Most entrepreneurs have tried all kinds of time management systems but still fail to keep up with their long list of priorities. If this approach is ineffective, perhaps paying more attention to energy management is the key. Tonya Kubo and Gwen Bortner explore the many reasons why energy matters more than time, as well as the often-ignored relationship between the two. They explain why understanding one’s energy patterns and biological cycles is required in aligning tasks accordingly and achieving maximum productivity. The two also talk about the importance of self-awareness in energy management and how it can greatly elevate an entrepreneur’s daily routine.
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Time To Pay More Attention To Energy Management
If you’re like many entrepreneurs, you’ve probably tried every time management system out there. You’ve blocked your calendar, you’ve batched your tasks, maybe you even hired help, hired somebody to manage your calendar, and managed your inbox, but you still feel maxed out. We are going to talk about why that might be happening and what you can do about it. I am here, joined as always by business advisor Gwen Bortner, and we are tackling a question that often comes up on the everyday effectiveness team.
Time Management Is Actually Energy Management
Also, in a lot of the business circles I run in, what if your capacity issues aren’t actually about time? Now, Gwen, I know you see this pattern a lot. You run in circles with a larger volume of entrepreneurs than I do. You see this in clients as well as in peers. You hear women in business asking all the time about time management. How to get more done? How to be more productive? Based on the conversations we’ve been having, there’s something else going on. Can you tell us more about that?
We talk about time management, but we can’t actually manage time. Time just does its thing. It’s just cruising along whether we do anything or we don’t do anything. It really isn’t ever about time management. It’s a term that we’ve all come to associate with things. It’s really about task management and activity management, and with that, where I think we think about time management is energy management.
Do we have the energy to do the things that we need to be doing at whatever point in the day or time we need to be doing them? It’s way less about time management and more about energy management, which is a tricky thing because it’s not consistent. I don’t think, for most of us in most ways, in most days, in most times. It’s a different awareness that I don’t think we’ve been very well trained to be aware about.
I would argue most of us have not been trained at all because I don’t think this occurs. Something you just said I want to pull that thread into is that you talked about how time just does its thing. You also talked about how energy is inconsistent. I think that’s really where the tension lies; there are always going to be 24 hours in a day unless we rearrange how we’ve configured time in our society.
We always have 24 hours, but we’re capable of doing varying things in each 24-hour block because, like you said, energy is not consistent. I might have a different energy in the morning than I do in the afternoon. I might have different energy today than I do next week. Here’s where I think we really do ourselves a disservice. My energy is always going to be vastly different from yours. Yours is going to be vastly different from another person’s. We fall into this comparison trap as if your 24 hours are the same as mine because they are. Your January 10th is my January 10th.
Minute to minute, they are exactly the same.
Exploring The Relationship Between Energy And Productivity
That’s where the similarity ends. I think what would be helpful is if you could take us from there and explain the relationship between energy and productivity because I’m not sure we ever hear that.
The thing about energy, the first thing you said, and I want to reiterate because it’s super important, is that different people have different energy at different times. One of the things that I have found that happens a ton in the entrepreneurial space is we read a book, we talk to somebody, we get advice from a consultant, an advisor, or whoever tells us what the best way is to do something. I’m going to say something related to time, like, “Get up earlier. Do this. Stay up.”
5:00 Club all the way, baby.
The miracle morning is a standard example that we see a ton of. I read Miracle Morning, and I was like, “That makes so much sense.” I am not a Miracle Morning person because I’m not a morning person. It’s just not the way that I work. People said, “No, if you just stick with it, you can make that change.” It’s like, why do I want to work so hard for this thing that’s not actually feeling like it’s providing the exchange of effort for what I’m getting out of it is not feeling like it’s balanced enough? I hardly ever believe in real balance but balanced enough.
