The Importance of Managing Energy

In this episode of Smart Business Growth, we explore why managing your energy is far more powerful than obsessing over time management.

Despite billions of time management tools, apps and hacks available, most people still feel overwhelmed, busy and out of control. Procrastination is high, focus is low, and many of us spend our days reacting rather than working on what truly matters. So why isn’t time management working?

The answer lies in energy.

Rather than managing every minute of the day, this episode invites you to shift perspective and focus on how you show up to the time you have. Because while time stays the same, your energy does not, and that directly affects your focus, productivity, decision making and impact.

Using simple metaphors like an energy bank account and a battery, this conversation explains how energy is constantly being deposited and withdrawn throughout the day. When energy is high, tasks take less time and feel easier. When energy is depleted, even simple work becomes hard and draining.

You will be guided through the Energy Edge framework, a practical structure designed to help you audit and intentionally manage your energy. The framework covers four key areas:

• Sleep, water and movement as the foundation
• Body and mind consumption, including what you eat, drink, watch and listen to
• Boundaries and drainers, identifying what quietly depletes your energy
• Joy and gainers, the activities and connections that restore and uplift you

You will be encouraged to rate yourself in each area, notice where your energy is leaking, and identify small, realistic changes, not big overhauls, that can make a meaningful difference.

This episode is especially valuable for business owners, leaders and professionals who feel stuck in the “busy trap” and want to improve their return on effort, not just their output.

Your takeaway challenge is simple:
->>> Remove one energy drainer and add one energy gainer this week.

Small shifts done consistently create sustainable results.

Learn more about Nicky at nickymiklos.com

Grab The Growth Code™ here!

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Contact: 0403 191 404 | hello@nickymiklos.com

Music by Jules Miklos-Woodley

Transcript

Hello friends and welcome to this week's episode of Smart Business Growth podcast. As always, I am absolutely thrilled that you are here joining me. And today we're going to have a conversation around managing energy and actually why it's more important or more impactful to focus on managing our energy than it is to focus on time management. Now time management of course has a role to play, has...

a lot of importance and can have a positive impact. However, our focus is too much on managing time down to the second, down to the nth degree. There was a period of about two and a half years and I did a, well, I don't know if it's a social experiment, but I did an experiment where I would every quarter jump in and look at how many search results would return when I Googled, how can I manage my time more effectively?

Now over a period of two and a half years, and I've stopped doing this for the last 12 months, but over a period of two, about two and a half years, the Google search results increased by over 6 billion. 6 billion. What that tells us is that we have literally billions of resources, frameworks, tips and tricks, tools at our fingertips around time management. And yet,

We still, if I ask people, what is your number one challenge at the moment? Often time or the barrier to you achieving certain goals or focus areas, guaranteed time or being too busy is going to be mentioned. So we have billions of resources at our fingertips and yet the research also shows that 88 % of workers will procrastinate daily. 50 % or 51 % will focus on low to no value tasks.

And only 20 % of us feel like our work is under control daily. Again, what this tells us is that we have billions of resources at our fingertips around time management, and yet we're still procrastinating. We still feel overwhelmed, and we're still falling into the trap of focusing on those low to no value tasks. Why? Why is this? I'm really curious to know what your thoughts are on this.

And feel free to send me a message as well about anything that we talk about today. ⁓ But also it's because we're in a state of overwhelm. It's because we're in a state of perpetual cycle of busy. We're stuck in the busy trap. We're on juggle street. We're being pulled in a million different directions, being all things to all people. And for some of you, that's despite having a team. We're still scattered. ⁓ I've mentioned before, and I've been talking recently in some of the workshops I'm running.

around to the fact that this day in this modern day and age, 2026, and in fact, this is a bit of an outdated a few years ago stats or even be more. our information that is being thrown at us is the equivalent of reading 174 newspapers a day. We are not wired to cope with this information overload with this amount of distractions that are being thrown at us.

So there is this feeling of being always on. It's causing us to feel reactive and we lean into the things that can feel sometimes a bit more comfortable, like the low to no value tasks, the stuff that's easy to do, that's a bit mindless. ⁓ So what do we do? And this is where I really come to, yes, we've got to pick some of our time management tools and make sure we use it, but not get caught up in the hype of the new planner, the new app, the new ⁓ hack, you know, to get more time. If we continually to focus,

continue to focus on getting more time, we're moving away from actually working with time, we're moving away from working in flow. And so a more effective, beneficial way to look at this is focusing on managing our energy. Now, for some of you, this isn't going to be new, because we've talked about this. And if you're just getting to know me and who I am in the work, managing energy is one of the critical components of success.

It's also a critical component of living a healthy, happy life. You know, when I look at my business values, intentional energy is one of them, alongside commercial impact. But I would argue we can't have one without the other when we're looking at sustainable long term results. You know, think about it like this. Managing your energy is kind of like managing your bank account. you can put in deposits, or you can make withdrawals.

