3 Founders share their techniques for accomplishing their most productive days.
Last week we shared what eight product designers find most challenging about the work they do. That seemed to really resonate. While we have interviewed a lot of designers for Ways We Work, we’re interested in folks in all different roles. Being able to compare and contrast how people in the same role and different roles work is the most interesting part, at least I think so.
We’ve also talked with a handful of inspiring founders and so today I thought I’d share their answers to the question of how they accomplish all of the various things they need to do in their days. As a founder, time is precious and spread very thin, so here’s how a few of them make the most of that time.
Grace Garey, Co-founder at Watsi
The one that I’m always striving to get better is just prioritization. In a startup where there are more things on the list of to-dos then there are people you have to realistically accomplish them, you have to have a framework for deciding what is most important. Being really clear about that is something that we are increasingly focused on. It’s an added challenge when you are lucky enough like we are that everyone on your team is super excited and passionate with a ton of ideas. We are always adding five things to the list for every one that we cross off.
Being able to zoom out to the bigger picture and start from the end point really helps. What does this look like if we are successful? At the highest level, what does Watsi look like if we are successful? At a medium level, what does Watsi’s marketing look like if we are successful? Even at the lowest level, what does this project or this email campaign look like if we are successful?
Then working backward from there, you start with the most important things and you can tell a story about what this looks like if you’ve done a good job. Then you can whack anything off the list that doesn’t directly contribute to that. Hopefully, by that logic if you don’t make it to the end of the list the stuff at the end probably wasn’t that important to your end goal.
Wade Foster, CEO & Co-founder of Zapier
I try to front load my week with meetings and one on one’s with my core team of people. I spend a lot of time in one on one’s with the leadership team at the beginning of the week to make sure they have what they need from me and that we agree on what the core tasks are. That way they’re set up well for the rest of the week to go and execute on that stuff. Bryan, our CTO is the really technical one and Mike is the product guy, and I spend a lot of my time on the marketing and customer service side of Zapier. So I spend a lot of time with our customer service team and our marketing team to make sure that things are going really well on both those teams.
All of those check-ins happen at the beginning of the week and then Wednesday and Thursday I try to keep a bit more open for my own individual work, the things that I just need to get done. Those differ from day to day, it could be stuff like doing an interview like this or writing and communicating that Zapier is a neat and interesting place to work. Wednesday and Thursday’s are when I can get in the groove and focus on doing something big and hard.
On top of that, everyone at Zapier does a little bit of customer service each week, so I end my week doing my support shift on Friday afternoons. I like to make sure that every single customer has heard from us that week. We use Help Scout for support and I like to see it at zero at the end of the day on Friday. That means everyone is taken care of for the week and we’ve done right by our customers. That’s what I try and wrap up my week with.
Geoff Teehan, Founder of Teehan+Lax, now Design Director at Facebook
I get up super early at like 5:00 and then I work out for 90 minutes before starting my day. I think about what the one thing is that I need to accomplish that day. It’s my one main thing. I don’t have a work priority list and a personal priority list. I have one list and I prioritize everything. Whether it’s a phone call, setting up a meeting, a recruiting thing, writing a brief, scheduling car service, all of those things are on the list. I take a clean look at it every single day and decide what I’m going to accomplish and I try not to take on too much. It’s easy to get overwhelmed and stretched out if you try to take on too much.
Facebook has a heavy meeting culture–at least I know it does on my team–so I try to protect my calendar as much as I can. I will put in blocks of time so that people can’t block me out. If something is important they’ll reach out via email or messenger and I’ll open up a time. I found that helps me stay focused on the things I think I should be focused on. I have a lot of team meetings and product meetings, as is, so protecting my calendar has been a very good exercise and productivity boost for me.
As a manager it’s important that you look out for the calendars of your team as well. They need to have good, clean blocks of time to do work, so making sure their meetings are grouped together is key. On Wednesdays we have a work-from-home or no meetings day here. It’s a nice, full workday and that’s been positive. But periodically it’s important to ask your team how their calendar looks. If it looks like a shotgun blast, that’s not a great way to do a lot of good work.
Ways We Work is a digital publication focused on telling stories and first-hand accounts of how people do the work that’s meaningful to them. Find us online and say hello!
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