There’s more upside than downside. One of the things that I talk about with my clients all the time is, let’s understand what is more naturally than what we’re going to do. Part of that is understanding our energy of what is more naturally going to work with our energy. You and I are like black and white as far as opposites go. You will wake up without an alarm probably by 5:00 at the latest. I’m more likely to see 5:00 because I have stayed up until 5:00. Only under duress, I’ve absolutely got to get up because I have to get to the airport.
I can do it, but it’s not a pretty thing. Knowing that, and I mean, our relationship isn’t such that it can be appropriate, but I am not saying, “No, I don’t. You can’t work then because I’m not working then.” That would, that would be really unhelpful. Now, do we both have to have energy when we’re doing this? Yes. We do have to find a place where we can match, but understanding that our energy levels are completely different and when we have the energy to do certain things. Now, this is the tricky part because we’re not taught to pay attention to our energy. We’re just not. You have to go to school, you have to be at school at such a time.
We get into those cycles that are established by society and are not based on necessarily anything specific. There may be some real outstanding guidelines, but we get into those habits and we think, we should work from 8:00 to 5:00 with an hour break for lunch because that’s what we’ve been told that employed people do. That’s not necessarily true. That’s not necessarily the best answer or the right answer. If I had my way, I probably wouldn’t start work until 10:30 or 11 but I have a lot of clients on the East Coast, which means it would be the end of their day. If they’re like you and tend to get up earlier anyway, it’s like way at the end of their day.
They’re already brain-dead by then.
Exactly. Not as helpful. Now, I could also make a choice to say that they’re just not my clients. I haven’t made that choice yet because I’m okay starting a little before 11:00.
I was like, you are okay starting at 9:00 and later.
I started at 8:00. I prefer 9:00, but I started at 8:00.
I would never put anything on your calendar at 8:00.
You actually know my energy’s better. I’ll occasionally do seven for something really unusual. That’s really understanding what my energy is but it took me a really long time to understand that. It was by paying attention. I mean, really paying attention to what that energy was and when it was. Most people would say trying to do focused work at 2:00 or 3:00 in the afternoon is just folly. I think it is probably for a huge percentage of the people in the world, but I was actually really good at that time.
That’s actually a really good time for me to be able to do focused kinds of work. If your natural energy runs different than what society says is normal, that makes it all the worse because you don’t know how to adjust for it. The key is to be paying attention. A third thing we can, or fifth, I don’t know how many things I’ve talked about. The eighth thing that we can.
If your natural energy runs differently than what society says is normal, it is much harder to adjust to it. The key is to pay attention. Share on XOne million.
The one billionth thing that we can add into the equation is our own biological cycles because that actually plays in as well. I’ve noticed there are a number of consultants that I’ve seen now that that’s actually their focus, helping you understand what your biological energy is and helping you line up your work to more align with your biological energy. Depending on how you feel about astrology and all of those things, all of the cycles are going on with the planets and the moons. There are a lot of things that can be playing into this energy equation. Even when you figure out your generic energy equation that works a lot of the time, it may not work all the time. It’s not an easy answer, which, of course, is always my answer.
Determining The Right Time To Do The Right Tasks
In answering my question about the relationship between energy and productivity, you brought up something that I think is a meaningful real-world example. Different tasks require different types of energy and what energizes me may not necessarily be what energizes you. When you brought up the difference in your natural rhythm and mine, where I’m an early bird, I’m up at 4:00, I’m at my desk at 4:30.
Different tasks require different types of energy. What energizes you may not necessarily energize other people. Share on XAll things being equal, you’d probably roll out of bed at 7:38 if you didn’t have a morning meeting and you’re okay at 9:00, but you would love to start later. When we started this podcast and we were trying to figure out recording times, we had to bounce around our time block quite a bit because we needed it to be a time when you could show up at your best, but we realized that too late in the day was not a time when I could show up at my best or I could show up, but I didn’t remember anything I said.
