I've been talking about a book I recently picked up called, Only the Paranoid Survive by the former CEO of Intel, Andrew S. Grove. Not surprisingly, he addresses how leaders should consider their time:
"One more word about your own time: if you're in a leadership position, how you spend your time has enormous symbolic value. It will communicate what's important or what isn't far more powerfully than all the speeches you can give. Strategic change doesn't just start at the top. It starts with your calendar. "
Poet Annie Dillard once said, "How we spend our days is how we spend our lives."
The two could not come from more contrasting spectrums. Grove was the CEO of a multinational corporation, while Dillard is a Pulitzer Prize winning writer. Still, both seem to understand that how we spend our time is different that how we talk about our time.
In my own life, I used to talk a great deal about the importance of personal relationships and family. Yet, each week when I took a glance at my calendar I had the sobering realization that very little of those 168 hours went to either. I was talking a big game but not backing it up with my actions.
It seems whether you look at your time through the lens of work life or personal life one thing is for certain: actions speak far louder than words. And theory alone means nothing without initiative.
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