Goals

• Identify the main activities of your job
• Assign time + energy spent, as well as generated value
• Re-allocate time + energy on activities that generate the most value, for you and the company

Introduction

Look at that guy over there, what a loser. Doesn't plan on becoming the next Steve Jobs on steroids. Doesn't even want to quit his job and join our totally legit pyramid scheme. Basically no ambitions whatsoever. Just looking at him makes me sick. We better keep distance, wouldn't want to catch that low-performance, "I like my job" virus he probably has.

- Two entrepreneurs, when they saw me entering the office with a smile on my face, circa 2018.

It's slightly messed up that this needs to be said, but: You're not a failure if you enjoy your current job. Not everyone needs to create a startup that's worth millions each year. No matter what you achieve, you'll be forgotten eventually. So you might as well get a kick out of that 9 to 5 with stable monthly income and dental insurance benefits. Unless you have the option to discover the secrets of manipulating your genes, uploading your mind to a supercomputer, harnessing the power of a supermassive black hole, shedding your physical body because you no longer need it, and eventually becoming an all-seeing, omnipotent god that wipes out whole civilizations just for fun. Would recommend.

But until you ascend to godhood: Have you ever thought about ways to increase the quality of your current job? I'm not necessarily talking about big changes such as a promotion. Many white-collar jobs nowadays have the potential to be transformed to your liking, without even changing job titles, switching departments, or having an awkward conversation with your boss. Due to the ever-increasing popularity of all things "agile", many of us find ourselves in structures that are highly self-organized and therefore quite malleable. All you need is a plan and some dedication. I can help you out with the first part, the second part is on you.

Step 1: What would you say you do here?

Obvious Office Space reference is obvious

What do you actually do at your job? This question is surprisingly hard to answer for many of us. Our job title might say "Senior Software Developer", but does that mean we sit around coding all day? Oh, how our hearts yearn for that to be true... In reality, a dev will spend a significant chunk of a typical workweek in meetings, ranging from mind-bogglingly pointless to "maaaaybe sometimes this is useful". Then there are various chats with the team, coaching a junior, arguing over ticket descriptions, waiting for exact specifications, reports to the project leader... And lately, to show responsibility and appreciation for the company's culture, a lot of time is spent organizing a big internal workshop on the next big frontend framework Vueactular JS.

Start by writing down all categories of activities you've done in the past few weeks. To validate it, you can double-check during the next week and add activities you've missed as they come up. And trust me, you'll miss some heavy hitters.

Here's an example of my typical activities about 2 years ago, in a pre-pandemic world. How naive we were back then...

Step 2: Input

How much time and energy do you spend on the various activities? This doesn't need to be an exact log, because your estimations will:

1. be wrong anyway
2. describe a typical week, which in reality doesn't exist

So let's try and assign rough ballpark estimates. Something like:

• 8 hours (unlikely for a single activity, unless you work 16 hours a day, in which case I pity your soul)
• 5 hours
• 3 hours
• 2 hours
• 1 hour
• 30 minutes
• 10 minutes

Next up: How much energy and mental focus do you put into these activities?

• High energy/focus (programming in a flow state, moderating a meeting)
• Medium energy/focus
• Low energy/focus
• No energy/focus (sitting in a meeting without paying attention)

It makes sense to look at time and energy separately, as both don't always align.

Step 3: Output

What's in it for you? And for your company? In the end, we want to optimize your workflows for all involved parties, which means we also need to get more clarity on the value the individual activities generate. This heavily depends on the type of company you work in. Do you know the main streams of income? If not, it's about time to get to know how your salary is generated. Once you know where the money comes from, estimate to which degree each of your activities impact the companies business:

• High impact on revenue (directly producing/selling products)
• Medium impact on revenue (administrative and supporting activities)
• Low impact on revenue
• No impact on revenue (browsing the snacks in the kitchen)

As in any healthy relationship, both parties should mutually benefit. So it's not just about the impact on the companies revenue, but also about the impact on your personal goals and plans for the future. If you have none of that, you might want to take a look at some of my other articles. At the very least, you should enjoy your time at work. So merge these factors and come up with a score for each activity based on how much you get in return, be it the opportunity to grow, make progress in your career or have a good time:

• High personal impact (honing the skills necessary for your planned promotion)
• Medium personal impact
• Low personal impact
• No personal impact (you neither enjoy nor gain anything else from pointless meetings)

Step 4: Let the intern handle it

Often it seems that employees strive to be irreplaceable, while employers should maximize for replaceability and redundancy, especially when it comes to critical tasks. Sounds like a conflict, and it certainly can be. But there's one thing that all involved parties will agree on: You should spend the majority of your time doing things you are uniquely qualified for. Otherwise, you'll not feel suited for your job, and chances are the company could find someone else that's either higher skilled and/or cheaper than you. Let's investigate how your typical activities hold up to that criterion.

How long would it take a typical newcomer/junior in your company to learn the skills necessary to produce results that are 80% as good as yours? Also, how long might it take until the task gets sufficiently automated?

• 5+ years
• 3 years
• 2 years
• 1 year
• 6 months
• Almost no training is necessary/there are automated solutions already

Step 5: Time for some good old scheming

Having outlined the current state of where your time and energy flows, and what outputs are generated in return, let's try to optimize it. The goal is to take a closer look at every activity, and based on the cost (time + energy), the value (impact on personal goals and the company's revenue), and the replaceability aspect, decide on whether you want to:

• spend more time/energy on the task
• spend less time/energy on the task
• stay at the current level of time/energy

Generally, you'll want to increase your investment if:

• the activity has a high impact on the company's revenue
• the activity pays off on a personal level, e.g., you're learning valuable skills
• it's hard to replace you, in other words, you are right for the job

If on the other hand one of the following criteria applies, you'll want to reduce your investment (time/energy) in the respective activity:

• the task has a low impact on both your personal goals, as well as the companies revenue streams
• someone else could easily take over, increasing the likelihood your employer will want to replace you with a cheaper worker or an automated process

Here you can see the final analysis of my own job about 2 years ago. How you can make the desired changes heavily depends on the specifics of your job. In my case, I basically just did what I set out to do, slowly adjusting the dials on each activity over a period of a few months, taking the following advice to heart:

It's better to ask forgiveness than permission

If that's not an option, ask your boss for help. I bet they will be impressed by your thorough analysis, and since you actively try to increase your positive impact on the company as a whole, it should be in their best interest to support you in this endeavor.

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