The weird mathematics of time management

When we want to manage our time to achieve a goal we usually see it in terms of allocating blocks of time in order to move from A to B and then to C. This has its place in time management thinking, but it isn’t always true…

When we think of achieving a goal we often think of it in terms of building blocks. We have a goal to achieve, and in order to achieve the goal we have to do A, then B, then C etc. When all the blocks are in place, we have achieved the goal. You could think of it in terms of building a house. First you put down the foundations, and then build the walls and roof. And finally you put in the doors and windows, and maybe plant a few trees in the garden.

When all this is done, you can stand back and say you have achieved your goal. The house has been built, brick by brick.

This can be a useful way of looking at things. It can teach us not to be overwhelmed by our goals, and that great things can be achieved if we do a little at a time. Keep building the house and eventually you’ll achieve your goal. If, say you need to put down 500 bricks to build a wall and you put down 100 bricks a day, in five days the wall will be built. The goal has been achieved by simple mathematics. 100 x 5 = 500.

It’s simple and straightforward.

However, this method of looking at goal achievement has its drawbacks. It can give the feeling that, even though a goal can be reached by doing one thing at a time, a goal can take a long time to achieve. It also gives the feeling that for a goal to be achieved, every part, every brick, must be in place before we get the result we crave. In terms of time management, it means we see goal achievement as a long line of tasks to be done one after the other. It can also be discouraging when we see the goal achievement as a huge number of small tasks. It can even put us off starting a project.

Non-measurable goals

So although this step-by-step approach holds true when it comes to achieving something concrete—such as building a house—it is much less useful when the goal is something that can’t be precisely measured. Things that can’t be precisely measured can include things such as starting your own business, being free of debt, or having a better relationship with someone. Sure, we can set a precise goal to have a successful business two years from now, but we can’t say exactly how that business will be built. There are just too many unknowns.

The concrete things of starting your own business—like developing a product or opening a store—can certainly be measured in terms of achieving a goal piece-by-piece. But many of the other things of starting your own business can’t be measured in this simple goal-achievement way. For instance, business has a lot to do with relationships—with customers, with suppliers and others. These things can’t be built up in small pieces that we can see. They are abstract entities.

And this is where their strength lies. They don’t grow piece by piece, but can grow exponentially once they are put in motion. It can be like a dam bursting. And luckily for us, many of the goals in our lives are abstract things, or rely heavily on abstract things for their achievement.

To return to the house analogy, imagine putting down one brick and coming back the next day to find that three bricks had actually been laid. It sounds weird, but when we achieve our goals a magical process like this does take place.

The sum is greater than the parts

The reason this works is that the sum can be greater than the parts. Or, in other words, all the small things that we achieve build up into something bigger than the small things themselves. For example, one useful business relationship leads to another useful business relationship—or very often three useful business relationships. Getting out of debt with one lender means less interest to pay—which means more money available to pay off another lender.

In terms of time management, what we need to do is stop looking at everything as a process that moves from A to B and then to C. When building something concrete, such as a house, seeing it as an ABC process is helpful, and enables us to practice good project time management.

But when dealing with abstract stuff it can be very unhelpful. We might move from A to B and then jump to F—because just putting A and B in place made something big enough to get us to F.

In other words, two and two can make five. Or even ten.

Looking at our goals in this way stops us from becoming discouraged at having to do so many things to achieve our goal. Once we realize that we might have to do just half of what we thought we had, the task seems nowhere near as difficult.

When faced with a large goal, just fall back on the simple advice to do one thing a day. You might find that doing just ten of those things has the effect of doing twenty. The small things are the things that will enable you to achieve your goal faster than you could have imagined. So do one thing a day and you might get two things done.