By Jim McCarthy Jul 20, 2009 4 comments

The Egg Timer Method

Yesterday, I was cleaning out my garage (yes, my life is that exciting) when I came across some materials from my time at Noah’s Bagels.  (Back in the glory days of Noahs, in the mid-90s and before I got into the Internet biz.)

Anyway, I came across a piece of Franklin Covey material about project management that described how the brain works best in 5 to 7 minute intense bursts.

Now, I can’t vouch for the neurobiology in that claim.  It could be as valid as the thing about how if you swallow gum, it takes 7 years to digest or that if you eat pop rocks and drink soda, you’ll explode.

But let’s assume it’s true.

Henry Ford once said “Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably the reason why so few engage in it.”

It sounds like a sarcastic comment about the intelligence of most people, but in fact, it’s not.  It’s a sarcastic about the laziness of most people.  It takes real effort and strain to focus your mind on a problem for a long stretch.  It takes discipline not to simply drift through a work day handling whatever trivia comes up rather than taking charge of your personal agenda and getting the right things done.

Personally, I know I’m most productive when I set aside 45 to 60 minutes to work on my biggest, most valuable issues by pacing up and down in front of my white board and scribbling down notes.  Often times, I find I can either resolve some decision or come up with a solution to a problem or identify some important opportunity in one of these “thought sessions.”

I even put them on my calendar and tell my staff I have a meeting with myself during that time.

But here’s something I’m going to add.  I’m going to go get a countdown timer, and then during those thought sessions, I’m going to alternate between 7 minutes of intense focus and note taking with a few minutes of relaxing and regrouping my thoughts.  But during the 7 minutes, total and complete focus.  It’s easy to let your mind drift when you’re in a meeting with yourself, but if a 7 minute timer is running, you can maintain focus.

It’s like a workout with repetitions.  You can’t do an intense workout for an hour and a half, but if you take breaks, you can get a lot of exercise done in 90 minutes.

I’ll report back how it goes!

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4 Comments

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