I’d have to listen to the episode twice afterward. We had to compromise on the right time for us. What I recognize with myself is that as long as I outline our episodes early in the morning and think through them, “These are the five questions I know that I want to ask when. These are the questions that I think she’ll ask me,” I can push our recording later in the day. I absolutely positively cannot be thinking about episode content late in the day. I’m too fried for that. What I wanted to address is this compromise I think works for us because the act of recording the podcast together energizes us both.
That’s another piece that you brought up that’s super important, which is what kinds of work make sense for you to do when. Another classic example of best practice, and how I feel about best practice, is that best practice is usually just common practice, which is to eat the frog first thing and do the hard thing first. For some people, that is a fabulous idea because they know getting the big thing passed gives them the energy to do all of the other things.
If they’re doing all the other things, they’re like, “I just don’t have energy for it by the time they get to the big thing. I’m going to put it off yet another day.” That’s a perfectly valid example. I also know for a lot of people, that just keeps them from getting started at all. They actually need 2 or 3 tasks that are so easy that it just eases them into their workday. For me, I’m not an eat the frog at any particular time of person.
There are certain times it’s like, “I’ve got space to eat the frog here. This is where I’m going to eat the frog.” Sometimes it’s like, “No, I really know I need to concentrate. I’m going to look for this time.” I do know that I will never eat the frog first thing, because I will not show up at my desk until I absolutely have to show up. The frog does not require me to show up. It’s all the things of understanding where the energy is and what works. Just because someone says, “This is the best way to do it.”
One of the things I learned in part of my experience as a professional knitting instructor is when someone says this is the best way, what they actually mean, they don’t say these words, but what they actually mean is when I discovered this way, it was life-changing for me. I want you to have the same amazing life-changing experience. I believe that this thing will be that thing but context matters. It always matters and because context matters, that may not be life-changing in the same way because there are all sorts of other factors about whether or not that made life-changing. Whenever someone says this is the best way, what they’re really saying is, it was life-changing for me.
Signs That Your Bottleneck Is Energy, Not Time
This is the best way I found after searching or I stumbled upon, this is the first thing I learned, but it worked really well. I think we’ve thoroughly explained how energy and productivity intersect. I liked some of the examples you gave also about how different tasks require different types of energy. I’m curious from your perspective, again, because I think you work with a larger volume of CEOs than I work with is what are some signs that the CEO, the entrepreneur, or the solopreneur would ever label you like to identify under? What signs can they use to identify that energy and not time is actually their bottleneck?
I think it really is a body thing of feeling. Does it feel tiring? Do you feel like, “I can get this done,” or do you feel like, “There’s not a chance I’m going to be able to get it.” I think it is an energy thing, but we haven’t been taught to just say, “That’s my energy.” I think we all feel it and we know it, but I don’t think we pay attention to it. I think that’s really the only trick we have to do, which is to start saying, “How do I feel about that?” I don’t think there’s anything magical about it. I think it’s just saying, “How do I feel about that?” Being self-observant. You’re standing outside and saying, “What would I see if I was standing over here in the corner, would I?” I see like, “This is good.”
I’m curious what you have to say about this because there are a lot of things at play that make it feel like time is the problem.
Time is way easier to measure.
This is where I was going. It is because time’s easier to measure. Somebody says, “As an entrepreneur, you should never work more than 30 hours a week. You bought the online program that promised you millions in twenty hours a week.” No judgment there. I get it. You find that you’re working 50 hours a week, 70 hours a week. You’re like, “There’s not enough hours in the day. There’s not enough time. I’m working 70 hours a week, but I’m not. I’m still not getting the thing done.”
You’re working late into the night to get the thing done early in the morning. I just haven’t slept enough. I need more sleep. I need more coffee. I ate too much sugar. There’s all of these other things that are easy to blame. I’m wondering at what point, obviously, there’s the process of elimination. Cut your sugar, cut your coffee, do all these things. At some point, the only thing left is, “This must be an energy level thing.” Are there other ways to deduce that it’s an energy issue versus a time issue?