So we can invest in and we can take out. And we have to continue to look at the balance of that bank account or the balance of that energy account. What am I putting in? What am I depositing to make sure that I'm coming from a place of optimal energy? Or what am I doing that's actually taking energy away, the withdrawals that will maybe deplete the energy,

And if we can be intentional with understanding where is our energy bank balance, we can then be more intentional around what we need to put in the deposits or, right, I've got a big energy day, I'm all cool to make those withdrawals because I have enough in the account. I think this is a really interesting way to consider and look at how we're managing our energy. So we want to make sure that we're considering things.

like fuel, I'm going to take you through some a bit of a framework and some questions to ask yourself around what are those energy deposits and what are those energy withdrawals. I think another really interesting way to look at this is, you if we think about time, we think about clock, we think about really being acutely aware of every single second. And honestly, sometimes time management these days, I don't know about you.

But for me, it's like I can be managing my time down to the minute, which actually is a bit of an energy drainer. It's an energy withdrawal. It also doesn't do great things for our nervous system. And I kind of joke in some of the keynotes that I do and conversations with groups around, I've had lots of conversation, coaching sessions with leaders around not having enough time to go to the toilet during the day. Now I say that lightly and you know, it's a bit of a joke, but actually there's an underlying.

really serious problem there. Because legitimately, that is something the conversations I'm having with leaders. And so it falls into this whole place where we're looking at time, the clock, the ticking of the clock and every single second, every single minute matters. But what a clock does not show is whether you are feeling good or not, whether you have energy to show up, whether your body is thriving, whether you are feeling optimal.

or if you're feeling really tired and exhausted. So if we're just managing by time, in 60 seconds, in 60 minutes, in six hours, in three hours, the time remains the same, but how I show up to that time will be different depending on how I feel and my energy.

And so again, if we look at this as a bank deposit, or even if we have the visual instead of the clicking talk to the minute, a battery, you know, I can see similar kind of metaphor as the bank, I can see if my battery is full, I can see if my battery is depleted. And if my battery is depleted, I will show up differently to that one hour to that 60 seconds to that three hours than I would if my battery is full. So it's not just about the time that we're using spending.

living in. It's about how are we interacting with that time? How are we showing up? Because if my battery is full, I could get something done in 20 minutes instead of an hour. But if my battery is depleted it might take two hours instead of an hour. So I trust that what you're getting here is there's a shift in perspective needed around how we look at our day and how we're approaching our day, not just down to the minutes to the calendar invites to the clock ticking over.

every second and what I'm doing in that time. But rather, how am I managing my energy so that I can be most effective and optimal energy in that time? Or I can be aware of the fact that my energy bank or the battery is a bit lower. And therefore, I can actually put some parameters around that. Maybe I need to reschedule or postpone a meeting. Maybe I need to be kinder to myself.

Maybe I need to schedule a bit extra time to be able to complete that task. Perhaps I need to reach out for support to get somebody else to help me. We then know what we're dealing with. So it's not about letting ourselves off the hook and go, no, I'm tired. I just don't feel like doing it. It's about going, okay, I understand and appreciate that I'm going to be showing up in a little bit of a different way. So how can I still be really effective and impactful in what I'm doing? Now this comes down to return on effort.

We want to make sure that there's ROE, return on effort in what we do. That what we're investing our time, investing our energy equally in, ⁓ is actually getting a return on the effort that we're putting in. So a couple of different things for you to think about there. Now, one of my favorite ways to really have a framework, I guess, you know, I love a structure because a structure takes the thinking out of it for us and it allows us to

get the results, the benefit, like it's a great way to help with the return on effort. And the thing that I often come to is the energy edge. So I created the energy edge through observing my own behavior, but also all of the clients that I've worked with, not just in the last 10 years in my business, but also beyond that working and leading sales teams and sales people are working with a variety of different types of business owners ⁓ and size of business. And what I noticed is there's some patterns.

When we are in that place of optimal energy or being able to show up fully present in that time that we have, there's a couple of key factors that are at play. So I am going to take you through four key areas and I want you to rate yourself out of 10 for each to do a bit of a mini energy audit, if you will, to understand where you're sitting in that bank balance.

Also keeping in mind that your bank balance, your energy bank balance will change day to day and could even change moment to moment. You you might have something happen in the middle of the day that actually ends up draining your energy. So your bank, your energy balance might be lower or it might actually motivate you and inspire you, which means your energy bank will be higher. I like to think about this like a pyramid. If we look at the foundation of that pyramid,

So at the base of the pyramid, the energy edge pyramid is sleep, water and exercise.

So I want you to rate yourself out of 10 for you could do individually or as a collective, how would you rate yourself in terms of sleep, water and movement? And again, you could write yourself out of 10 for sleep for water for movement or give a combined number. Now, 10 out of 10 is rocking it. Awesome. I'm really hydrated. I'm investing in movement and exercise. And my sleep is great.

