Andy Grove's Daily Routine

Andy Grove was Intel's third employee and ran it as CEO through its rise in the 1980s and 1990s. His daily routine is unusually well documented because he wrote one of his working days down, meeting by meeting, so other managers could see where the time went.

In High Output Management (1983), that day runs from 8:00 AM to 6:15 PM. It holds a 3-hour executive staff meeting, an hour on a quality problem and 2 hours lecturing at employee orientation. He worked from a cubicle, kept office hours instead of taking interruptions, and anyone arriving after 8:00 AM went on the "late list".

It's for managers whose calendars feel full but who can't say what the hours were for. It's most useful if you run a team and your day keeps getting taken by other people's needs.

Log your own day the way he did, for a week. You come out with a clear picture of where your time goes, and a manager's day with its meetings grouped and its interruptions fenced off. Sleep and the evening are our estimates, and his times are rounded to the half hour.