“When you’re starting up, everything happens in a frenzy and making it to your next weekend or next milestone is itself a victory. You don’t have time to manage well because you’re so busy creating. But eventually, every organization gets out of start-up phase. Which means you have more time for managing.”

You know the scenario.

You get to the end of a meeting, an experience or a project and say to yourself “That was a total waste of time.”

What’s scary is how often you and I end up saying it.

So how do you eliminate things that are a total waste of time as a leader?

I think the best way is to rule out things categorically.

How do you do that? Just look at the patterns you see that waste your time and simply decide I’m not doing that anymore.

The key is to identify what ‘that’ is.

So here are 5 things that are a total waste of time for any leader.

1. Worry

Worry.

So many leaders struggle with it.

And it is almost wholly unproductive.

It’s understandable that leaders have a lot they could worry about.

As I’ve told my team many times, our job is basically to help solve the problems nobody else has been able to solve. That’s why you’re a leader.

Consequently, leadership can be a breeding ground for worry.

But you should do everything in your power to eliminate it.

There’s a world of difference between thinking about a problem and worrying about a problem.

Thinking about a problem will lead you to a solution.

Worrying about a problem leads you nowhere.

Plus, most of what you worry about will never transpires.

As 16th Century French philosopher Michel de Montaigne put it, “My life has been full of terrible misfortunes, most of which never happened.”

Leaders should think about problems, but not worry about them.

If you’re stuck in worry, how do you get out?

Although I’m not an innate worrier, when I do worry, this has helped me immensely: I make my logic trump my emotions.

If that’s not working, I take it to a group of leaders I trust and lay out the problem for them and get their insight.

Worry hates the light of day.

Once I’ve thought about it and even shared it with others, then I do one more thing:

I focus on what I know to be true rather than what I feel is true.

In a season of worry, feelings are your enemy.

Logic and community are your friends.

So to beat worry, focus on what you KNOW is true, not what you FEEL is true.

2. Meeting with someone who doesn’t need to meet with you

When someone asks you to meet with you, my guess is your default is to say yes.

So is mine.

But play that out. As your church or organization grows, that means you would spend all week every week meeting with people—many of whom didn’t really need to meet at all and most of whom don’t need to meet with you in particular.

Deciding who you need to meet with in advance helps.

My priorities are (in order) our senior staff leaders, our elders, our staff team…and a few key people beyond that. That’s it.

Most leaders waste time meeting with people who don’t need to meet with them.

Do I meet with other people? Yes, but only after those key people have the time they need and after my other priorities are done, which means I do say no a lot (I still hate that, but it’s necessary).

I outline more about meeting people in this post I called Why You Can’t Have Five Minutes of My Time.

While it may sound harsh, it’s liberating and you will get more done. Plus, your church or organization will be positioned to grow as a result. And here’s a primer on how to say no nicely.

And finally, are you addicted to meetings? I wrote this post outlining 5 reasons most leaders spend way too much time in meetings.

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