West Interviews Angie Spiteri

Speakers:
West: West Loh
Angie: Angie Spiteri

West: I want to welcome everyone to the call today. We’ve got a really special guest on the call today. And I first met her, I believe, in Brisbane, when she came here for a workshop with the Grants. And we were lucky enough to be placed next to each other at the dinner table, I believe. Isn’t that right, Anj? We had a bit of a chat there and I found out a little bit about what Angie does. I was very excited to hear that she helped people maximize their time, and obviously, I had to get her on a call to share her awesome information with you guys.

I’ll give you a really brief intro on Angie and then I’ll let her explain a bit more about where she came from. But Angie’s basically known as an Efficiency Specialist. She used to work at the Australian tax office—but we’re not going to hold that against her in this call. [Laughs] She basically got into a lot of trouble for working too efficiently, basically, is what her bio says. And from there, she’s gone on to put a lot of her efforts into creating a system, an ebook. And she’s gone on to be able to teach people how to achieve what she’s achieved through her work.

And I think it’s especially important for people listening to this call who are interested in personal development, self-help and wealth creation because one of the biggest problems is on top of your own work that you’ve got to do, if you’re interested in improving your self, your life, your health, you’ve got to keep reading and you’ve got to keep listening to gurus and doing different programs. And it can be very, very difficult for people to fit all of that in, especially in today’s day and age where information is just so readily available. How do you, one, choose? And then how do you, two, fit it all in to where you’re going? And I’m definitely hoping that Angie will be able to shed some light on that today.

So without further ado, I want to welcome you to the call, Angie. Thanks for joining us.

Angie: Thank you, West.

West: Why don’t you tell us a little bit about your story and how you got into being a time efficiency specialist?

Angie: Well, I used to work for the tax office. And from when I first started with the tax office, I used to do quite a bit of work compared to some of my colleagues. And that’s where I got my nickname: Speedy. But that’s not how I fell into the efficiency—this industry, I suppose. The way I fell into that was I did a coaching course. So I worked for the ATO for many years and specialized, actually, in setting up things and getting them as efficient and effective as possible. I didn’t realize I was actually doing that. But now that I look back, that’s exactly what I was doing and that’s why I had that particular role because they were all new to the ATO.

And when I went on maternity leave, I decided to do a coaching course ‘coz I thought, ‘yeah, I want to be a coach. I want to work for myself.’

And I finished my course, the accreditation of my course, in three months. And the people who ran the academy were actually astounded that I had done that. And they asked me how I had done it and I explained that, you know, when my little son was asleep a couple of hours a day, I would do my research and my accreditation which was actually quite a lot of work to do. And they were floored that I could do it all in two hours but, you know, I just followed the guide at the back of the book which said you could do it in three months.

And my dad, at that time—God bless him—he was passing away. He was quite sick. So between my son and running around to the hospital with my dad… I did this accreditation. So they got me to write a time management course. And basically, from there, I started specializing in time management. And it’s funny. You know when you’re really on the right track so that you can really help people. And that’s how generating time came to be, basically. And I’ve been doing that for about four years now.

West: Wow.

Angie: Have helped over four hundred people and they all say that after one of the workshops that I ran or when they read one of my books, they can generate one to two hours back every single day.

West: Wow, that’s awesome. And I really like the way that people are reacting to your workshops. I was doing a bit of research of reading on your website before this call today and I wanted to include this piece of information in the course—I think it’s really important—on one of your pages you have the most recent time management studies that show in 365 days each year, 104 days are weekends, 11 days are public holidays, about 20 days for annual leave, 5-10 days for sickness…which leaves about 220 working days. And out of that, 80 percent is wasted on interruptions. So that only leaves about one and a half months of actual productive time. That’s amazing.

Angie: It is. It’s a bit scary, actually. And when you add to interruptions, multiple handling, distraction, procrastination…you really start to feel a bit sick as to how much time is wasted.

West: Absolutely. That’s incredible. And I certainly can relate to that. And just before we actually started recording this call, Angie, you were commenting on my email that I sort of got an autoresponder on my email now because email was taking up a lot of time. And when you enter someone’s email, it kind of opens up an ongoing conversation and you sort of feel obligated to answer back. And then, you know, if you’re doing that with a few people, it just tends to sort of go on and on. So yeah, you had some positive comments about my emails so thank you about that.

