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Speaker 1: Do you need to do a reset? Whether you're starting

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Speaker 1: at a new company, starting a new position, or just

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Speaker 1: starting a new season in your work life, an effective

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Speaker 1: reset is the key to hitting the ground running at

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Speaker 1: a new, more efficient pace, and for the executives at Google,

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Speaker 1: this is absolutely critical, which is why they listen to

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Speaker 1: Laura may Martin, Google's executive productivity advisor when it's time

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Speaker 1: to reset her calendar. Laura employs a zero based approach,

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Speaker 1: one that's common in budgeting, but it should be more

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Speaker 1: common in calendaring. So what does it mean to take

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Speaker 1: a zero based approach to your calendar and how can

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Speaker 1: you do it for your calendar. My name is doctor

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Speaker 1: amanthe Immer. I'm an organizational psychologist and the founder of

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Speaker 1: behavioral science consultancy Inventium, and this is how I work

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Speaker 1: a show about how to help you do your best work.

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Speaker 1: On today's My Favorite Tip episode, we go back to

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Speaker 1: an interview from the past and I pick out my

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Speaker 1: favorite tip from the interview. In today's show, I speak

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Speaker 1: with Laura may Martin about doing a zero based calendar.

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Speaker 2: So many people have heard of zero based accounting, So

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Speaker 2: what that means is instead of looking at last year's

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Speaker 2: budget to build this year's budget, let's just start from scratch,

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Speaker 2: because we all have that tendency to say, well, we

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Speaker 2: spent ten thousand dollars on events last year, so let's

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Speaker 2: just put that as ten thousand this year, and so

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Speaker 2: it just kind of we just look at it as well,

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Speaker 2: it already existed, so let's just go with that and

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Speaker 2: then tweak it a little bit. So you know, another

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Speaker 2: zero based example is you could do zero based closeting

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Speaker 2: where you act like your closet is a store you

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Speaker 2: walk in and you say, would I buy this today

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Speaker 2: and the answer is no, then you probably are just

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Speaker 2: keeping it because you already had it, not because you

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Speaker 2: love it and want to wear it. So that's when

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Speaker 2: we look at our calendar that way and ask ourselves,

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Speaker 2: what's just kind of hanging around because we've always had

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Speaker 2: it and not because it's really what we need for

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Speaker 2: our role and our priorities right now. That's kind of

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Speaker 2: the zero base mentality. So sometimes what I'll do is

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Speaker 2: print out a totally blank calendar for an exec or

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Speaker 2: whoever I'm working with, and say, okay, let's put the

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Speaker 2: things on the calendar that you absolutely cannot change, you know,

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Speaker 2: like your manager's meeting. You're not going to cancel that, Okay,

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Speaker 2: you put that on your calendar. Now, let's draw in like,

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Speaker 2: if you could start from scratch today, based on your

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Speaker 2: current team, your current role, your current priorities, what would

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Speaker 2: you want your week to look like? Meeting wise or

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Speaker 2: time wise, and even just the act to even just

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Speaker 2: having a blank calendar in front of them. You should

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Speaker 2: see how giddy people get. Even if none of this

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Speaker 2: was ever going to become true. It's just that idea

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Speaker 2: of starting from a clean slate and asking themselves, Okay,

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Speaker 2: you know what do I want? If I was in control,

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Speaker 2: you know what would I design for myself? So instead

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Speaker 2: of saying, well, you've always met bi weekly with Pam,

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Speaker 2: you know now, they're like, okay, I guess I'll add

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Speaker 2: that on. It's like, no, is that still a good

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Speaker 2: use of your time? Do you always have an agenda

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Speaker 2: to talk to her about? Do you meet with her

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Speaker 2: in other places? Do you ever cancel because you have

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Speaker 2: nothing to say? Okay, if so, let's not put that

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Speaker 2: on there. So you know, right now we kind of

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Speaker 2: just leave our schedule as it is because that's the easiest.

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Speaker 2: But when you think of zero based calendaring. It's just

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Speaker 2: a way of saying I'm not going to keep any

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Speaker 2: meeting because I've always had it, or because it worked before,

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Speaker 2: or because I previously needed it, or because I always attend,

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Speaker 2: so I definitely always should. You know, it's no does

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Speaker 2: this work for me? Now? Does this make the most sense? Now?

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Speaker 1: So, now that you know about is you're advised calendaring,

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Speaker 1: I wonder if you might be looking ahead to next

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Speaker 1: year and thinking about how you could apply it. January

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Speaker 1: is always such a great time to set new rituals,

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Speaker 1: and doing an overhaul of your weekly time commitments could

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Speaker 1: be a great way to free up more time in

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Speaker 1: your diary for doing deep work or other things that

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Speaker 1: are critical in your role. And if you're keen to

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Speaker 1: listen to the rest of my most recent chat with Laura,

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Speaker 1: there is a link to that interview in the show notes.

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Speaker 1: If you're looking for more tips to improve the way

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Speaker 1: that you work. I write a short fortnightly newsletter that

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Speaker 1: contains three cool things that I've discovered that helped me

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Speaker 1: work better, ranging from software and gadgets that I'm loving

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Speaker 1: through the interesting research findings. You can sign up for

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Speaker 1: that at Howiwork dot co. That's how I work. Dot Co.

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Speaker 1: How I Work is produced by Inventing with production support

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Speaker 1: from Dead Set Studios. And thank you to Matt Nimmer

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Speaker 1: who does the audio mix for every episode and makes

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Speaker 1: everything sound so much better than it would have otherwise.

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Speaker 1: See you next time.