S2A

There are 1440 minutes in a day. Can you spare 10 of them?

A friend of mine has been shooting through the ranks of large Midwest company. She started in production scheduling almost 15 years ago. She excelled and soon found herself in charge of the company’s ERP modernization project. Again (against all odds), she excelled and was promoted a third time to Director of Enterprise Projects.

About 6 months ago, she set her sights on a new opportunity – VP of Informatics. The position is currently held by her boss, who announced that he would be retiring at the end of the year. While my friend certainly has the inside track, it’s expected to be a very competitive process, with many internal and external candidates.

We met for coffee after the announcement, and to my surprise, she expressed concerns about her qualifications for the role. Specifically, her lack of understanding of corporate finance (a preferred qualification for the position), coupled with her lack of time to learn the subject.

I asked, “Can you spare 10 minutes a day?”

It’s a rhetorical question, of course. We can all spare 10 minutes a day. Here’s the magic:

10 minutes/day * 5 days/week * 48 weeks = 2,400 minutes

That’s 40 hours in under year! Considering it takes the average reader 4-6 hours to read a 300-page book, you could read 6 to 10 additional books a year.

Armed with this information, I made a list of 5 must read books and 2 excellent magazines on the subject of corporate finance to help her navigate the gauntlet of interviews to come.

What new skills or subjects could you learn in just 10 minutes a day?

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