Adam McFarland

One of the things we were most looking forward to when moving to our warehouse was having FedEx come daily to pick up all of our shipments. Previously Greg and George were driving any customer orders over to the local FedEx from Greg’s house where the products were stored. It’s worked out great - FedEx comes around 3:30 every day, which in theory means everyone can leave by 4 if they want to.

However - the flip side of the issue is receiving shipments, which has been quite a pain since moving. Mail doesn’t get delivered to our industrial park, so for all USPS packages and mail we have to use a different address…our P.O. Box. FedEx, UPS, and other shipments arrive at all sorts of hours, as I suppose you’d expect.

We had generally all been going in from ~9 AM - ~4 PM. The gas savings from carpooling has been nice (although I am not really a carpooling fan in general, which is a whole other post), but it doesn’t provide for the best coverage, specifically in the early morning.

After missing two shipments Friday morning, George called me and we discussed the issue a bit. At first, I thought “let’s call all the shipping companies and tell them we don’t open until 9 AM”. Then I realized that it was unrealistic to expect FedEx, UPS, DHL and every other private shipping company to coordinate around our schedule. Shipments are going to come at all hours of the day, starting at 7 AM and ending at 5 or 6, whether we like it or not. FedEx in particular likes to come right around 8 AM I’ve noticed.

I thought about it some more, and since I am still in early riser mode, I offered to start going in at 7 AM. Instead of going to the gym at 6:30 and then being ready to go into work by 8:30, starting Monday I’m going to work from 7 AM - ~2 PM and then hit the gym mid-afternoon. After that I’ll probably grab some food and work for a few more hours before calling it a night.

While this isn’t really my ideal schedule, I’m curious to see how it works. I’ve always been a morning gym guy. I’m hoping it breaks up my day a little more and gives me a little more freedom because I won’t be doing much carpooling. 7-2 is also a nice little 7 hour shift, so even if that’s all the work I do for the day I’m still getting quite a bit done. Of course, it could go the other way and I could hate stopping work mid-day and have trouble waking up without my workout…we’ll see.

Did I have to adjust my schedule? Of course not. But I think that as a four-person company we’re best staggering our shifts a bit so that we have as much coverage as possible. Right now it might not be a big deal if we miss a shipment or two a week, but we’ve vastly expanded inventory and plan on continuing to do so. Missing a few a week could become a few a day in six months. I’d rather just nip the problem in the bud right now. A minor schedule adjustment for me now could save us a bunch of headaches over the next year or two.

On January 1 I wrote about how I hate New Years Resolutions and then proceeded to make one myself:  to improve my sleep schedule.  Throughout college and my early professional life I’ve always been an erratic sleeper to say the least, and I became envious of those who were able to wake up early and start the day “ahead” of me.  I decided on 6 AM as my new wakeup time because it’s early, but not so early that you have to be asleep at a ridiculous hour every night to get your 8 hours.

So how has this past month been?  Amazing and life-changing are probably the two best adjectives to describe the feeling.  I have been:

• Going to bed by 10 PM most nights.  The latest I have fallen asleep is probably 10:45.  If a good sports game or show is on, I’ll record it to watch in the AM.
• Waking up every single day at 6 AM.  I use my iPod to wake me up, and I have a backup alarm set for 6:10 in case music doesn’t do the trick.  The latest I have risen from my bed has probably been 6:12 AM.
• I generally eat, check email, and watch Sports Center (or a recording of a game/show from the previous night) from 6-7, and then leave for the gym around 7.
• By 9 I am showered, dressed, have eaten my post-workout meal, and am back at work (having already cleared my inbox earlier in the morning).
• Stop working by 7 PM at the latest so I have a few hours to myself.  If I have dinner plans or other plans with friends, I can stop working at 4 PM and still have accomplished a ton.

Here have been the benefits:

• Far less stress.  Instead of waking up and thinking “crap, I need to get to the gym and rush my workout and get back and get to my emails” I’m now way ahead of the game.  Clearing my inbox from 6-7 lets me relax at the gym knowing I don’t have anything major waiting for me when I get back.  By 9 AM I’m at the point where I used to be at noon, and that is huge.
• Much higher productivity.  Obviously if I’m 3-4 hours ahead of my old daily pace I’m getting a lot more done.
• Less tired - I’m only really tired for the last 15 minutes before I fall asleep and the first 15 minutes when I wake up.  Never think about it otherwise, which is a huge change for me.
• Better workouts at the gym.  Now that I’m not rushed, I feel 100% satisfied with my efforts instead of the usual ‘I wish I could spend more time working out’.
• More consistent eating habits.  I have always been a wanna-be-nutritionist, but with a regular sleep schedule I’ve been able to really hone in and eat my 6 or 7 meals at the exact same times each day.  And by having more time, I can prepare what I really should eat instead of settling for faster-but-unhealthier alternatives.  Much like never feeling tired, I never really feel hungry except right before I am scheduled to eat.
• More time to hang out with friends.  I’ve seen my friends more in the last month than I did all last year…seriously.
• More time to play read, watch sports, and play video games.
• Just overall more happy and fulfilled.  I’ve always been a pretty happy guy, but if I could quantify my happiness increase it would be around a 25% increase…solely from waking up early!

