? Secondly, the changes are entirely within my control. I don't need anyone's permission to start planking in my bedroom, even if it does provide my husband with daily amusement. I can make these changes tomorrow, better still, today. Thirdly, the advice is specific and the outcomes are clear. I know precisely what to do and whether it’s working. Whether it's keeping my blood pressure in check or reducing blood sugar spikes, the benefits are measurable. Now, shifting gears to my work life, I find parallels between Dr. Moseley's approach and my Time-Intelligent Teams workshops. These workshops aim to enhance teams' productivity and enjoyment at work – to help people to invest their time more effectively. We focus on one collective and one individual change that are within the team's control. Through reflection, brainstorming, and laughter, teams identify actionable steps to work smarter, not harder. The feedback from these workshops has been resoundingly positive with managers reporting improved communication, higher levels of commitment to the change and more cohesive teamwork. Of course the power of ‘just one thing’ is that once you’ve mastered that one change and it has proven it’s value, it simply becomes part of how you do things. Which leaves you free to cast around for the next ‘just one thing’ that could also have a transformative effect. And another after that. That’s why, to my amazement, wall squats have joined my daily exercise routine and I’m evangelising about the benefits of cooked tomatoes. I just need to find Michael’s episode on why sticky toffee pudding will reverse the ageing process…..