As the CEO of SpaceX and Tesla, Elon Musk is arguably one of the most successful and busiest entrepreneurs within the tech industry. While he is notorious for setting extremely ambitious, even unrealistic ‘stretch goals’ (a trait dubbed as ‘Elon Time’ by some), perhaps what is even more difficult to believe is how he manages his time across several different companies, while managing to squeeze in 6 hours of sleep a night, time for his 6 children (including one newborn), weekly exercise and time to read books!
Whether you’re a budding entrepreneur, an aspiring billionaire or just someone who feels as though you just don’t have enough time, nearly all of us can learn a thing or two from Musk about time management and productivity.
1. Signal over Noise
“Focus on signal over noise. Don’t waste time on stuff that doesn’t actually make things better”.
Filtering out what will truly bring you closer to your goals and what isn’t necessary can be tricky at first, but is the key to streamlining your work. Always ask yourself - what does this task achieve in relation to my goals? Is there a faster way to do this? Can I delegate this task?
2. Always seek improvement
“Constantly think about how you could be doing things better and questioning yourself”
It’s no secret that successful people tend to value criticism over compliments.
Always striving for a more efficient way to carry out tasks will inevitably improve your productivity and output in the long run.
3. Minimise Distractions - Even if that means meetings
Avoiding distractions may sound like a bit of a no-brainer, but how many of us still keep checking our phone, taking important calls or mindlessly daydreaming when we are meant to be immersed in our work?
This doesn’t just apply to digital or social distractions, but also our environment - How cluttered is your desk, and how is that impacting your mind?
Elon Musk is a notorious skeptic of meetings, claiming that large meetings should be held infrequently and only for urgent matters “unless you’re certain they are providing value to the whole audience”
He even goes as far to advise that you should leave “as soon as it’s obvious that you aren’t adding any value”. Now, while this advice may not be completely practical for those of us who aren’t the CEOs of our companies, he raises an important point - if you aren’t adding value to a meeting, or the meeting does not add any value to your work, why are you there?
This simple rule applies to nearly everything you spend time on - whatever you spend time on, ask your self, what does this add to your work, your social life, your health?
4. Efficient communication is effective communication
“Anything that requires explanation inhibits communication”.
Miscommunication is a huge time-waster in every company at every level.
A few ways that you can streamline communication:
Avoiding confusing jargon, acronyms
Speaking directly and to the point
Contact someone by the shortest route possible, if not directly - a lot of time is wasted when a message has to be relayed up or down the hierarchial chain.
If you can communicate more efficiently with your colleagues you can stop wasting your time as well as theirs, and speed up everybody’s work.
5. Plan your day meticulously
Failing to plan is planning to fail.
Scheduling is probably the most commonly overlooked and misunderstood, yet simplest productivity hack.
Most people don’t plan their days, and those who create plans or lists don’t stick to it, and letting their to-do lists pile up over the week.
Another common mistake is giving yourself far too much time to do a task than it actually requires - if you give yourself an hour to do a 10 minute task, you will probably use up that entire hour.
Musk uses a ‘timeboxing’ method - he breaks up his day into 5-30 minute chunks from the time that he gets out of bed to the time he goes to sleep. Knowing what and when you’ll be doing things is key in getting as much done in a day as you can.
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