The other day I had the distinct honor and privilege to spend more than an hour talking with LinkedIn’s CEO Jeff Weiner on stage at a Singularity University program. We touched upon many topics, the highlights of our conversation being beautifully summarized by the one-and-only Stephanie Crowley Papaioanu:
Among the many great comments, the piece which stood out for me was Jeff’s answer to a question from the audience on how he manages to stay not only sane with his extremely busy schedule but also finds the time for thinking deeply and innovating.
His answer is: “I schedule 90 minutes of unstructured time on my calendar every day. It might not be a continuous 90 minute-block every day but rather three blocks a 30 minutes — but every day I make room for thinking and serendipity.”
As trivial as this sounds, it is a huge commitment and something I believe we all would benefit from. How much of your daily schedule is blocked off for non-directed work, time for you to reflect, read, converse and think?
If Jeff can find 90 minutes in his schedule running LinkedIn — why don’t we all find the same amount of time daily?