The first is everything really is about being self-observant, quite honestly, on this topic. The first thing is, how much time does this thing take, and has it always taken this amount of time? Every single solitary time.
I hate that question.
One of the issues that really is a time issue is we say to ourselves, this is supposed to take an hour, and it takes an hour and a half, which then means we’re taking 30 minutes from something else and that just cascades on and on and on. If it’s actually supposed to take an hour, then the question is, how often has it taken an hour? Maybe it used to take an hour because your business was half the size that it currently was. I’m thinking of bookkeeping right now because that’s always my go-to. It’s an internal thing.
It’s like, “No, this should only take an hour.” It’s like, it takes longer because there’s more stuff to do now. Using the, it takes an hour because it took an hour, two years ago. That might be the problem. It may actually be a time issue. That’s also the other side of it is like, it used to take an hour and now it takes an hour and a half and to say, “I used to do it in the morning and now I do it at the end of the day.” You could say, “Let me try doing it in the morning this next time and see if we get it back down to an hour or if we get it back, if it’s still an hour and a half.”
That helps us understand it’s like, “I’ve got better energy for it in the morning than I do in the afternoon if it goes back down to an hour.” If it takes an hour and a half, it’s like, “No, I’ve just got more to do. It takes an hour and a half.” Part of the piece is being very curious and self-observant about these things, saying, “Is this something that could be done in less time? Do I feel like I’m dilly-dallying and slogging through it? Do I feel like I’m just like just right on it every step of the way?”
Being aware, if I do it at a different time, does it feel differently for those things? I do think there is a combination of sometimes our energy being taken away because of the time we haven’t actually allocated enough time for the thing. We’re creating this undue pressure that actually is creating the anti-productivity pressure. It is a time thing, but it also becomes an energy thing. I just feel like I can’t get everything done. Is it because you just have too many things to do? Are we just not maximizing?
Practical Strategies For Managing Energy
Is it because you are spiraling about all the things that you should be doing or that you should be moving faster or whatever? I like this because I feel like we’re getting to this place of providing some practical strategies for managing energy. One thing you said, you did not say these exact words, but things take the amount of time they take. That is one way you can tell if you have an energy problem versus a time problem is if you used to be able to do it faster or if you used to be able to do it with fewer errors in the same amount of time, then now, then you probably have an energetic challenge.
If you used to do a task faster or if you were able to do it with fewer errors in the same amount of time, you probably have an energetic instead of a time challenge. Share on XIt is also possible, and I see this a lot of times in my work, because I work with a lot of creatives, that you don’t actually have a realistic impression of how much time a thing takes. Something that I’ve seen, and actually this is what opened my eyes was I had discovered an AI tool and it was like a free AI tool and it was back when I was homeschooling and it was supposed to help people with ADHD prioritize tasks and so I was using it to help my middle schooler figure out what she could do in a school day.
I thought, “Let me test it on myself.” I livestream every week and I give myself one hour to plot my livestreams. I’m always running up to the wire and going, “I would have liked to have read through my outline.” I plug this whole thing into this free AI tool and it comes up with four hours of allotted time for the one-hour live stream.
It explains why it should take four times the amount of time that I’m actually presenting to plan. What’s funny is that I shared this with some friends, and they all did the same thing in terms of how long it should take them to write a blog post and how long it should take them to manage their social media. All of us were allocating about a fourth of the time that this nameless, faceless computer algorithm spits out.
Now, in all fairness, I do a pretty stinking good job in about two hours. I know my audience well enough and what I want to talk about, but it had never occurred to me that one hour was unfair and unreasonable. I think that the first thing is if you don’t know how much time something’s supposed to take, I don’t think it makes sense to ask people around you because honestly, other people underestimate how much time they spend on things.
