Four to Eight Weeks: Elad Gil's Calendar Audit for CEOs Who Have Run Out of Time
Emrah · Four to eight weeks. That is how long Elad Gil says it usually takes for a CEO to get real strategic time back after a serious calendar audit.
Gil wrote the High Growth Handbook for leaders of fast growing companies. One chapter is about managing yourself, and it starts with a plain fact. As a company grows, the demands on the CEO grow much faster than the CEO's hours.
His fix is not a mindset. It is a weekly calendar review, later a monthly one. Cut first round interviews. Cut internal meetings you no longer need. Cut random outside commitments. Say no to conferences and press that are not strategic.
He also lists warning signs of weak delegation. Your action item list keeps growing. You are still deep inside an area you handed off four to eight weeks ago. You attend every company meeting.
Then there is rest. Gil admits he used to take vacations while staying inside the work. His answer is one or two truly disconnected weeks a year, plus a no work day every week.
There is a real exception. Early on, a technical founder who talks to customers should keep those meetings. That is how the company learns.
Investors read the calendar too, just through its results. At 40 people, a founder who is still on every sales call looks like a single point of failure, and the follow on conversation gets harder.
A founder can get ahead of that. Show the three calls you keep and why. Show the six you hand off, and by when.
Count the hours last week that only you could have done. What share of your total was it?
#Startups #Founders #Leadership #VentureCapital #CEO #Scaling
Source: Elad Gil, High Growth Handbook, "The role of the CEO: managing yourself," 2018
