This is a short talk/transcript by Debbie Danon describing a team tool she created called “What Color is Your Time?” to reduce chronic interruptions and help people set and respect boundaries around time, energy and attention. She defines color-coded categories (green, amber, red, golden, blue) mapped to task concentration and urgency, and explains how to use the system personally and as a team to protect focus and schedule deep work.
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When I started working at a boutique learning and development consultancy, I was taken aside by the founder and tasked with a project. He spoke proudly about how friendly, collaborative and supportive the team were, but that this also came with a shadow side. There was a chronic culture of interrupting. People would show up at each other's desks and ask, have you got a minute? And the desk occupant wouldn't feel able to say no. So they'd lay down their work, even if it was urgent or important to field the request. Unsurprisingly, junior members of staff didn't feel safe to turn down their seniors because saying yes to what you'd been asked was a big part of growth mindset culture too. Numerous studies maintain that it can take between seven and 20 minutes to regain your concentration or your flow after an interruption. That's a lot of wasted time and energy. So he asked me to work out how we could rein this in. I figured we needed to give the team explicit permission to take full ownership of their time, energy and attention. I saw how relentless meetings, projects piling on and not being able to consent or say no left the team overwhelmed, unfocused and with little sense of true priority. So I created a system, a quick and easy way to communicate our boundaries that became second nature part of the culture. I teach this to my coaches and my clients now and it's called what color is your time? What color is your time? Is a communal system of publicly setting and respecting boundaries around time. Boundaries around time, yes. But you'll see different colors of time are designed to also govern our energy and attention. To get started, list out the different tasks you you have to do and recognise what kind of time and attention they require. Green admin Low concentration can be done anywhere available for questions or a conversation. Amber Longer admin tasks, like emails requires more concentration and less interruption. You might say I'm not on email right now, but if it's really urgent, call me. Time sensitive tasks with an upcoming deadline, like a proposal, an imminent event, crisis management. It requires full concentration, total elimination of distractions and interruptions. Then there's golden time, Deep thinking, creative tasks, strategic planning tasks which are important but not urgent. This too requires full concentration and no distractions. Be aware this is the one that will get eaten up the most by other things. So be sure to block this out in your calendar and guard it with boundaries. Blue, you Time exercising, stretching, taking a walk. The self care that sustains you and keeps you sane. Now you can put time in your calendar accordingly. Just know that colors are just a tool. You don't have to literally put colors in your schedule unless you want to. You might also change the color of your internal messenger icon. Some teams I've worked with use emojis of the relevant color so others can see what color their time is right now on Slack or similar. Be ready to push back and ask people to reschedule if they encroach on your blocked out time for the sake of your priorities. Remember, you can use this as a tool yourself, but it really comes into its own when you make it a team tool. Once you've introduced it and got team buy in, you can also start to coach people with it in a one to one. Have you shielded some golden time for that strategy you're working on? How can I help you protect your golden time? How might what colour is your time? Help you and your team take more ownership of your time, energy and attention.