Amazing as this has been, I probably couldn’t have done it even a year ago.  Your social situation dictates when you can and can’t sleep and wake up.  At 25, the whole “going out to the bar every night” thing has worn off and I don’t really have the desire to be out until 4 AM anymore.  When I do go out, I can stay out until 12 or 1 and still get a decent amount of sleep by 6.  And of course, I can always sleep in on a rare occasion.

The big question is:  can I stick to it and make it a true lifestyle change like I have with diet and exercise?  I vote yes.  Partially because I made it 30 days and I have no desire to ever sleep in again, and partially because it just fits perfectly in my entrepreneurial life.  Obviously I won’t know for a year or two if it sticks, but I’m going to be extra serious about sticking with it for the next few months and hopefully by mid-year it’s just automatic.  I’ll try to post updates every few months to force myself to stick to it or admit that I suck if I don’t.

I’m not a huge fan of “New Years Resolutions”. To me, NOW is the best time to start something new and waiting until New Years is stupid (side note: I’ve most likely developed my hatred for New Years resolutions due to the fact that I’ve had trouble getting a good workout in January or February at any packed gym I’ve been a member at for the last 10 years because everyone and their mother decides to get in shape on 1/1 and quits by Valentines day….quite frankly, it drives me nuts and I’m dreading my trip to the gym tomorrow morning).

Of course, this is the part where I become a hypocrite and go against everything I just said. Yesterday I saw a post on Lifehacker about the How to Wake Up Early site, which got me thinking about my sleep habits. Hard core blog readers will remember a time when I wrote a lot about my crappy sleeping habits (see Does it matter when I get my 8 hours of sleep, Making a bold move, Here we go again, and Sleep - my productivity killer). I stopped not because the problem was solved, but because I figured I’d piss people off if I made sleep the main topic of a young entrepreneur blog.

For my physical (and to some extent mental) health, there are three key components I’ve always focused on: eating healthy, working out, and getting plenty of sleep. The crazy thing is, I’ve got #1 and #2 down to the point where they are habits that I don’t need to worry about anymore. I’ve been lifting and working out continuously since high school, and for about the past five years I’ve eaten an extremely healthy and balanced diet. That stuff is easy for me. It’s probably not for some, but it is for me.

However, I can never get the sleep thing down. I don’t really have trouble sleeping, I just don’t have a set schedule so I tend to just do whatever I feel like whenever I want. Every time I get into a good groove for a week or two, I let it get out of hand and I convince myself I should just sleep when I’m tired and stop worrying about getting up early. However, a recurring theme in my head is always “I could be so much more efficient if I got on a better sleep schedule”. When your weekly number of hours of sleep looks something like 5-7-10-5-8-6-9 and you sleep and wake at all sorts of crazy hours it puts an added stress on you mentally and physically, and also impacts your diet and exercise.

I’ve come to the conclusion that on 95% of nights I’m not out past 10 PM, so I really don’t need to be up late. Thanks to digital cable, I can record any show or sporting event I’d normally watch and watch it the next morning. That was my largest hurdle. The next hurdle in my head was WHY? I’ve come to the conclusion that almost every successful person I know wakes up early. Don’t know why for sure, but I’m guessing because it’s a lot easier to waste time away at night than it is in the early morning.

Even more important, I feel like I’m starting my day in a productivity deficit and I’m always trying to catch up. I’d say I average waking up at 8 AM. Not bad…but after grabbing some food, going to the gym, eating again, and showering, I don’t get my start until around 10 or 10:30 on a lot of days. After sifting through emails, many days I look up and see lunch time without accomplishing any work. That stresses the shit out of me, and it’s time to change. I want to jump out ahead on my day and feel like I’m on top of things. By instituting a routine I’ll be healthier and I’ll worry less about sleep, which will make me happier and more efficient. All at the cost of….well, I suppose at the cost of my prior laziness and inability to commit.

So, starting this morning - armed with some good tips from the site - I got up at 6 (side note #2: did anyone else know you can use your iPod as an alarm? Me neither…what a great way to aid my new waking up process….). I’m going to try to stay on a ~10PM - 6AM schedule. I made a note to do a follow-up post on 2/1, although if this works I’m guessing I’ll comment on it more frequently because it’s kind of a big deal for me.