Millionaire morning routine: Dan Martell, a millionaire entrepreneur and one of New York’s best-selling authors is a popular coach for founders and CEOs. Known for giving his audience a peek into the life of CEOs, he has now revealed his morning routine, which helps him better plan his day and energy levels while ensuring he completes tasks on time.
In a YouTube video, Martell shared that he starts his next day before he goes to bed. This requires planning and calendar blocking, even if he intends to talk to someone for 15 minutes. He revealed how impossible it is to stay up till 2 AM with “two human alarm clocks” – his children. So, he wakes up at 4 AM and wraps up his day by 9 PM.
The 90-minute rule
According to Martell, he spends the first 90-minutes of his day working on his number one priority. While this may follow an intentional routine of ramping up your mind and body with physical workouts, he emphasises how this is one of the most crucial periods of one’s day. This hour and a half keeps him occupied in terms of fundraising, business development, sales, and marketing.
But his ‘morning’ usually starts at noon, when it comes to doing the creative work. He chooses to stay away from screens, emails, or anything that would have him consuming, instead of creating. In his video, he says, “What I don’t do is I sit there on my phone and start getting into my inbox or looking at WhatsApp. I get up – I execute,” Martell said, sharing his inspiration about how he only focuses on moving the business forward.
‘I don’t have white space on my calendar’
Blocking and planning his calendar is a significant part of Martell’s day. “I don’t have white spaces on my calendar,” explained Martell as he added, “Everything is allocated.”
In fact, even if he does find an empty block in between meetings or commitments, “We’re always looking to fill it,” he added. As quickly as 15 minutes, he also encourages interactions with potential contacts, only to be as productive as possible, while inviting new growth opportunities his way. He also shares that the 30-minute slot is often allocated to business partners, employees, leaders, and people he wants to coach.
Anything longer, he would ask himself, “What projects do I want to accelerate?” looking at his tasks as boulders to push up mountains. Furthermore, he refused to do bleed time, certain periods of time in a day where some people may choose to recover or view emails. He shared that even his email viewing time or social media usage time is blocked in his calendar, including personal time such as date nights and spending time with his children.
The main rationale, though, behind Martell’s productivity principles remains maximising the time at hand. Doing more in the same unit of time to achieve more and let the natural flow of energy drive his day’s schedule.