Angie: Incoming email is…I don’t know why we’ve given it such priority and we’ve lost the ability to actually use alternative methods of communication. But on average, statistic is that people are spending three to four hours a day on emails. But I would say the average person probably revolves the whole day around emails.

West: Absolutely. So how can people get around that? I mean, when people come to see you on your seminars, do you talk about that? What do you tell them to do? What s8trategies for email, particularly?

Angie: Well, email is a hot topic. And my workshop is one of the few that actually looks at the best parts of Outlook that actually help you manage your work right. You know, Outlook’s got thousands of functions and it’s funny that six that are really good to me.

But anyway, the first thing that I can—the strategies—would be to just to stop looking at it just exactly what you have done. To get into a week, firstly, to plan your week. A lot of people don’t plan because they feel that their plans get blown out of the water. So there’s no point to what they do so they end up reacting to whatever comes up and then wonder why they don’t get to what’s important or wonder why they’re working late.

So first thing is: on a Friday, to plan the week ahead. Get your most important work into your week first. And then beside, when you’re going to look at email, if you can reduce it to once a day or once a week would be fantastic. Once a day is fantastic as well. But just reducing the number of times you look at emails can get you back one to two hours instantly.

West: Mmm. Definitely.

And to be perfectly honest, Angie, an email—how important can all emails you get be? I mean, if it’s not life threatening or life changing, it isn’t going to hurt to wait an hour or two hours or three or four hours before you check it and answer it, you know, do it all in a bulk rather than let it pop up and interrupt you and reacting like you were saying.

Angie: It’s funny, West. I don’t look at my emails from Friday to Monday—‘coz I work three days a week, that’s what I try to maintain while I’ve been working and my son’s been growing up. And nothing ever happens so dramatically that some can’t wait ‘til Tuesday or they could give me a call. But funnily enough, when I had my biggest disasters is because I haven’t received the email when somebody really should have called me instead to check if something’s gone wrong ‘coz they haven’t heard from me. So it’s not because I’ve received the email; it’s more because I haven’t.

West: Very true. Very true. For sure.

Now, email, I guess, is just one strategy that you talk about. What are some of the other things that people can do to maybe get an hour a day back or two hours a day back?

Angie: Well, some of the simple things. Like firstly, you’ve got to take time back. You’ve got to control the tasks that you’ve got on your plate. So if you can’t manage your tasks then you’re never going to get in your other goals and projects. So you’ve got to have a system to actually manage both.

But firstly, you’ve got to take time back. And the best way—or some of the best ways—is to reduce clutter. So to get rid of the mess that you’ve got in your…

West: You mean, like physical clutter? Not the emotional clutter?

Angie: If other than email, yes to both. Anything that’s also in your head…like tasks that are running around, get them down on paper if you’re a paper-based person or on your task file if you’re electronic. So they’re the three main areas.

Set up a post for everything and anything in its place so that when you’re clearing your inbox or clearing your in-tray, you know exactly where to move that piece of work or information onto it so it doesn’t stay or revolve around your inbox. You know what I mean? Because most people spend a lot of time, one, jumping from one email to the next or putting out fires because something that was right at the bottom of the screen that they’ve forgotten about, that they’ve left in their inbox at the time remind them, hasn’t reminded them at all and they have to drop everything to get it done. So things like these causes management distractions, interruptions, multiple handling. They’re the things that really steal our time… looking for information we already have. I mean, there’s a statistic that says the average person spends six weeks a year looking for information they already have.

West: That’s interesting but probably very true.

Angie: They’re not your average. That’s not your order that then gets interrupted twenty times by the rest of the people because they know this particular person’s got that information so they just continually ask them to find it, you know?

West: For sure.

Angie: So firstly, setting up properly, getting stuff moved into a home so you can find it when you’re looking for it. Once you’ve done that, then making good habits like reducing the number of times you look at email, clearing your inbox, making your plan to get work done so that there aren’t any surprises or any— there are always surprises, but then you can accommodate them.

West: Definitely.

Angie: But also, what planning does is it helps you manage interruptions as well because you can then decide what’s most important: a discussion about next month’s conference or the report that you’ve got to get finished today?

