In Time, Talent, Energy, Michael Mankins and Eric Garton assert “too many companies are living in yesterday’s world. They are seeking competitive advantage through traditional methods, and they aren’t finding it. And they are missing their main opportunity for boosting performance and outstripping competitors.”

““But today’s world is different. Financial capital is abundant and cheap…What are today’s scarce resources, the new sources of competitive advantage? For most companies, the truly scarce resources are the time, talent, and energy of their people, and the ideas those people generate and implement.”

How to liberate your organization’s time? Here is what they suggest:

1. Who knows where time goes? Using today’s tools, a company can track all the meetings and communications that eat up so many hours. It’d a great way to determine the magnitude of the problem.

2. Time is money – and should be treated as such. That means creating time budgets, monitoring time investments, and reducing wasted time.

3. Meeting management is essential. Good meeting practices can eliminate vast quantities if wasted time – and can make the meetings that remain far more productive.

Mankins and Garton explain HOW to do all this in Chapter Two.

Time, Talent, Energy: Overcome Organizational Drag & Unleash Your Team’s Productive Power, will be published by Harvard Business Review Press (March 2017).