Top Time Management Mistakes in Your Cleaning Business | The Magnetic Operator Ep. 8

Welcome back, everyone to another amazing episode of the Magnetic Operator. I'm your host, Kaden. This is Sam. And today we're diving in again.

Diving in, straight in, like the divers of the Olympics.

Yeah.

You know what's crazy? Those divers, the ones that have to do like the synchronization and yeah, part of the score is to not create a splash. Well, today we're going to create a splash. No, that's. I was trying to pun it up, but they are pretty skilled.

Yeah.

Those Olympic divers. If you've been watching the Olympics, I hope you're enjoying that. But today in the episode, we're going to be talking about one of the most critical aspects of leadership and management and that is owning your calendar. I think for the most part we really struggle with owning our calendars because we let things come to us and then we accept those things. And so what we want to really highlight today in the episode is what top performing BSCs do to manage their time well enough to handle the emergencies, balance the day to day responsibilities, streamlining the communication and the coordination, and have a life outside of work. Actually, I think most would argue that that is a struggle.

Yeah. I mean, that's why you got into business as a CEO or even as just senior leadership. Your ability to own your calendar will give you back the time that we all truly desire to spend on hobbies, family, whatever it may be. So we're going to talk about some of the techniques and it actually comes in a follow up from last episode. And that's what we'll dive into. Yeah.

So what's the secret? We're going to tell you today. Let's get going.

Dive in.

Dive, dive in.

But we're going to make a splash in this one.

Much, much bigger splash than what they do in the Olympics. All right, so here we are in the segment that you know so well now, hopefully, because you've been listening to, every episode, is beyond Mach 1, taking Operations Supersonic. So as Caden mentioned earlier, the question that's posed today is actually based on the last episode regarding adaptability. And the question comes from Stan. Stan asks us, Caden, after your episode on adaptability, I'm curious, what can I do to actually manage my time better? Feels like I'm always stuck in the grind, dealing with chaos and putting out fires. Well, first off, Stan, you're not alone. I think everybody has that challenge, especially in the realm that you're in, in the industry that you and others are in. The industry that we work with. Right. Definitely a challenge. Right. So we're going to unpack this pretty well today. Talk about what is okay, what makes a notable MO and what we're looking at for an elite mo. First off, Kaden, when we think about this question, adaptability, what can I do to manage my time better? How do I get out of the grind, dealing with the chaos, putting out the fires? First off, what's the relationship that is being managed here in this question?

Yeah, so I mean, Stan, real quick, appreciate you watching the last episode and for submitting this question. Last episode we went pretty high level, so hopefully today we give you some deeper details on maybe what this looks like and what we've prepared for you. But the reality is when you own your calendar, that's going to fall into leadership's relationship. So going back to the beginning of these podcast series, you have your client relationship, you have leadership and managerial relationships, and then you have frontline relationships. So all three of those relationships, this is gonna affect all the relationships. But really at the core, I believe that when you have your crap together, it is at the core how your leadership team is going to function. Because it all starts with leadership. So it's gonna affect first and foremost the relationships that exist among leadership management, and then it trickles to the client relationship, then it trickles to the frontline relationship. So at the core, everything starts with leadership because you have to take ownership and responsibility of your calendar and your time and how you strategically move the business forward by working on the business, not in the business. Now, obviously much of the audience that we talk to, you're kind of beyond that super small startup. Doesn't mean that we don't have listeners in that category, but we're focusing on these companies that are scaling. And that's the advice we're gonna give you today. You've kind of gone into this. What would you say? I mean, beyond the startup phase, Right. That's a different level of chaos.

Right, Right.

