Life Tool: Weekly Strategy Time
This post is part of a series. You can start at the beginning or see All of the Tools.
“You need to be able to step back and review the whole picture of your life and work from a broader perspective as well as drop down ‘into the weeds’….For more people the magic of workflow management is realized in the consistent use of the reflection step.”
That quote is from David Allen in Getting Things Done. If the Annual Strategy Retreat is the opportunity to set annual Objectives, a “Weekly Strategy Time” is the consistent reflection step to flesh out Key Results and To-Dos.
Background
In my first job, as a junior analyst, I stumbled into this practice. First thing on Mondays, I’d look at the calendar to find the meetings in which I would have to present my analysis. At that point in my career, my days were 90% working time and 10% meeting time, so I really just had to figure out how to order and pace the work to get it done well.
Now, as a junior executive, the challenge is much different. Without intervention, my calendar would be 90% meetings and only 10% working time. So my planning challenge is more about finding enough time to do meaningful work and about choosing between competing priorities. Weekly Strategy Time is when this planning happens.
The Practice
Weekly Strategy Time is set on my calendar for 60 minutes, first thing on Monday morning. Why? Because I need to do it before anything else during the week; it’s emotionally draining to feel behind, to feel like events are controlling me. Weekly Strategy Time helps me feel in control of what I need to do.
Because the time is held on the calendar each week, it ensures that nothing gets scheduled before I have this time for myself.
In principle, there’s no magic to Monday morning. I often do Weekly Strategy Time on Sunday night to get ahead of the week. In Getting Things Done, David Allen recommends Friday afternoon as time to clear the inbox and plan for the subsequent week. Whatever works for you is the right way to approach it.
Getting Started
First, set a recurring meeting invitation to hold time for yourself to do weekly planning. Even if you do it at a different time, the calendar reminder will likely help you make it a regular practice.
If you need a commitment device, you might try communicating your top priorities to your spouse or boss each week. Once they expect that, it will force you to have thought through your priorities
An Actual Weekly Strategy Time Agenda
The questions you might ask yourself each week include:
- What should I do to make progress on my Key Results?
- What meetings do I have this week? When I am going to prepare for each?
- When should I schedule time to work out?
- What should I cut from my calendar (e.g., low priority meetings, meetings that others on my team can cover, meetings that are best done another time)?
Those are the questions I ask, but the ones that work for you might be different. The key step is creating the time to reflect on what is important — and is unimportant — on a regular basis.
During weekly strategy time, I’ve also used a paper template that drives reflection on those questions. That tool is covered in another post.
I want to hear your thoughts!
This is a “living post,” in that I’d like your help to add to make it more valuable. What have you tried that is similar? Have any stories about the impact of using a tool like this? Please share!
See All of the Tools for other posts like this.
