Giving Time Away To Feel More Effective

Every month the Harvard Business Review features a new study, and asks the people responsible for it to 'defend their research'. The title of a recent feature was "You'll feel less rushed if you give time away" and it introduced the research in this way 

• The finding; Spending time helping others leaves people as if they have more time, not less
• The challenge; Does giving away your time really make you feel as if you have more of it? Is the secret to productivity being more charitable?

The author of the study, was then asked 'To be clear, you're saying people feel as if they have more time. But they don't. In fact they have less time, since they've given some away. There are still only 24 hours in a day', and responded

Yes, objectively they have less time. But they feel more effective, and that enhances their productivity. Certainly, if you're giving so much time away that you're not able to complete other tasks, its not going to work. But our research indicates that giving even a small amount of time to someone else should make you feel as if you can do more in the time you have.

The idea that people feel positively about themselves after doing a good deed for someone else seems sensible, but the question as to whether giving this time away makes one feel more effective, does in our experience, depend on whether these are random or planned acts. 

As the author reflects, if you're giving away so much time that other important tasks do not get completed, then this "is not going to work". What can work, however (and what is reflected in FranklinCovey's approach) is to provide some structure whereby an individual has an opportunity to consider

• the various roles they play
• what is most important to them in these roles (including the contribution they would like to make or the legacy they would like to leave)
• the way they spend their time on a day to day basis (including the 'lure of urgency' and time spent on activities they may consider, on reflection, 'unimportant') 
• how best to reallocate time to that which is important, but not urgent

In this way, it is (in our experience) not the act of giving away time that makes someone feel more effective, but rather the choice they make to be guided by the 'compass' (their sense of direction and values) and not solely by the 'clock' (their schedules and activities).