But this chaos is like, you've probably already hit like a growth ceiling, Right. You can't do everything. You've kind of put leadership in place, you have people, but it's not working. And so hopefully today, what we will help you uncover through the, okay, the notable. And then the elite is just better ways to manage operations, to become that elite mo So I guess to first dive in level one, that okay, level is that you as a CEO or a senior leader, living in this state of chaos, like, there's a better way, which is why you're probably investing in time and energy into education and listening and things around You. But the reality is, is that just knowing alone isn't enough. And that's really where the desire is gonna first set. So I would label that as the okay status you've become aware. And that again follows the trend of every single one of these episodes. That first levels, the first state of becoming aware. But I had this happen this long time ago. I was talking with someone about a calendar invite event, and he said, I don't know how to do that. And everyone is at a different level. But it just showed me the level of organization of like, I set up a calendar invite and things like that. Your time as a senior leader, as a CEO is the most expensive time in the company. And you've got to understand how to manage it, to manage it. So the time management of today, the okay level is going to be that you're aware, something needs to improve, and that'll get you far in the sense that it lets you take action. That's the first step to taking action. So you'll get somewhere just by being aware. But let's dive into the notable category. What's like that next level? Moving beyond awareness. The intention is there, but like, what's the first action?

So my thought, as you were speaking, definitely the okay operator has a calendar, right? And they have meetings and they're taking care of things, but they really are just all over the place, Stan. It can be all over the place. You could be planning to do one thing, but then something completely takes you away. What sets an okay from a notable apart, I believe is the actual planning piece. But then what happens once there is a plan, right? The planning involves priorities, clearly defining what's the priority? What will get us to the next level. What am I needing to focus on? What are the greater things that I will be able to accomplish?

And.

And knowing that someone else can help out down the road. And so I think that's the difference between okay and notable is planning and prioritizing, but then actually setting it somewhere it's visible and that you're aware of it. I think awareness is a huge aspect of owning a calendar. Knowing that, reflecting, right? I think a notable mo reflects and says, well, you know what, I should be looking at this and I should be prioritizing this. So I'm gonna give it time this week or I'm going to give it time at this point.

The intention is there.

Yeah, yeah. So I think a notable operator has that intention, is aware of the priorities, and actually gives planning to those priorities, which leads to greater outcomes. Right? You're Going to achieve more when you're aware and have that intention to nail those priorities on top of just being reactive and letting things come to you.

Yeah.

Think about that.

Yeah, well, it's these levels. I mean, I've experienced every single one of these levels and not only imagining my calendar, but just managing work in general. Over the years, it's been interesting to look back and realize at what point in my career has it been a strength or a weakness? And this next level, the elite operator, it's not for the faint of heart and it's not something that you can just snap your fingers and all of a sudden you can do it perfectly. And so what takes you up a level from that is just that literally every minute, essentially at least every 15 minute block in your calendar has a plan and an intention to be doing something. It doesn't mean you're in, in meetings for 50 hours a week, but it just means that you have a level of ownership on your calendar that says, hey, I am going to do this project. I'm going to spend time with this person, I need to take this person to lunch. I need to give priority to my family. I have a daughter that has a recital for something like whatever it is, you have moved beyond awareness. That is you acting day in and day out as an elite operator, showing up in life that I am literally going to craft my life. I'm going to do it at a level that if someone wants to come and be a part of my calendar, chances are I already have that time determined and I have an intention for that time. And so now I'm going and I kind of hit on this last episode. But now I'm going to start living life of. I've already determined priorities, I've already determined strategically. This is why it's going to deliver an roi by spending my time here and now when someone comes up to me and says, hey, do you got a minute? And you're like, technically, no, right? It's completely full. And kind of jumping back to the last topic of being adaptable. It's because you have the stage set of every single intention meeting, whatever it may be on your calendar, your ability to choose in that moment actually skyrockets. Decision fatigue is real when you, you're constantly trying to make decisions and have to make decisions without much data or understanding, sometimes behind decisions. But almost like the data point when you put something on your calendar, the data point is this. Now more important than this, you actually have context to actually make a decision off of and becomes so much Easier instead of being like, well, I was gonna try and like do this task list today, and it's not on top of mind, but this person's at my door and they need my time, so I'm just gonna like, give it to them. And now it's like sitting in the back of your mind like, oh, I have a bunch of things to do. Well, now it's like, nope, I have the one thing that I'm going to be doing right now, and that is not more important than that. And so I will schedule that time with you kindly in a week and a half from now. Now, I get there are emergencies that happen, but 80% of the time, functioning in this state of organization and planning and owning your calendar is 100% better than living in a state of chaos.

