Is Managing Energy More Important than Managing Time?

Taken From http://www.slowleadership.org/blog/2008/05/is-managing-energy-more-important-than-managing-time/#more-576

Well-intentioned ideas like these are no match for the harshness of entrenched organizational and financial system

Most people try to cope with ever more demanding jobs and escalating targets by working longer hours. Sometimes it seems to be the only way, even if the impact on lives and relationships is almost wholly negative. But what if responding to workplace pressure in that way is dealing with the wrong issue — trying to manage and extend time, when what you need to be doing is managing your energy levels?

That’s the message of a paper in Harvard Business Review by Tony Schwartz and Catherine McCarthy, entitled “Manage Your Energy, Not Your Time” (subscription required).

This is a long and detailed article, together with a questionnaire to help you see if you are headed for energy problems. The premise, however is simple: time is a finite resource, whereas energy can be increased — and also used more effectively. When you’ve used up all the time you can get, you cannot find more. If your energy isn’t up to the demands you are placing on it, there are techniques that can assist you to make more available.

The authors write:

The core problem with working longer hours is that time is a finite resource. Energy is a different story. Defined in physics as the capacity to work, energy comes from four main wellsprings in human beings: the body, emotions, mind, and spirit. In each, energy can be systematically expanded and regularly renewed by establishing specific rituals—behaviors that are intentionally practiced and precisely scheduled, with the goal of making them unconscious and automatic as quickly as possible.

Time and energy go together

So far, so good. Yet time cannot quite be dismissed from the equation. However much energy you have, you still need the time to use it properly; that includes decision time to be able to set proper priorities, and uncluttered working time to use your energy to get things done.

Much of the problem of overwork is due to “thieves” of time — like attending pointless meetings, compiling useless figures and reports, and wasting time reading endless e-mails. Until you tackle these, you are throwing away both time and energy on activities of no importance. That’s why we continually suggest that slowing down makes results come faster: you make time to decide carefully how to allocate your time and energy; you don’t fritter them away by rushing to complete tasks that will gain you little or nothing.

A well-intentioned answer

Here’s how the authors of the HBR paper explain their solutions:

To effectively re-energize their workforces, organizations need to shift their emphasis from getting more out of people to investing more in them, so they are motivated—and able—to bring more of themselves to work every day. To recharge themselves, individuals need to recognize the costs of energy-depleting behaviors and then take responsibility for changing them, regardless of the circumstances they’re facing.

Again, so far, so good. But looking at the problem this way sees it as more about attitudes than systems, and that’s a mistake many well-intentioned people make. They assume organizations will recognize — and act on — their best long-term interests, which includes investing in their people. They assume individuals will do the same.

What this viewpoint misses is the impact of the systems within which both individuals and organizations operate.

Reality: Change needs new systems

So long as investors, represented by Wall Street, focus on short-term trading and gains from increasing share prices, organizations will have little incentive to take the long-term view. Investing in people costs money and produces little immediate pay-off. “Persuading” them to work longer hours for the same pay gives quick returns at no extra cost. In a world of grab-and-go executives and shareholders, quick returns are what count. You may not be invested in, or employed by, the organization by the time those long-term benefits arise. Then you will have given up profits today to enrich someone else in the future — not something Wall Street or top executives relish.

For individuals too, finding ways to invest greater energy in their workplace only makes sense if they assume that: (1) they will be around to reap the benefit; and (2) promotions, pay rises, and other rewards are given out strictly according to merit.

If they fear being “let go” to boost short-term profits — or make up for corporate errors — (as many do today), it makes more sense to devote energy to job search rather than their current role. And if they see promotions going to those who play the best game of office politics, regardless of merit, how will they trust the company to reward them fairly for their devotion?

Overwork and burnout are endemic in organizational life today because of the financial and organizational systems in common use. Until those systems are changed, no amount of well-intentioned coaching is going to make much difference to people’s experience of work.