The rich invest in time, the poor invest in money – Warren Buffett

Part of the changes we have been implementing at the office is focusing on time. It is the most precious resource we have. You only have 24 hours in a day. Spending every one of them wisely is important. A study of my work weeks last year revealed that I had developed some bad habits surrounding how I spent my hours and days at work. They were habits so by definition they were hard to change. I took the opportunity that the changes in our operations was making available to me to implement some changes in how I personally operated. I invested my time in improving my skills in several areas.

Our changes to how we operated included changing some of the software we were using. Instead of doing the typical habit of learning as you go; I delved into the training at the front end so that when I ran into an issue I either knew the solution or knew exactly where to find it. I didn’t waste my time searching for answers because I already had them from my training. While I will not say I have fully mastered the software my novice period was short and the transition from the old software to the new was nearly seamless. When talking with the administrator of one of the software packages he said that the most important part was taking the time to set it up properly at the beginning because after that it tended to just work with few glitches. The only problems he tended to have were when there were software updates that broke something. This happened with our new phone system which after the initial set up an update rolled out which broke our setup for two days until we worked out a solution.

Another aspect is insuring that we do not spend more than 50 hours a week working. While some type A personalities will think that means we are slacking off the opposite is true. Based upon the latest science productivity tends to start falling dramatically after 55 hours to such that someone who works 70 hours a week is about as productive as the 55 hour a week worker. Those 15 hours would be better spent insuring you get enough sleep or maintaining a higher quality of life. Failing to get enough sleep has been shown to reduce productivity as has not exercising regularly.

A quick read that highlights some things to reflect on how to best use your time can be found here: http://qz.com/386166/how-successful-people-work-less-and-get-more-done/

Let us know in the comments any changes you have made to make better use of your most precious resource of time.