Speaking of state, I'm glad you brought that up because my question to you as you were speaking, was, in your experience, you're a CEO, you've been in leadership for 10 plus years now in your career, what gets you into that state of desire and awareness? What have you found to be helpful to get in that state? Right. What elements of leadership have led you to say, okay, I do got to own my calendar. I can't let it go. Because I think what Stan obviously is asking here is, hey, I have all these, I want to do better time management, but all these things are taking my time. So what would help Stan realize, like, oh, I just need to get in this level of thinking because a lot of times just perspective.

Yeah, right.

How you think about something lets you actually execute what you're actually trying to accomplish.

Yeah.

Any thoughts there?

One of the first things, and we kind of touched on this, I believe in our last episode. But running a time audit, truly understanding where your time is going, guys, at this point in time, if it shocks you, say the first step to change is like becoming aware. But that is the step to becoming aware. How is my time being spent? So I actually went through my last time audit last October. I was reading a new book and was talking about this time audit, decided to do it. And I only did it for like a week and a half, almost two weeks. And it was enough data and to become aware of where my time is being spent. Two things came out of that. So real quick, simplest version, doing a time audit, you literally put a 15 minute timer on your phone. Everyone has a smartphone these days. Put it right in front of you and constantly repeat. At the end of every 15 minutes, it's constantly going to go off. And you just have A log, whatever it is, it could be a journal in front of you, it could be an Excel sheet open on your desktop computer. Whatever it is, could be the notes app on your phone. You literally take three words at best and say what you were doing for those last 15 minutes. And then after you've collected all of that data, I mean, you could do it from the time you woke up to the time you go to sleep as a whole, if you just gathered that data point. And then after a week's worth, two weeks worth at most of data, just take a green or a red highlighter. And which ones did you like doing? Which ones are you happy that you spent time doing? And which ones do you feel like were depletion? Yeah, I really don't love doing that task or that type of thing. And then you start becoming aware of what fuels you. And you as the CEO, as the leader of your business, needs to show up day in and day out to show up for your team, to show up for your clients, to effectively manage these three core business relationships to succeed. If you're spending a bunch of time in the red, that's going to affect your mental and emotional capacity to show up. Right. So it doesn't mean you won't ever or shouldn't ever do things that are in the red that you've marked as red. But how do you fill your calendar with things that were green that you marked as green, that were strategically eventful for you and you enjoyed doing? If you wanted to go up a step from there, it would be to actually put a dollar value on each of those green activities. To say, hey, this is a $10 an hour task, this is a hundred dollar an hour task, or this is a $5,000 an hour task.

Going back to that perspective, right? Like, hey, if you're thinking about that piece of work, who should own it? Right. And I think that's the other element that definitely is here is the importance of delegating the importance of finding value in the work and then making sure the right team member is doing that work. And I would say as well too, when thinking about how you get to that perspective or having your mind in that idea of, hey, I'm going to make my perfect week, right. It boils down to clarity and what you're trying to accomplish as a business. Yeah, the vision that you have, your mission, what are you trying to achieve? Because if that's always forefront, then you are more likely to realize that, hey, I'm going to give time to the high value tasks while My team does X at a lower value task. And so this actually is a good segue into the elite MOS framework that USTAN can use to create a work week. Owning your calendar through this framework. So, Kaden, let's introduce Craig Ballantyne's Perfect Week method.