We go into the assumption that most entrepreneurs are fundamentally creatives, whether they identify as creatives or not. They’re visionaries. They’ve got all of that. Understanding what typically that personality type is. Those personality types are horrible at understanding how time passes. I’ve taught a lot of classes on this. Often, at this point, I’ll say, “Everyone write down how much time, don’t look at your watch, don’t look at your phone, tell me how much time you think has passed since we started this.”
You guys could do it right now if you weren’t actually watching it and seeing the time and things because you probably are. Most people will be off huge amounts. There are certain personality types that will be very accurate, usually within 5% or 10%. Most types will be way under or way over what they are because this is back to being very self-aware and being very conscious of it. My husband is one of these people, and he’ll be doing something every once in a while.
I’ll say, “How long do you think you spent on that?” I know he thinks either he spent a very tiny bit usually or a very long bit, but almost always it’s a very tiny bit. We just did this. I did this just a couple of weeks ago with him and I said, “How long do you think you were in there?” and he said, “What, like maybe 45 minutes.” It was like, “You were in there for three hours.”
Time blindness is a real thing. We’re finally at a place in society where people talk about it in those terms. You can Google time blindness and see all sorts of TikToks and reels. Usually, it’s shared in the context of ADHD, autism, or other different neuro types. To your point, I think creatives in general, they hyper-focus on whatever the creativity is. For me, it could be writing. For you, it could be knitting, but it could also be spreadsheet stuff. You speak spreadsheet in a way that just baffles me.
Creatives usually hyper-focus on whatever the creativity is. Share on XTime blindness is time blindness. From the perspective of what are some ways that our listener could appropriately manage their energy to be more effective? You mentioned doing a thing at a different time of day to see if that changes. I mentioned outsource and how long it should take you to use some random computerized tool that doesn’t know you and isn’t going to make judgments on you. It’s just going to go to, “You fed me this information. This is how long I think that information should take.” Do you have any other ideas on how somebody could work to manage their time better?
We’re talking about managing our energy.
Energy, sorry. Thank you.
I really think the first thing to do is pay attention. Sometimes, paying attention means logging it. It’s not like in a time task study time log, but really an energy log where maybe you’ve got a sheet of paper that’s got the hours broken out into fifteen-minute increments. Do it for an extended period of time, not just for a day but do it for a week, and maybe do 2 or 3 random days and then maybe do it for a couple random weeks. I like using what I call the plus-neutral minus thing.
What I mean is it’s really just that. I make just a quick note so it’s a super quick tick mark thing. We aren’t having to do a big heavy-duty analysis. I feel very energetic. I feel like I’ve got good energy going. Zero being neutral. It’s like, “I’m not feeling tired or not feeling like I don’t want to do anything or any of that.” Minus being those things. Just track it and just say, “This fifteen minutes plus, this 15 minutes zero, this 15 minutes minus, this 15 minutes minus, this one zero, this one plus, this one minus.”
Do it for several days and see if there are trends. Are there things that you can see? You can go back and look at either your calendar or your task list and especially if you find it seems really random, it’s like, “Is this really related more to the task than it is to the time? Is it related more to the time of day than it is to the task?” If you’re seeing some consistent trends, it’s like, “That’s probably a really good time of day for me.” If it’s completely random, you can say, “This time of day, I was doing that task. It’s always negative when I’m doing that task.”
That’s more about the task and less about the energy. It’s the energy toward the task. That’s a different thing. It really is about taking some time to be self-aware. What I described won’t add that much time to your day at all to do. It’s very quick. You have to be willing to do it. A lot of it’s like, “That’s silly. It’s not going to do it.“ It’s amazing how much information you can get from that data, which isn’t a big giant make-work thing. You could also, at the end of each day, journal and take fifteen minutes and say, “I noticed this part of the day was really good.” This wasn’t anything to help you be self-aware.
