Slack messages are for the birds.

Unless you're talking about new music or sending me a photo of a puppy, I'm not interested.

I get you need to get things done in a remote environment.

I get that your people trust you.

I get that you want to be available.

And you can have all those things.

But you sure as hell don't need to be the first responder for anything.

Your two missions as a remote leader should be to:

That comes from self-evaluation.

It's a weapon. It's a tool. It's your best friend for offloading nitty-gritty and getting into big-thinker stuff.

So what are we stacking here?

The self-evaluation stack is what took me from thinking "I need to be available for my people at all times," to cutting down on my notifications by 90% and my fires by 95%.

Stack these bad boys, and you'll experience the same:

1. Research before the answer

2. Flip the question

3. Block a time

Why you'll use the stack.

I was all of these things in the past.

Use the stack if you're:

• Constantly getting disrupted by team messages

• Invited to every client call

• Having meetings to talk about future meetings

• Never getting on top of your inbox

• Using Friday as a "catch-up" day

• Looking for another role or scouring Indeed for greener grass

Even if you're only one of these things, adopt this stack.

If it can single-handedly neutralize 90% of the disruptions in my workday, it can sure as hell do the same for you.

Let's dive in.

1. Research before the answer

You don't minimize disruptions by doing nothing.

That only maximizes the problem.

But chances are you can kill over 50% of the disruptions from your team in <1 week with this one method.

Always require your team to research it before they ask you about it.

This isn't a one-off thing. This isn't an occasional thing. It's a required thing.

A doctrine. A mantra. A lifestyle.

Remember the kid in middle school who was raising their hand, asking the obvious question they could have found in the textbook in front of them?

Yeah... nobody likes that kid.

Don't allow your staff to look at you as the textbook.

If you're their first resort for every difficulty, your mental health will be the last resort for you.

Whether you've already learned this or are hearing this for the first time:

Management comprises of training the behaviors of the people around you.

Every interaction you have (read EVERY interaction you have) comprises your training on what's acceptable behavior.

When my 2-year-old son says, "I want this." And I give it to him. I'm training him that saying "please" or asking nicely isn't required.

When you do the dishes 10 times in a row, even though it's been your spouse's turn for the last five, you're training your spouse that it's acceptable to be lazy around you.

And when you answer every little thing from your employees when they could have looked it up (hello, Google), you're training them that doing the research is pointless because you'll just solve their problem for them.

Fuck that.

Here's your new procedure (part 1 of the Self-Eval stack):

1. Require they do research on their own before consulting you. They need to bring the article, book, search query, video, whatever right along with their question.

2. Make them reflect on why they think they couldn't find the answer independently.

What's this do?

• It trains them to think independently.

• If the answer isn't easily found, it'll reveal the holes that need feeling in your training + organization.

• BONUS: It saves you time and cuts disruptions by half.

You're welcome.

2. Flip the question

My staff comes to me all the time occasionally to help them put the finishing touches on an email for a client or to spitball ideas on approaches for offers.

Every time this happens, I flip their question on them.

They ask me, "What do you think of this?"

I ask them, "What was your thought process on it?

Asking questions as a first instinct is hard for a leader. You have the expertise. Your time is valuable. You just want to get the problem off your plate.

Avoid this mentality.

By always starting with a question, you're (and here's a shock) training that person to offer up a context to their solution.

Again, you're helping them think independently and training them to go deeper into every communication.

The byproduct? They'll stop asking what you think after a handful of these conversations and just do it.

They'll understand what's required because they've been trained to think critically without you.

And baby, that's a life skill no matter what you're doing.

That's two techniques in the self-eval stack that will likely prevent 80% of your disruptions.

Add this last one, though, and you'll be headed towards a more serene workday.

3. Block a time

Hey, you're a leader for a reason.

You've got a lot of skills and knowledge pouring out of you.

So even if you require your team to research ahead of time and always flip the question back at them, there's bound to be some spillover.

Enter office hours.

Just like your college professor would reserve a couple of hours a week for any and all questions, you can block out one hour per week to help anyone who needs just that little bit more.

It's simple. It's easy. It's one hour which saves you ten.

Here's how you do it:

1. Create a project in your CRM

2. Ask your team to put in any potential items they need your help on into that project. First come, first served.

3. Send a weekly standing meeting (always after Noon) where you'll knock as many of these off in one hour.

4. Make the meeting optional. If your people don't have anything they need help with, they don't have to attend.

5. End the meeting as soon as all issues are resolved.

6. Any unresolved issues cycle to the top of the next meeting or start the self-eval stack again.

You've heard this before, but yep, you're training your people to prioritize, prepare and think critically.

The reality? Your team won't want to save every issue for one hour per week, so they'll slowly start learning how to solve these problems themselves.

I can hear the Slack messages dwindling already.

Science shows that every time you're disrupted, it takes 23 minutes to refocus.

Translation? You can't afford micro-management. You'll never get anything done.

So why is this called the Self-Evaluation Stack?

Simple. Each of the three methods empowers your staff to level up and become better versions of themselves.

1. Research forces them to dive deeper.

2. Answering questions forces them to explain their position.

3. Setting a time forces them to be prepared.

It may seem obvious, but I've never had a leader who's provided me all three.

And if you're underwater, are you really going to scoff at it?

It costs you nothing to adopt and will save you dozens of hours monthly.

Why am I so passionate about it?

Cut out disruptions AND meetings

I averaged 18+ hours in meetings in 2022, and then I adopted two things:

1. The Self-Evaluation Stack

2. And the Time > Talk Method

These two things are going to save me 400 hours this year.

What can you do with 400 more hours a year?

What I'm working on

Let's face it; there's more to shifting our mentality than just trying to change.

Systems help.

Enter Notion.

I've never worked in Notion before, but I see it as a valuable resource for system building and improving our daily.

Here's a quick poll (time investment = 10 seconds).

What items would you like to see me build? They'll all be free, btw.

Here’s something I’m going to steal

Systems and resources I'm using right now to improve 1% every day.

I'm a Webflow disciple. It's what my website is built on. Get started for free. Need help designing a site? Let's just call it a hobby of mine. Book with me here to chat about it.

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