Making the most of your time: 500 word manifesto (Inspired by Hugh MacLeod)

By Rajesh Setty on Thu 07 Dec 2006, 9:13 AM - 8 Comments

On Nov 23, Hugh made a call to “Change the world, 500 words at a time.” Brevity is good, but hard to practice. I was in the middle of writing my new eBook “Making the most of your time” [more than 10,000 words ] and decided to get a 500-word excerpt for this manifesto. So, here it goes:

Making the most of your time

You can’t manage time. You can only manage yourself. Successful people manage to get a lot more out of their time. Here are nine things that you can focus on next year to make the most out of your time.

1. Executing on your current projects flawlessly

No excuses there. None of the other items in the list matter if you keep breaking promises and go south on your commitments.

2. Strengthening your personal brand

Whether you like it or not, you have a personal brand. It is “who you are” to the world. A personal brand, like any other brand is a promise to the world.

Your personal brand or identity in the marketplace is important as it has direct correlation with the value that the marketplace places on you. Here is how it always works – first you invest in your personal brand meaning first you work on your personal brand and then your personal brand works for you.

3. Building long-term relationships

Long-term relationships with powerful people will provide you the ultimate competitive advantage. Invest in building them. Here are three things to remember on relationships:

• It is not what you know but who you know.
• It is not who you but how you know who you know
• It is just not who you know; it is who knows you.

4. Increasing your capacity to deliver

Who you are currently may not be ready to face the challenges or take advantage of the opportunities of tomorrow. You have to continuously invest in your capacity to deliver in the future.

5. Making a difference to the world

This world is what we make of it. Everyone has an unspoken responsibility to make a positive difference in this world. Without worrying about what your neighbor is doing, do something good.

6. Increasing others’ capacity to make a difference

You also have a responsibility to increase the capacity of people around you to make a difference. Lift them to a higher level in any which way you can.

7. Spending time with friends and family

They say that we are blind to things that are very close to us. Family and friends typically come into this category. You can take them for granted and if you are bit late, you don’t have to worry as you won’t have them for you to take care.

8. Become a valued member in multiple networks

You can’t do everything alone. You have to not only belong to multiple networks but also be a contributing member there.

9. Learning and learning to unlearn

The information overload is only going to get worse. Explore Mindmapping. Explore Accelerated Learning. Explore Audio books. Explore Book Summaries. Do something but don’t stop learning with quoting lack of time.

It is also important to ensure that you leave behind those skills that may no longer be relevant. In other words, learn to unlearn.

Related Articles:

Posted in the Main Page category.

If you enjoyed this article, Get Life Beyond Code delivered by email or subscribe using your Feed Reader and

RSS

« Previous Post

Anonymous on December 7th, 2006

And you resisted a tenth point, thus keeping to your philosophy of time management. Bravo.

Jason Haley on December 7th, 2006

Interesting Finds: December 7, 2006

Anonymous on December 8th, 2006

Exceptionally sound and useful Manifesto!
BTW… Discovered your excellent blog this morning via Hugh MacLeod’s Gaping Void!

Anonymous on December 8th, 2006

6. Increasing others’ capacity to make a difference
If asked to chose a single point from this manifesto, number six would be the one. Alone, it encompasses the rest.
Carolyn

Anonymous on December 8th, 2006

Thanks to all of you for your comments. I am extremely busy with the launch of my new startup coming up next week (controlled beta only)
Hence the tardiness on responding to comments
Best,
Raj

Teblog on December 9th, 2006

Hitting a networking nerve

Rajesh Setty offered some thoughts in response to Hugh MacLeod’s call for 500-word ‘Change the world’ mini-manifestos. On in particular jumped out at me: It is just not who you know; it is who knows you. Over the past 25

j's scratchpad on December 12th, 2006

Time Management, which really means managing ourselves

So, yeah, so a lot of us collide with the end of the year like it’s a brick wall of all the things we meant to do this year and find ourselves pushing into the next year.

Life Beyond Code » Update on ChangeThis Manifesto - Making the Most of your Time on August 24th, 2007

[...] For those who are interested in a shorter version of this eBook is here: 1. Making the Most of Your Time: 500 word manifesto (Inspired by Hugh MacLeod) [...]