West: So do you help people also learn how to prioritize what’s important to them or is that something you just let them sort of decide as they go and sort of teach them how to do that?

Angie: I actually don’t believe in prioritizing. I believe that people do the ABC or 123—that’s a wish list, as far as I’m concerned. Because if you’ve got a list of things that you think are important, unless you’ve decided… ‘coz most of all when they do a to do list, for example, they don’t put how long things take to do those things…

West: Yes, correct.

Angie: …and what tends to happen is all the quick things get knocked off the list and all the big things continue to just move forward.

So I believe that if something is important and it’s going to take longer than fifteen minutes, you need to schedule some time. And there’s a great saying from Stephen Covey of 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, but he wrote this time-management book called First Things First. It’s an excellent book.

West: Definitely.

Angie: And one of his sayings is ‘it’s not about prioritizing the schedules; it’s about scheduling your priorities.’

West: That’s powerful.

Angie: Yeah. So back to getting into your week first… and then amazingly, all the other small things that really must get done will get done too.

West: It kind of falls around it. I think he also tells a really good story about putting a… a professor walks in the room and he has a little test for students where he puts in rocks and then he puts in sand then he puts in water. Yeah, it’s a really good analogy.

Angie: It is. Because if you don’t get those rocks in the jar first…

West: Exactly. If you full it up with water or sand first, you’re in big trouble.

Angie: That’s right. Those things either don’t get done during the week or they get done on top of your working week. That’s mostly what tends to happen to a lot of people.

West: Definitely. So I’m guessing that this system that you’re talking about applies to all areas of your life, not just work. I mean, you’ve got to schedule in time for your wife or husband or partner and kids, schedule in time for, you know, probably put in the big rocks—exercise—and all that sort of stuff as well, correct?

Angie: Exactly right. And again, Stephen Covey in his book, he says how most people spend their life climbing the success ladder only to get to the top and realize that it’s against the wrong wall. And the point of this is that we tend to put all our time into one basket, you know, into the work basket. And, you know, ‘I can’t go home now because I’ve got to finish this one more thing’ or ‘I can’t play with the kids because I’ve got to do my emails’ or ‘I can’t do whatever it is because of something to do with work.’ So it really extends into all our other areas of life.

And one of the things that we look at—in my ebook and the workshop I run—is about getting time in your week for all the major roles in your life. So if you, you know, you might be a mom, a wife, yourself as an individual, you might be a boss as well as an employee, you know. What are the most important for you to achieve the following week in those roles? Or what’s something that’s going to work you towards your goals for those roles that you can get done next week? And is there a way of creating synergy? So rather than trying to cram fifty things into your week, how can you maybe kill two birds with one stone, like getting some exercise and doing it with some friends or your kids so that you’ve got time with your kids but you’re also getting some exercise?

West: Absolutely. So multi-tasking. And yeah, just getting really clear about what’s important in your life and obviously trying to achieve a very good balance in different areas of your life. Because I do think, and I agree with you, that most people put a lot of focus on work and not enough focus on play. And I think that could be detrimental in the long run.

So I’m assuming, Angie, that you have clients from all walks of life that they come and talk to you. I mean, would you have like just, you know, average moms and dads, average workers and also hi-level managers, entrepreneurs? Do they all kind of, um, face the same problems in terms of time management or is there a different set of obstacles that these guys have to tackle?

Angie: It’s all the same. I mean it’s all the same regardless. And I suppose the biggest issues are things like planning and procrastination, funnily enough, and how to get through that and get on with the goals that you’re going to achieve.

West: I also wanted to ask you, Angie—you mentioned procrastination just a second ago—how do you help people overcome procrastination? Do you have any strategies that you found worked for certain clients?

Angie: There’s a few. And it all depends really on the individual. But the best ones, I think are, you know, when you’re talking about if you don’t get something done, what’s that going to cost you? And the more immediate you can make that cost to the person, the more likely they’re going to get through procrastination.

West: Absolutely.

Angie: But you know, a really simple one to get through procrastination, is when you’re actually planning work to get done…if you’re continually putting something off, like maybe too big for you to actually to get it done…

West: Yeah. So chunk it.

