The Principal Time Audit

“Hey, can I interrupt you for 30 seconds?” Some version of this question is asked of school principals all day, and it never takes 30 seconds! There are many different competing demands on a principal’s time. How principals choose to spend their precious time can make a difference in student outcomes and teachers’ quality of work. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the average K–12 school principal works roughly 58 hours per week. Ask any principal, however, if they have enough time to get everything done, and they will say some version of “There are never enough hours in the week.”

If principals want to get the most out of their time and start taking more control of their days, a time audit can be a critical first step. This process helps school leaders understand how they are spending their time and find areas where they can make changes.

A time audit aims to answer questions like these: How are you spending your time? Are you intentional about your time, or do you let others dictate what you do in a day? When you are intentional about your time, are you focusing on the right tasks that will move your school forward?

The Time Audit Process: Data Collection

The time audit has two main parts: data collection and data analysis. First, pick two weeks during your school year that appear typical for your school. Over the two weeks that you’ve chosen, write down what you do every 15 minutes. Because principals are often interrupted throughout the day, I chose 15-minute intervals to capture how I spent my time. I set a repeat timer on my watch, so every 15 minutes it would vibrate and I could quickly jot down what I was doing at the time. It is helpful to carry a notebook during the time audit so you can keep track of your time even if you aren’t in your office. Aim to keep your notes short to save time: sending emails, meeting with a teacher, phone calls, observation, observation prep, etc.

While there are many times you may be too busy to write down what you are doing in the moment, do your best to accurately account for your time as soon as you can. This is also a time to be honest with yourself; if during a 15-minute chunk of time you were on social media, catching up on March Madness scores or anything else, write it down. There is no judgment in that, and we need an accurate look at how we spend our day if we want to become more focused on the top priorities for our school. 

You will get the most out of this process if you commit to it for the full two weeks. Two assistant principals I’ve worked with decided to complete the audit together to encourage and hold each other accountable along the way. Here‘s what Assistant Principal Julia Dorn told me about their experience:

We took note of our actions every 15 minutes. It was a very interesting and insightful process. One challenge I had was that time got away from me! It was challenging in some parts of the day, depending on what was occurring at school, to keep track of my time. However, the benefits of doing the time audit outweighed the challenges. I learned that I spend a lot of time meeting with staff to support students throughout the week. I was able to reflect on how my time is spent and where I would like to shift my time.

I have been spending more time in the lunchroom and checking in with students since the time audit to increase my daily time with students for support. While our role is to support staff, we also are supporting students. This time audit encouraged me to reflect on how to balance the two and how they interact…. For those interested, I also recommend completing this with a colleague to analyze and reflect with. Those conversations opened discussion for deeper reflection and analysis beyond what I could do alone

The Time Audit Process: Data Analysis

At the end of the two weeks, it is time to move into data analysis. Go through every 15-minute chunk of time and count how many times each segment appears. For example, if “Email” shows up 21 times, that means you spent five hours and 15 minutes over the course of two weeks on email. Then divide that number by the total amount of time you worked over the two weeks. If you worked 102 hours over two weeks and spent five hours and 15 minutes on email, that is 5.1% of your time spent on email. You can use this data tracking and analysis sheet to make the process easier.

As you do this, you will notice that principals do so many different things in a given day. Finally, assign a category and priority level for each of those items. The categories should be comprehensive, things like “Instructional Leadership,” “Managing Resources,” “Safety,” “Climate and Culture,” “Personal,” etc. For priority levels, I use the Eisenhower Matrix. The Eisenhower Matrix is a quadrant that looks like this:

Which of these four quadrants does each of your activities fall into? Are you doing things that others could be doing for you? Are you doing things that are not important, based on the priorities of your building? Most of the time, the tasks that are not urgent and important are actually the most important, but they get pushed aside for anything in the urgent row. How can you work on your systems to spend more time in the “Not Urgent and Important” category? 

The time audit is a powerful tool for taking back your time and assessing what matters to you. How you spend your time demonstrates your values. If you do not like what your time audit says about your values, it is time to make a change.