Importance Of Self-Awareness In Energy Management
I think just to summarize, self-awareness seems to be the key when it comes to energy management. You have to be aware of what brings you energy, what robs you of energy, and what allows you to maintain energy. You have to understand the intersection of energy and productivity as it relates to time because some things are always going to take the amount of time that they take and that has nothing to do with your energy, but other things will take longer if you’re in a low energy point. I’m curious. Do you have an example of a couple of things that you have noted either in yourself or in clients who are energetically dependent in terms of how long it might take them to go?
Bookkeeping is one always. Any sort of that true administrative thing. Unless you thrive on it, which most entrepreneurs do not, that’s really rare. I’m a weirdo in that area. I actually like doing some of those things. For most folks, it’s low energy, they don’t like it. It’s one of those things like, “Can you do it faster at higher energy or will you just waste good energy on your bookkeeping?” That’s the other piece like, “Can I actually benefit from using what I’m going to call good energy as opposed to low energy?” I’ve had some folks say, “I’ll just do that when I’ve got good energy.” It’s like, “No, that you’re wasting it.”
It’s just going to it’s just going to sap it out of you. It’s just going to suck it like a giant hose giant vacuum hose right out of you. Understanding those kinds of things is helpful. For me, as you know, because this is back to you and I are opposites, writing is that thing. It’s not good for me to use writing-type things when my energy is really good because it’s not going to make it that much faster. It’s just not but because I’m a weirdo and I actually like my bookkeeping, I can get my bookkeeping investor from doing it during good energy times.
That’s helpful. Anything else you think readers need to know on this topic?
I really think your summary is it, and that you’ve got to be self-aware. You need to realize that the energy piece plays so much more into time management, task management, productivity, and all those things that we don’t really talk about the energy piece. The energy piece is probably a much bigger element than what we typically give it credit for. If you start being self-aware about it, you will start seeing that you find more time because you’re using your energy better, getting more done, and feeling better about it. Of course, the other thing is if you can finish the day energetically in a positive space, that makes it so much easier to go into day number two.
It’s very true. Gwen, thank you so much for having this conversation. It’s another example of conversations behind closed doors that need to be brought more out into the open. Reader, whether you are just starting to feel the pinch of growth or if you’ve been struggling with capacity issues for a while, I hope that we have helped you to understand where your energy and observing where the energy comes from and where it doesn’t is crucial for building sustainable success. Hear me, please.
Packing more in your day rarely drives the outcomes you would expect. We see it all the time. Instead, the true productivity hack, if there ever was one, is to match your energy with your business demands in a way that feels good and produces results. The tension between balancing time and energy is delicate, or at least it can be delicate, and it might require some outside perspective because if you’re anything like me, you are harder on yourself than anyone else around you.
If you want some low-key, super low-key outside perspective, we have Insight to Impact. Our premium weekly accountability subscription helps you gain clarity on your business one reflection at a time. Each Friday, you receive a thought-provoking question in your inbox that will invite you to examine a specific aspect of your business. When you respond, you get personal feedback to implement positive change. If you don’t respond, that’s fine. We’ll be back in your inbox the following week. If you want to check this out, head over to EverydayEffectiveness.com/Impact and you can learn more.
Mentioned in This Episode
About Your Hosts
Gwen Bortner has spent four decades advising executives and entrepreneurs in 45+ industries. She helps women succeed in business without sacrificing happiness by identifying their true desires and aligning their business functions. She spots overlooked bottlenecks and crafts efficient plans toward sustainable success that center your values and priorities. Known for her unique approach to problem-solving and accountability through the G.E.A.R.S. framework, Gwen empowers clients to achieve their definition of success without sacrificing what matters most.
Tonya Kubo is a marketing strategist and community builder who helps entrepreneurs build thriving online communities. As co-host of The Business You Really Want and Chief Marketing and Operations Officer (CMOO) at Everyday Effectiveness, she keeps conversations on track and ensures complex business concepts are accessible to everyone. A master facilitator with 18+ years of experience in online community building, Tonya takes a people-first approach to marketing and centers the human experience in all she does.