Yeah. So Craig Balintine, if you haven't heard of him, just Google it, look it up. But he talked about the perfect week method. Many other industry gurus and performance coaches in life adopt the same thing and have adopted their own tweak on it. But it's essentially like, what we're gonna give you, Stan, is a way to actually go build out your perfect week. Because the last thing, Stan, we want you to do is to grow business that you hate. Yeah. We want you to develop operations to become a magnetic operator. And a reminder, magnetic operator isn't someone who operates in the business. It's. They have developed an operational framework for their entity and their organization that draws people in. People love experiencing. It's. It doesn't mean that you are the operator. It's just you create magnetic operations. So as that quick clarification, this isn't all on you. So Craig Ballantyne's Perfect Week starts with defining your perfect week. And I mean, like, in detail. What I mean by that is last week you could describe everything you did, right? Because it happened in detail. You can come to me, like, I did this. We had a hockey game. All of those details. We experienced this one day, we had this meeting because it actually happened. Can you do that for your future? Do you have that understanding of what the perfect week looks like for you? So for me, when I went through this exercise, I had to go through, and I said, well, after I did the audit, I looked at all the green things that I enjoyed doing, and then there were things that I didn't do that I wanted to. To have on the calendar. So I would label things in my week as the huge priorities, which was certain aspects of business that filled me up that I loved doing. One of my strengths is I'm an idea person. I love spending time in ideas. Well, is there time on my calendar that's constantly diving into ideas and creative energy? Time with my wife, with my daughter, playing hockey. Like business and personal goes, there's no rules here. There shouldn't be any rules. It's not a work and life balance. It's a work and life integration. It's just life. And so you have to understand what it is that would be your perfect week. And if it's like, hey, I want to work out every single morning from this time to this time. I want to do this twice a week. I want a date night on Thursday nights with my wife or my husband or my spouse. Whatever it is, build it out in detail and you have an entire week in front of you. And every 15 minute block is planned for in your mind in the perfect week. And then you're gonna find that, wow, I actually do have time for the things that are most important to me that I haven't been giving time. I've just been led to this fallacy that I don't have time.

Before we move on to the second part of this method, you know I love pizza.

Yeah.

And we've been to mod pizza.

Yeah.

For those of you who don't know what mod pizza is, you get to go and build your pizza and then they throw it in a brick oven. In that line, I get to choose the ingredients that make my pizza a perfect pizza. I use ranch with marinara sauce. Well, there's your first game changer. Don't even, don't even give me that. But I then add 10 different meats and you can plus vegetables and seasonings.

And people would say, you choose to put vegetables.

I do.

Okay.

Because to me, that's my perfect pizza where I'm getting my vegetable two inches thick.

Right.

But when the pizza comes out, it is stacked. But it's my perfect pizza. And I can eat that whole thing because I put the ingredients on it that I love and want on my pizza. But then, you know, Caden over here might put honey on it because you can do that too. And I am not gonna eat his pizza.

Gross.

It's actually like hot honey. I don't know. But the point I'm trying to make is if you want to make your perfect week, like you've mentioned, it's ingredients to making the perfect week to execute on both business and personal life. Right. So find what ingredients make you the most happy.

Right. Yeah.

Gives you that perfect pizza that you're going to enjoy. That. That point. I think it's enjoyment if you want to enjoy your work week and your life week after week.

Yeah.

You need to have the right ingredients and you got to understand what those ingredients are. Which actually brings you to the point of number two, and we've talked about it pretty extensively already, which is conducting the time audit.

Yeah.

If you're highlighting aspects of your day to day.

Right.

Really every 15 minutes, what did I do? What am I doing? And then highlighting. Is it a good activity? Is it the Right. Ingredient. If not, mark it as red and then any green ones. You're putting a value to it. Right. Like this is a good ingredient. I want to put this in. So conducting the time audit, you've already kind of given that breakdown. That's the next step after you define what it is that you're truly looking to accomplish. So now you know what you want. You then put the ingredients inside of that perfect week and then you go and execute. You get to go eat the pizza.