Angie: So just breaking it down a bit further can sometimes help you push through procrastination.

West: Definitely. Yeah. Because if it’s too big a task, people will just sort of blow it off, but if they can break it up into little, smaller, bite-size pieces, there’s a good chance they’ll be able to tackle it.

Angie: And it’s almost semantics as well, you know, just putting a verb at the front of your task sometimes helps you to go forward. So you don’t have to think about, “Oh, what do I need to do with this?” Or “I’ll put it off. I’ll do it later,” you know, it’s more I can write a letter or call ten people. You know, just that action word can sometimes help people just move forward.

West: Hmmm.

Angie: So that’s quite simple. But the other one’s really good to mobilize people: What are they going to miss out on or what are they going to gain? And focusing on that end result rather than the feeling of moving forward like fear or “I don’t know what I’m doing” or whatever it might be.

West: Yeah, I think when people involve some emotion into their results and some consequences that could negatively affect either them or the people around them keep them accountable to other people. I think that’s very, very powerful and it works for most people in my experience and I’m sure in your experience as well.

Angie: What actually really fascinates me is to teach a topic because I think, first off, it’s just really a decision, a decision to say I’m going to do this today or this week or everyday for the next, you know, whatever it might be. And once you’ve done it—well, experts say it takes 21 28 days to make a habit once you’ve done it for that long—then you don’t think about not doing it; it’s just part of the routine.

West: Definitely. It becomes a habit.

Angie: But just make the decision to actually get it done rather than the decision to put it off. It’s very interesting.

West: Very, very powerful.

All right. Well, I thought I’d ask you first about maybe some tools that people can use like potentially some software programs or some things that they can use on their computer or their workspace that maybe you know of or you recommend. Or if you don’t know any, I’d like to run by you some of the things that I do and maybe you can comment on those. So firstly, Angie, do you have any things that you recommend that people use or can do to sort of cut down on wasted time?

Angie: Sure. I support Outlook…the calendar and task on Outlook. Now there are different versions of the same thing, but I find that one the easiest to use. I’ve used quite a range of those electronic tools but I just find that very easy to use. And I like to keep things as simple as possible. I’m not very technically-minded. I know hot to use Outlook quite well. But if there are too many things for me to manage then things start to fall through the cracks. I just try to go for one system and one system that I use effectively and then just start from there.

I’ve also got a PDA that I can synchronize my contacts, etcetera. And I don’t tend to use them, to tell you the truth, in all honesty. I tend to use my Outlook for most. And if I need to, like I’d just have a look at what I’ve got on for the day, I print it up or I use my PDA. But, um, yeah, I don’t tend to use any more than that.

West: Cool. Very nice. I like your keep it simple philosophy.

I use a program called Temptation Blockout, Angie. And this might be interesting for you and a lot of the people out there. What it does, basically, if you’re tempted to use any other programs on your computer that aren’t adding value to what you’ve got on for that day, you basically just put the programs in that little program and what it does is it actually blocks it from being able to be opened on your computer for the time that you set it. So I found that to be useful. ‘Coz it’s just crazy, the kinds of things like, you know, you might want to—on your break—have a game of Solitaire or something like that. And it turns out, you know, you basically couldn’t finish the game or whatever so you go for another one. And before you know it, ten-fifteen minutes has gone by and you just wasted fifteen minutes of your life on Solitaire. So by blocking that, like, altogether, you don’t even get into that ballgame.

I mean, the beautiful thing about it is you can put in the times when you’re allowed to use it. But if you put, say, an hour a day and it only allows you for that hour a day to use it and you can’t use it outside of that, which is really good.

Another thing I like to use for websites, the Internet Explorer has like a security option where you can block the sites that you tend to waste time on. So it might be a new site or for me, personally, I used to actually spend a lot of time playing chess. And recently, it’s been a bit of time on Facebook. So I actually block those sites when I’m working so that I’m not even tempted to do it. Because let’s face it, we’re all human, aren’t we, Angie? And sometimes, you know, you’ve got to take extra measures if you know that’s one of your flaws.

Angie: Yes, definitely. One of your temptations.

West: Exactly. Exactly.