If it's a one, means not sleeping at all, ⁓ no hydration, no movement whatsoever. So rate yourself accordingly and give yourself a score out of 10. The next section above that, there's four sections of the pyramid. The next one above sleep water movement is body and mind consumption. Body and mind consumption. So what I mean by this is what are you consuming in your mind?

and consuming in your body. So yes, it could be things like

food and diet and being aware of, you know, alcohol intake and what you're drinking and all that kind of stuff, body consumption. And mind consumption is equally as important. Mind consumption comes down to what are you watching? What are you reading? What are you listening to? Are you getting caught in the doom scroll? Are you getting caught up in the negative media news cycles to a point that is unnecessary? You already know what's going on, but you keep getting caught in these cycles.

Are you consuming those almost 200 newspapers a day by being on the socials a lot? What television shows are you watching or series are you watching? The people that you're around, mind consumption, is there a lot of really negative people or really positive people around you? So rate yourself out of 10 for body and mind consumption. Again, you can either rate one for both or you can separate it.

But really important that we are aware of what we're consuming, not just in our body, but equally in our mind. So you've got a rating for 10 for body and mind consumption, and you've got a rating out of 10 for sleep water movement. The next section is what I call drainers or boundaries. So it's actually we need to look at our boundaries around the things that drain our energy.

So out of 10, where would you rate yourself in having strong, solid boundaries, not only in place, but also that you see through around the things that drain your energy. So draining your energy could be things like certain type of work, certain type of clients, certain type of people that you spend time with, certain hobbies that you're doing. And you've never really thought to stop and go, does that still actually give me energy or does it drain energy? Types of food

that you're eating that kind of leaks into body, mind consumption. So our environmental impact, the way that we're exercising, maybe your movement is quite high, but you're exercising in a way that's draining energy. And there could be an opportunity to mix it up. So give yourself a rating. Am I aware of my drainers? Do I have boundaries that I stick to? Really important, the second part that I stick to.

And then at the very top of the pyramid, the pointy bit, we have got joy. Gainers.

Rate yourself out of 10. Where would you say that you sit when it comes to having things in your life that bring you joy? Things in your life that give you energy? Some of the conversations that I'm having at the moment is around, want more joy in my life. I want to do more things this year that actually make me happy. Like, yes, great. Otherwise, what's the point? What's all this for? But here's the thing.

If we don't start at the foundational elements and work our way up, we won't have the space to bring in more gainers. We won't have the space to bring in more things that bring us joy. Because if we don't have sleep water movement, we are physically exhausted and don't have capacity to be able to be a bit picky and intentional about what is our body and our mind to consumption. You know, when you're really tired or you've rushed and you're just, you're rushing around, you're absolutely exhausted, maybe you can relate.

if you've ever had a hangover the next day, we don't make as good choices about what we're eating, drinking, and what we're actually consuming in our mind, what we're watching, what we're listening to. So they really fit together like babushka dolls.

And so when we're so exhausted and we're not making great decisions around our body mind consumption, you can see how then it's easier to be a bit more loosey goosey with your boundaries. Maybe you're setting some, but then you're not following through, which is a really common thing that I see.

And if you don't have boundaries in place around removing some of your drainers, you won't have the space to bring in more with your gainers, with the joy. They all feed into each other. So if you feel like I don't have time to X, Y, Z, read that book, do that thing that I love, spend time with the people that I really want to hang out with, we have to reverse engineer that. Okay, what boundaries do I have in place with the things that I could remove?

Okay, if I'm loosey goosey with that, the boundaries is that because I'm overwhelmed and overloaded with what I'm feeling my body and my mind with. And is there actually a pattern of behaviors because I'm not getting enough sleep, water movement. So you can see how it all really fits together. And I know that I mentioned this energy edge briefly in one of my previous podcast episodes, but I really wanted to isolate and give this the attention that it deserves. Because sometimes we need to hear things a few times before we actually something clicks or we do.

take action on it. So if you've heard me talk about the energy edge before, want to challenge you to think, what have I actually implemented and how have I used this? And if this is the first time, I want you to look at your rating. And in fact, you could do the rating even if you've heard about it, because it changes every month, every week, every quarter. And so look at those ratings that you did out of 10 for each of those four sections. Look at the highest.

and acknowledge that, celebrate that, And look at the lowest score and think what's one thing that I can do to start to move this result. Play lightly with this. And my action for you today is to do one thing, to bring in an energy gainer and to remove an energy drainer.

because this starts with the small one percenters. This isn't about making a massive shift overnight. But if you follow that formula and that structure, you will find where the gap is. All you have to do is revisit. Reverse engineer, how's my sleep water movement?

my body mind consumption, am I solid with my boundaries? And that's going to create space for you to bring more joy and more gainers in. This is a simple framework that you can share with other people that you can put to practice yourself and always come back to it if you're feeling a little bit like the 88 % of people that are procrastinating daily. Let me know, send me a LinkedIn message or a DM or an email. ⁓ How did you go with this? And I look forward to seeing you next week.