I have a long held belief that “minutes matter”. Throughout my career, I have always looked for the most efficient way to accomplish a task. And I am always amazed at how many inefficient practices have persisted for years when I start with a new client. The reasons are usually “just because” or “that is the way the person before me did it” or “we’ve always done it this way”. For the record, I hate all of those answers. While, I am sure I have some practices that could be improved, there are also things I have done in a certain way for years that I recently changed. The reason is that a better way suddenly dawned on me, or perhaps a colleague told me about the way they do something similar and their way is better (as they say, “well stolen is half done”) or I learned about a new piece of software or learned about functionality in a piece of software that I own that I just didn’t know existed.
I can think of a few things that I’ve changed in recent months as I wondered what Microsoft Word or Excel could do in a more efficient manner. Do any of these changes save me ten hours per week? Frankly, no. But a few minutes here or there add up.
Earlier this week, I organized a group to attend a webinar on the ways Chat GPT can help use Excel. The insights gained won’t change my world overnight, but it gave me a new avenue to explore for efficiencies. And, while I was typing this draft, Copilot offered to rewrite a sentence that was awkwardly constructed. It gave me three options and I chose one. Although, warning, for some reason Copilot changed the font of that sentence. Also be warned, I have received several documents lately that were clearly written in their entirety by Chat GPT. They weren’t very good, and it colored my opinion of the senders. It has its uses but be careful!
One also shouldn’t lose sight of what they can do within a few minutes. Whenever I arrive for a meeting, I glance at email before getting out of my car. Sometimes a quick reply or phone call is all that it takes to keep a project moving. My one-minute phone call may let someone else keep working on a project rather than waiting several hours until after my meeting has ended. Over time, this can advance a project by days compared to having unnecessary delays.
When I see certain clients on my caller ID, I almost always pick up because I know they literally need just one minute. Before I jump into the car, I try to think of a few calls that would still be productive even if I’m not in front of a computer or reading a document.
Are there time wasters in my day? Sure. The occasional glance at news or social media can easily turn into 20 minutes. I try to avoid those as much as possible. If you need a break, a power nap is better for productivity (although hard to achieve at the office).
And speaking of minutes, don’t schedule meetings for 60 of them. Schedule for 30. Set the expectation that you can be done in 30 minutes and you’ll be amazed how often it happens.
I hope reading this was worth three minutes of your day.
If your business could benefit from fractional CFO services, I would welcome the chance to speak with you. Please give me a call at (314) 863-6637 or send an email to [email protected]
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Ken Homza
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