The other thing I like doing—and I’ll just share some of these with you, Angie, and you can comment on them as a time efficiency specialist, but I think it might be useful for some of the members listening—I also use a program called, actually, Windows Media Player, which is available with most systems. When I’m listening to an audio program or a DVD program, it can actually play the program at double the speed. So I get to listen to, say, a two-hour program in one hour. And that saves me an hour of time.

There’s also a portable player called the Zen Creative. Zen, I believe, plays as an MP3 player audio programs at double the speed. So you can, you know, save tons and tons of time doing that and it’s a great way to—if you love listening to stuff and immersing your mind in awesome materials related to wealth, health, fitness, whatever it is—you can do it in half the time. So that’s another great tool.

Have you heard of anyone doing that sort of stuff before, Angie?

Angie: No. But it’s very interesting actually. That’s a good one.

I’d say probably about 90 percent of the people that I work with have got very little IT skills. And all they know about—even Outlook—is just how to send a message. Filing is optional; they may not even know how to create a file.

West: Right. Right.

Angie: And that’s the extent. That’s probably 20 percent again. But yeah, most people I know have got very little IT skills so they wouldn’t be even aware of these sort of tools and whether they’d be able to cope with it.

West: Definitely. Definitely.

Angie: It only takes getting used to, really.

West: Yeah. Well, I mean, I’m pretty certain many of the people who are listening to this call are at least familiar with computers and programs and the internet. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have been able to, one, sign up or be listening to this call. But I completely understand where you’re coming from and I’m sure if the people on your side listening to the call want to contact you and find out more about it, I’m happy to chat with you about how they can get access to that sort of stuff as well. But if they’re doing any kind of work online or yeah, as I’ve said, they’re listening to audios or anything like that, that’s really, really useful.

One other thing I’ll throw in is another program I use called—I think it’s called Ace Reader. And what is does is it enables you to read documents really fast. So basically, it just flashes the words on the screen and you can set it anywhere from 50 words per minute to 1500 words per minute. So you can get through a pdf document or an email or anything that requires reading, and you set the speed and relax your eyes. There’s actually a program that teaches you how to read it really fast and you can get through a lot of reading in super, super, super quick time. And you don’t actually have to move your eyes or flick it through or scroll down. You just basically look at the screen and it sort of feeds it into your brain. So that’s another tool that I use as well which has been quite useful for me.

Angie: That’s’ amazing.

West: Definitely.

Angie: You really are just limited by your imagination.

West: Yeah, I completely agree. For sure.

Angie: No, I don’t use those tools. I think, yeah, some of them sounded really interesting, especially the listening one.

West: Yeah, absolutely. I’ll definitely be sure to send you through more details on that if people on the call are interested in hearing about them.

Yeah, so far it’s been great. You told us some of the major problems people encounter and some of the things that people can do to gain an hour or two more per day. Is there anything else that you can share at this stage, Angie, to help entrepreneurs or maybe business owners, particularly, who are more entrepreneurial and don’t have—I guess—set, structured days as, say, a normal work person would? Do they just follow the same protocols?

Angie: It’s exactly the same. I mean, we’ve all got the same amount of time. And the most successful people are just the ones that have managed to get one to two hours of their most important work into their day first.

West: Yes.

Angie: I mean, that seems to be the biggest thing. Whatever your most important time, get it done first. Try and get at least one to two hours everyday of quiet time, concentrate—not to do emails, of course—but to do something of great value that’s going to move you forward and your business forward.

If you aren’t doing the things that you’re planning to do, stop and notice why. Like what is it in your schedule that you’re not getting to as much as what you’re actually getting to ‘coz it tells you where you may need training, where you may need to develop procedures so that you’re not having to deal with the same sort of low-level work all the time, and make decisions to either outsource or get stuff sooner rather than later. Because a lot of people stick with doing things that they hate doing or doing things that they’re not particularly interested in when there are many ways that you can actually outsource that work.

West: I love that word, Angie—outsourcing. And I say that because I recently did a presentation on outsourcing. But I think that’s an awesome, awesome philosophy that people should adopt. And if there’s something that can be done cheaper and more effectively and you actually do it, then you’re actually losing money. So it’s very important that, you know, if you do see something or even if you’re in an organization and there’s a task that you can sort of delegate to someone else, then I strongly recommend doing that.

