How to balance your MBA life with only 168 hours in a week?
There are 7 days in a week, 168 hours in a week and 10,080 minutes in a week. Are you currently balancing your MBA life the way you want? Harry Kraemer is the author of Your 168: Finding Purpose and Satisfaction in a Values-Based Life. In this book, Kraemer has an exercise to help you find out how to balance your MBA life.
The exercise
According to a KelloggInsight article, Kramer says to make a grid with six rows for each of the major aspects of your life: career, family, health, spirituality, fun and volunteering. Firstly, decide how much time you would ideally like to be devoting to each of these activities. Then, work out how much time you are actually devoting to each of these categories. Lastly, calculate the difference.
Kraemer, the former CEO of Baxter International who is now a clinical professor of leadership at Kellogg, cautions that you should only do this when you’re in a really good mood. Why? Very few people match what they want to be doing with what they are actually doing.
“Every one of us has 168 hours” in a week, Kraemer says. “Do you know where you’re spending your time? And are you spending it where you believe it matters most?”
Self-reflect
The first step would be self-reflection. Kraemer regularly supports leaders to engage in this activity. “Turn off the noise. Think through: what are my values, what’s my purpose, what really matters?” But make sure you do this activity while keeping in mind that a value is not merely a preference. Rather, it is something that you cannot comprise or negotiate.
Since the pandemic has brought about a lot of time for self-reflection, a good example of this would be traveling for work. According to Kraemer, ask yourself, “Do I need to fly to San Francisco for a three-hour meeting? Would it make more sense to do a phone call and spend more time with my children? Before COVID, was I confusing activity with productivity?”
Find a solid sounding board
The second step, according to Kraemer, would be finding a solid sounding board who will tell you whether you are living these values. An example here could be a family member, close colleague or classmate, religious leader. “Find people whose values you appreciate, whom you admire, who can give you an honest appraisal of whether you’re on track or not,” he says. And if it doesn’t seem like you are on track, you need to engage in the first step, self-reflection, to figure out how to get back.
Kraemer explains that soliciting feedback is a key leadership skill in any context. And as you rise through the ranks of your MBA degree or at your work, it most probably will get more difficult to get non-sugar-coated feedback. To ensure getting straight talk is to make sure you’re interacting with everyone in the company. Meaning, going well beyond your own team. “You find out a tremendous amount of what’s going on by being able to cut through the hierarchy,” he says. Plus, “It keeps you grounded.”
Act on your feedback
Lastly, Kraemer says that you will need to prove that you are prepared to act on your feedback — even if it contradicts what you initially believed. For example, you come to an MBA or work meeting with a project idea but a member in your team has another suggestion. Surprisingly, Kraemer advises to thank them - assuming their idea is valid - and assign them to lead the project in the way they suggested.
“You have to find ways to demonstrate how much you really want the feedback,” Kraemer says. Consequently, once peers or other people in your group see this, they will start offering opinions that are true too.
You can watch the full webinar here.