--- title: On Managing Your Your Energy | daily.dev description: Managing time alone is insufficient for effective tech leadership — energy is an equally finite and critical resource. Drawing on Andy Grove's observation that... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/on-managing-your-your-energy-31txshwd2 twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: On Managing Your Your Energy | daily.dev og:description: Managing time alone is insufficient for effective tech leadership — energy is an equally finite and critical resource. Drawing on Andy Grove's observation that... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/on-managing-your-your-energy-31txshwd2 og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/31txsHWd2.png og:image:alt: On Managing Your Your Energy og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # On Managing Your Your Energy **[Effective Software Leads](https://daily.dev/sources/softwareleads)** · 12 min read · 10 upvotes · 1 comments ## Summary Managing time alone is insufficient for effective tech leadership — energy is an equally finite and critical resource. Drawing on Andy Grove's observation that a manager's work is never truly done, the post argues that productivity depends not just on hours available but on the quality of energy brought to each task. Four types of energy are identified — physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual — each depleted by different activities. Practical strategies include scheduling deep cognitive work during peak mental energy, batching emotionally demanding conversations, and building recovery time between high-drain activities. The author shares a personal example of managing three concurrent projects by restructuring their day around energy rather than time, which made an otherwise unmanageable workload sustainable. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### What are the different types of energy a manager needs to manage besides time? Tony Schwartz and Catherine McCarthy identify four types: physical energy (the body's capacity to sustain work, depleted by poor sleep or nutrition), mental energy (capacity for concentration, analysis, and decision-making), emotional energy (capacity to feel, react, and regulate emotions during difficult conversations), and spiritual energy (a sense of purpose and alignment with one's values). These forms are interconnected, so poor sleep can reduce mental sharpness and mental fatigue can trigger emotional reactivity. _daily.dev surfaces career and leadership reading for managers working out how to sustain focus across a demanding day._ ### How can a manager structure their day around energy instead of just time? Schedule tasks requiring deep mental energy, like strategy documents, during peak-focus hours such as mornings, and batch emotionally demanding conversations, like performance feedback, into dedicated blocks rather than spreading them throughout the week. Push lower-energy administrative tasks, like email and Slack, to the end of the day, and build in recovery time, such as a short walk, between emotionally taxing meetings and tasks needing composure. _managers rethinking their calendars around energy rather than minutes can find similar experience reports through daily.dev._ ## Community discussion Top comments from developers on daily.dev. **@feforeboot** · 1 upvotes > Wouldn't it have been more energy-efficient to write "Your" just once in the title, though? ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Doing nothing at work](https://daily.dev/posts/doing-nothing-at-work-wzxdeddcu) · Tech Lead Digest · 148 upvotes · 6 comments - [Designing for Flow: How Leaders Create the Conditions for Team Productivity](https://daily.dev/posts/designing-for-flow-how-leaders-create-the-conditions-for-team-productivity-sosqujgnj) · RUBYLAND · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [How to Manage Cognitive Load as a Developer](https://daily.dev/posts/how-to-manage-cognitive-load-as-a-developer-o2igwvd9g) · Atomic Spin · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#productivity](https://daily.dev/tags/productivity), [#leadership](https://daily.dev/tags/leadership) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/on-managing-your-your-energy-31txshwd2) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"On Managing Your Your Energy","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/on-managing-your-your-energy-31txshwd2","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/on-managing-your-your-energy-31txshwd2"},"datePublished":"2026-08-10T13:15:10.494Z","dateModified":"2026-09-14T08:48:48.454Z","description":"Managing time alone is insufficient for effective tech leadership — energy is an equally finite and critical resource. 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