But in an entrepreneurial perspective—and I know a lot of people on this call are leaning towards entrepreneurial work and a lot of them tend to try and do everything themselves—one of the major, major concepts is if it’s a very low dollar activity and you know how much your time is worth and you can get someone to do it for cheaper than what it’s worth than if you do it yourself, you know, you’re leaving money on the table. So I strongly encourage people to follow that outsourcing model.

Angie: The only two other tips is:
Whatever tool you’re going to use, just use one and use it well. Split your tasks. The tasks are different from scheduled-time tasks—the 15 minute or less things that you do in around everything else. And your scheduled work is work that’s going to take blocks of half an hour or more. So split the two up so you can clearly see what’s quick and what’s not, what needs a block of time and then decide when you’re actually going to do those at work if it’s most important.

And the very last thing is every single day, in some way, either for ten minutes or an hour, make sure you do something that’s working towards your goal. And that could be in every areas of your life: your health, your family, your business, whatever.

West: Absolutely because it’s just so easy to get caught up in the, you know, major in the mind of things—I like to say; and I think I heard that from one of the guys, Jim Rohn, who I really like studying—but if you spend all your time doing the little things that don’t matter, you actually feel busy but you’re not getting anything done. And I think he uses the term, ‘never confuse activity with achievement.’ And I really love that quite as well.

So when you’re doing stuff, you know, make sure that it’s taking you towards and not further away from your goals.

Angie: That’s a big one, especially for business owners, because they think it’s quite a thrill—even though they may not admit it—over putting out fires. And they just tend to do that all day long and have…rather than maybe dedicating half an hour to something trying to actually pay them back a lot more from than putting out those fires or rectifying how to minimize those fires, you know.

West: Definitely. Or hire someone to put out the fires so they can focus on the vision and the strategy would be my preference.

Angie: Yeah. And you’ve got to work with yourself too. If you’re not a person that likes sitting down for an hour or half an hour, if you get all the thrill from moving from one thing to another, then work with yourself and not plan to do an hour of something that you hate or work in shorter chunks so that you actually use that time quite effectively.

West: Absolutely. I have to say I fit into that basket, Angie. So that’s a good bit of advice for me as well. Certainly. Certainly.

Well, I think there are some awesome information on the call, Angie. And thank you again for joining us. Before we let you go though, if so many people are really interested in what you’re all about, can they find out more information about you?

Angie: Sure. I have two websites. One is about the ebook. It’s got a time-management package. It’s called Get Time Instantly.

West: Fantastic. And tell us a little bit about the ebook.

Angie: Well, it’s really easy to read. As I said, it’s very practical. It tells you how to get back time first and then how to use that time effectively and to beat procrastination particularly.

West: Fantastic.

Angie: So that’s an ebook. It comes with a sort of five little short videos on how to use Outlook like a pro. So in the actual ebook, I go through how to set up Outlook to help you manage your tasks and your time time. And then I show people—by DVD—how to actually do that. From what I’m saying from the book, I show them on the screen as well.

West: Awesome.

Angie: Yeah. Outlook is so easy to use. And it can help people so much to just forget about what they need to do until they need to do it.

West: And it pretty much comes with every Windows Operating System, doesn’t it?

Angie: I think a lot of people get the Express, Outlook Express for free. And that doesn’t come with the Calendar or Task Fast. So they need the full version of Outlook.

West: Okay. And tell us about your other website. You said you had two sites.

Angie: Yeah. And the other website’s called www.generatingtime.com. And that basically goes to the workshop that I run here in Western Australia. There are two workshops. We’re going to half days because a lot of the people that work with me or that want to come to my courses would prefer things to be half days, which makes a lot of sense, actually. So we split the workshop into two. And the first one is about generating time. So it’s about getting back time using the Outlook tool properly and how to plan so that your plans don’t continually blow up.

West: Well, I just wanted to thank you personally, Angie, for spending some time with us on the call today. We got cut out briefly before and if this sounds a little bit different from the actual call, it’s because we had to hook up on Skype because Angie’s phone died on us.

But Angie, I want to thank you so much for giving us some time today. And I really appreciate all that you’ve shared with us today.

Angie: Thanks West. I appreciate your time too.

[END 37:19]