Right? Yeah. Well, and then that third thing is, after that timeout has been done we've talked about it, is to analyze that part of analyzation is critical because I'll be the first to admit I have a lot of things that I'm not really good at. And I can point them out and be like, hey, there's this person that's better at this, or I don't enjoy doing this, but I don't have someone that I can trust to give that. So, like, you're gonna find, find the inefficiencies of. Okay, well, if it is up to me to do these things on my calendar and I have no one else to truly delegate them to, like, who else can take them off? Well, how are you going to go solve for that inefficiency? Yeah. And so that's step number three is to analyze the inefficiency. And number four is go engage your team. Go share the results. Like, after we did it, it must have been a few months later after I had initially done it, but I asked the entire company to go do the same audit. It wasn't going to be tracked in a way that leadership was going to be able to see everyone's time audit. It was a self discovery. And so the ability for the team to come together and say, hey, here's all the things that I'm finding joy in. Here's what I'm not like, go have an open conversation. And Stan, hopefully that allows you to see something that maybe you marked in red is a green for someone else. Yeah, right. Like, hey, I can go delegate that because they want that. That fills them up. And then step number five at the end of that is once you've done all that is go develop the actual solutions and take it one day at a time. You can't change this overnight. Since I did this last time audit and I had done one before, but since this last one, a lot of things in my personal life changed in business now, by all means, I'm not perfect at it. I still have blank space on my calendar each week and it bugs me. But I'm trying to get to the point where there's not a single 15 minute marker that's blank because I am designing constantly that perfect week and I'm adjusting and I'm being adaptable and moving things in. But go take it one day at a time and go develop those solutions with the team and go discover where you need your next hire. Because you, as the CEO and leader, have to have the time to lead the company and work on the business first and foremost. And it's going to probably make you aware of one or two hires that you just realize you need to make sure that you can spend more time working on the business. And yeah, hopefully, Stan, that five step framework that we just shared is executable in your mind and it's not terribly overwhelming. Just each of those one, one step at a time. And maybe as we were talking, you thought of other things that you can add to that. Again, it's not always what is taught, it's what's caught. So hopefully you caught something that was insightful for you to be able to.

Take action today to that point you made just a minute ago. It's called the perfect week methodology. But being perfect at it is not.

There is no perfect.

Right, Right, right. Practice makes progress.

Right.

And so the perfect week can be executed and you'll see challenges. You will fail at keeping some of those things and that will naturally happen. But the difference is the consistency and the frequency of trying to perfect the perfect week, finding the ingredients.

Right.

And going through that methodology. And so that consistency is where you're going to be able to keep the ball rolling, that flywheel rolling. Right. Definitely. Momentum is huge. But you know, Stan, you mentioned the idea of, man, it is difficult to just manage time. Right. And when you have a lot on your plate, that is a challenge. Right. And so oftentimes the myth that comes with this type of concept is I literally don't have any time to waste on time audit, Caden. So I'm already stretched too thin. Your advice, it's just too much for me. What would you say to that?

That is true that it takes a little bit more time in your day to do the time audit, but it's a one and done deal to become aware. It's not a permanent process that you're going to add in your life.

So.

So the sacrifice, I recognize it as a sacrifice of time energy kind of feels like it constantly is an interruption throughout the week. But like that level of becoming aware is going to 10x your business after the fact. So I would just say that that's a little bit of a here and now mindset. Think about the future because that's what gets us to do hard things. If it doesn't challenge you, it won't change you.

Agreed. I think one of the learnings definitely in my career has been again the perception. My mindset then lead me to a desire to take time to become more self aware.

Right.

And so definitely there's been a lot of books that have helped us in the past. Raise your game was one that just made me realize like it's all me, like it's on me if I want to succeed, if it's going to be, it's up to me. Right. So as leaders, that is such a true concept. Right. We have to become aware. And so you have to give yourself time to reflect, analyze your performance. If you're at the top level, no one else is coming to you and saying, hey, you're not doing a good job.

Right.

So you have to self reflect and you have to look inward and say, okay, where are the chances to improve? And time management through a perfect week method is one of those ways.

Yeah.

Right. And so any other thoughts on books or ways that you can change that perspective?

Yeah. So I mean, at the end of the day it's just gonna be the next action step. So it can be a little bit overwhelming to think about like, all right, I'm gonna go do this time audit. I wanna do this, I wanna meet with the team. Just take the next action step, like whatever you've written down as like action step number one. Just go do it today and focus on the next step. After that, break it down and focus. Follow one course until successful. And that is our advice for you today. Please continue to watch. Feel free to subscribe if you haven't already. We see a lot of people watching compared to the number of subscribing. It really helps us if you actually subscribe so you can know when new content gets dropped and it allows the good message hopefully that you've been enjoying actually get spread. So thank you to our audience for listening and we will catch you next time on the Magnetic Operator.

Thanks everyone.