Your most precious resource is your time. Great entrepreneurs spend their time on top priorities, less successful entrepreneurs don’t. To become a great entrepreneur you need to learn to identify top priorities through a prioritisation framework and proactively design your calendar to ensure you spend enough time on the right activities. 

To do this you first need to know how you are spending your time. To learn how you are spending your time, schedule everything in your calendar. Then set up 15-minutes each week to add up how you spent your time or have your executive assistant do this.

Then review your priorities for the week and schedule blocks of time to work on your top priorities. To do this write a list of how you would like to spend your time (See below). Then at the end of the week write a list of how you actually spent your time. Keep iterating until your time and your top priorities align. Have all members of your team do the same to ensure the company collectively is spending time on the company's top priorities. 

What should you be spending your time on at different stages of the company? 

In the early stages of a company the founders should be spending 90% or more of their time on either product (improving the product or delivery of services) or growth (marketing and sales). 

An example of an early stage founding team’s ideal time allocation: 

• 45% Product building
• 45% Growth (Sales and marketing) 
• 10% Administration and compliance 

Actual time allocation: 

• 20% Building product
• 20% Growth (Sales and marketing) 
• 20% Administration and compliance 
• 40% Other 

In the later stages of a company as the focus moves from a founding to a 20 person team the CEO should be spending the majority of their time on: 1) Product and company vision and strategy, 2) Hiring and managing the team, 3) Financial management and fundraising, and 4) Evangelising the company.  

Example of a calendar audit by founder managing a 50 person team: 

Goal time allocation: 

• 25% Managing direct reports (1-on-1’s, Weekly meeting, Quarterly & yearly goal setting) 
• 10% Internal communications (Offices hours, weekly email, all hands)
• 10% Ad hoc projects & decisions (Crisis management, helping under resourced, strategic input)
• 10% Executive hiring (Meeting with candidates, recruitment) 
• 10% Culture upkeep (Team hiring, values alignment, employee experience) 
• 10% Product & strategy (Market research, customer research, product management)
• 10% Email (Receive 214 and replies to 30 on average)
• 5% Financial management (Fundraising, investor updates, investor meetings) 
• 5% Public relations (PR, blog posts, events, strategic sales) 
• 5% Self improvement (Getting mentored, advisory sessions, seminars, mediation, etc.) 

Actual time allocation: 

• 20% Managing direct reports (1-on-1’s, Weekly meeting, Quarterly & yearly goal setting) 
• 15% Internal communications (Offices hours, weekly email, all hands)
• 10% Ad hoc projects & decisions (Crisis management, helping under resourced, strategic input)
• 10% Executive hiring (Meeting with candidates, recruitment) 
• 10% Culture upkeep (Team hiring, values alignment, employee experience) 
• 10% Product & strategy (Market research, customer research, product management)
• 15% Email (Receive 214 and replies to 30 on average)
• 5% Financial management (Fundraising, investor updates, investor meetings) 
• 5% Public relations (PR, blog posts, events, strategic sales) 
• 0% Self improvement (Getting mentored, advisory sessions, seminars, mediation, etc.)