Your one non-renewable resource

Your one non-renewable resource

For any project, the three primary resources are time, money, and people. And with any project (and in life itself) the only resource that is non-renewable is time. You can always find more money and you can always add more people, but you can never recover time spent on a project. (Yes, you can add time to a project, but that just means the project finishes later; you haven't actually renewed time.)

Why does this matter? Because time is non-renewable, you should guard it very jealously. Not only your own time but anyone else working on the project. That means only "using" someone's time when you absolutely have to.

For example, are you having a meeting to discuss the project? Will the meeting involve only sharing of information or will it involve decision-making also? If it's only information sharing, more often than not the information can be shared by memo/email. Don't get ten people in a Zoom meeting for half an hour just to talk. That's time lost forever.

And should a decision come down to adding more time or adding more expense, always choose the latter. You can always find more money (renewable) but you can't renew time.

Wes's Wednesday Wisdom Archives

Success Requires Discipline

March 14, 2019

When it comes to data management, most of us know what to do; we just don’t …

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Take a moment to be grateful

March 7, 2019

Because we’re so focused on always improving what we have now, it’s easy to overlook …

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KPIs and Dashboards

February 28, 2019

I saw DJ Muller from MemberClicks speak on KPIs (key performance indicators). In his session …

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Documenting Process is Critical

February 22, 2019

When it comes to managing data successfully, process is critical. For example, a client of …

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Motion vs. Action

February 14, 2019

In James Clear’s book Atomic Habits (I recommend it!), he discusses the concept of motion vs. action. …

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Are You Answering Your Calls?

February 7, 2019

I’ve written about this before, but apparently I have to keep repeating it. If you’ve …

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Who do you trust?

January 31, 2019

Who Do You Trust I was reading an article recently about Warren Buffet’s “rules” for …

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Set benchmarks to measure progress

January 24, 2019

It’s impossible to measure progress if you don’t know your starting point. This sounds axiomatic, …

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You’ll make incorrect decisions. Acknowledge them and fix it.

January 17, 2019

A client of mine recently wrote the following to me: “It’s so hard to set …

You’ll make incorrect decisions. Acknowledge them and fix it. Read More »

"Experience is unobservable to everyone except the person who it happens to."

January 10, 2019

In Dan Gilbert’s book Stumbling on Happiness, he writes: “Experience is unobservable to everyone except …

"Experience is unobservable to everyone except the person who it happens to." Read More »

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