How to be Extremely Productive
Professor Robert Pozen discusses his
new book, Extreme Productivity: Boost Your Results, Reduce Your Hours,
in which he shares performance-enhancing tips on everything from better sleep
on overnight business flights to dealing with employees' mistakes. From the HBS
Alumni Bulletin.
HBS senior lecturer Robert Pozen is living proof of the adage "If you
want to get something done, ask a busy person." Throughout a distinguished
career that has included often-overlapping leadership roles in business,
teaching, public service, and the law, Pozen has also written six books and
maintained rewarding relationships with his wife and their two children.
“It takes a lot more than
organizing your schedule to be productive.”
In
a widely read Harvard Business Review article (May 2011), Pozen outlined six
"principles for getting a lot done." Now in his new book, Extreme Productivity: Boost Your Results, Reduce Your
Hours,
he shares more performance-enhancing tips on everything from how to sleep
better on overnight business flights (window seat, no alcohol, earplugs, and
eyeshades) to dealing with employees' mistakes ("No matter how
spectacularly the project flopped, don't attack the person").
Deborah
Blagg:
Classic productivity books often focus on time management, but Extreme
Productivity takes a much broader look. It reads more like a businessperson's
handbook. Did you intend that?
Robert
Pozen: It
takes a lot more than organizing your schedule to be productive. I wanted to
discuss skills that have been critical in my own career. Communication is
one—reading, writing, and speaking. Another is how you operate within your
organization and deal with both those above you and those who report to you. I
also wanted people to think about how they are managing their careers in the
evolving context of their own professional and personal lives.
Q: The book addresses aspects
of business life that are vexing to many of us. For example, what are some ways
to make meetings more productive?
A: You should not schedule
meetings that last more than an hour, or 90 minutes at the most. There are
tremendous diminishing returns in lengthier meetings. When you only have an
hour, you don't waste time on nonproductive tangents. You also need to think
about how you structure the meeting. When meeting materials arrive in your
email five minutes before the meeting starts, it's a signal that the person in
charge hasn't laid the groundwork for a productive use of time. There should be
adequate time in advance for everyone to prepare for a thoughtful discussion.
All
meetings should have an effective close. People should think, "What are
the to-dos, and who's going to do them?" Senior executives tend to think
that they can accomplish this by just telling people what to do. But there's a
big difference between assigning a task to be completed by next Tuesday vs.
introducing a challenge, getting buy-in on addressing that challenge, and
having everyone come together on a way it can get done by a mutually agreed
deadline.
Q: On the subject of
management styles, you write about the wisdom of adapting your personal style
to that of your boss. What if your boss's style is interfering with your
productivity?
A: By "adapting," I
don't mean that your style needs to be the same as that of your boss, but you
should be in sync and try to make sure your skills complement each other. For example,
if your supervisor is a "big-picture" thinker, you could balance that
by being detail-oriented. The notion is to understand your boss and position
yourself accordingly. And if the differences you have with your boss are
compromising your ability to do your job, you just have to take the leap and
talk about it directly.
Q: Those are sensitive
conversations. How do you make them productive?
A: People fear that if they
air their differences with their bosses, they may be fired, but that's not my
experience. If you raise topics politely, explain your perspective on the
issues, and stay away from personal attacks, I think most bosses will respond
positively. Even better, go into that conversation with a suggestion or two
that would lead to better results. You may think you're sticking your neck out,
but if the conflict is there and neither of you addresses it, you are probably
not long for that job anyway.
Q: You take exception in the
book to the practice, at many professional firms, of organizing work around
billable hours. How does that hurt productivity?
A: The most obvious answer is
that there is a negative financial incentive to solving problems quickly and
efficiently. Hourly billing is a deeply ingrained model of measuring work, but
it comes from a time that predated our knowledge-based economy. When your goal
is a great marketing plan or a brilliant idea for a software system, it doesn't
matter if it took 2 hours or 20 hours. The client is paying for the quality of
the solution.
Q: What do you think about
the issue of flexible work hours?
A: There's a long way to go
yet, but once you embrace the concept that results are the most important
factor in evaluating performance, if someone leaves early or comes in late in
order to take care of a family matter, it's a non-issue—as long as that person
is getting their work done and achieving good results. And that concept of
being able to attend to outside obligations should be as important to those at
the organization's highest levels as it is to middle managers.
Q: We often find that work
obligations overwhelm our best intentions when it comes to spending time with
family. How do you juggle conflicting priorities?
A: Many managers insist that
their jobs routinely require them to stay late at the office, but when you
press them, they admit that isn't true. Some occasional emergencies need to
take precedence over everything else, but unless you work in a hospital, those
situations are rare. Even if you have to catch up with work after dinner, take
a couple of hours every day to connect with the people in your life who should
matter most.
Q: You stress the importance
of reading, writing, and public speaking. Any hints?
A: When it comes to reading,
prioritize. Determine which information is most important to you, and spend
more time reading that information carefully. I've worked with a number of
high-school students, and what I tell them about writing is just as valid for
managers: begin with an outline. It keeps you from getting halfway through and
not knowing where you should go from there. With public speaking, don't read
from a script. Instead, have one piece of paper with an introductory sentence,
brief notes on four or five points that you want to make, and a conclusion
sentence.
Q: You advise against doing
too much career planning. Why?
A: I think people should keep
their options open. An annual self-assessment is a wonderful tool, but it is
not productive to sit in a room and try to figure out where you want to be in
10 or 20 years. Instead, think about
what you can do in the next year or two to broaden your learning, experiences,
and choices. Career planning should be an exercise you engage in throughout
your life, and it should take into account the changes that occur along the way.
by Deborah Blagg
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