You spend more of your life at work than almost anywhere else, so make as much of it as possible about the part you actually enjoy. The Collins Fun Matrix is the simple 2x2 I use to decide where my time goes.
Often, when I am onboarding a new group of people, I talk to them about my story and my career so far. I tell them that one of my golden rules is to keep asking myself a simple question: is this actually fun? Sometimes I put it more bluntly: if it is not fun, don't do it.
I usually have to add a warning, because taken too literally that is a career-limiting move, a proper CLM. I do not mean walk out the moment a task gets boring. What I really mean is this: work out what you genuinely find fun, then do the work to make those things take up more of your time and produce the best outcomes in your role.
It is worth taking seriously because of the sheer amount of time involved. You will spend more of your waking life at work than almost anywhere else. More than with your friends, often more than with your family. If that is where the hours go, the least you can do is aim as many of them as possible at the parts you actually enjoy.
It is not always possible. There are things in every job that are not fun and that you cannot stop doing. But the rule still holds: find what is fun for you, point as much of your day at it as you can, and build a routine for the rest so it takes as little of you as possible.
I have used a simple tool to do this for years. I call it the Collins Fun Matrix, mostly because naming it makes me actually use it.
It is a 2x2. One axis is fun: does this energise me or drain me? The other axis is importance: does this genuinely move the needle, or not?
Important · Not fun
Systemise It
Delegate, automate or batch it so it costs you least.
Important · Fun
The Sweet Spot
Protect it and grow it. Put it in the calendar first.
Low value · Not fun
Eliminate
Stop doing it. The easiest time you will win back.
Low value · Fun
Time-Box It
A reward or a break, not the whole day.
That gives you four boxes. The whole game is to grow your time in one of them and shrink your time in another. Here is how I treat each.
This is the sweet spot, and it is closely tied to playing to your strengths. People throw that phrase around a lot, but there is a reason a strength is usually something you also enjoy: it gives you energy when you do it. For me, this quadrant is people, creativity and innovation together. Give me the chance to work with great people on a genuinely hard problem, and to figure out how we crack it using the latest technology to unlock real value, and that is where I get properly excited.
This is where you do your best work, because energy and value pull in the same direction. So the instinct to treat it as a luxury, the thing you get to once the boring stuff is done, is exactly backwards. Protect this time. Put it in the calendar first. Grow it deliberately by asking what would let you spend a few more hours a week here.
This is the dangerous quadrant, and the key thing is simple: do not let it become the majority of your time. It matters, so you cannot ignore it, but it drains you, and it will quietly work its way into your calendar until it has taken over the week if you let it.
So audit it honestly. Do you actually need to do this at all, and does it really need to be you? Then make it cost as little as possible. Systemise it so it runs the same way every time without fresh thought. Delegate it to someone who is genuinely better at it, or who does not find it draining. Automate as much as you can, which is a different conversation now than it was even a year ago, because AI can take on a real share of this work. Batch what is left into a routine so it lives in a fixed slot instead of bleeding through the day. The goal is not to enjoy it. It is to handle it well while giving it the smallest possible share of you.
This is the trap that feels like progress. Enjoyable work that is low value: the tidy little task, the interesting tangent, the thing you reach for because it is pleasant rather than because it matters.
I do not think you should cut it out. A bit of low-stakes, enjoyable work is a good break and a fair reward. But it has to be time-boxed. Use it as a reward after the important work, or as a deliberate breather, and put a hard edge around it so it does not quietly expand to fill the day.
Low value and draining. There is nothing clever to say here. Stop doing it. Most of us are carrying a few of these out of habit, or because we always have. Find them and kill them. It is the easiest time you will ever win back.
Do not overthink it. Once in a while, list how you actually spent last week and drop each thing into a box. You will usually find two things: you are spending less time in the top-right than you assumed, and more in the bottom-left than you would admit.
Then make small moves. Hand off one draining task. Time-box one enjoyable distraction. Protect one block for the work that matters and that you love. Do that a few times and the shape of your week changes.
I will say it plainly, because I believe it: a working life is too long, and too much of your life, to spend it on things you neither value nor enjoy. The matrix is just a way of being honest about where the hours go, and a nudge to keep pointing them somewhere better.
Do not save this for a planning day. Think of one thing in your role that is genuinely fun for you, the work you would happily do more of, and put a recurring block in your calendar for it today. Protecting that one slot is the smallest possible version of this whole idea, and it is the one that actually changes your week.
Alex Collins
Co-founder & COO at RAI Digital & Infinite PL · Ex-EY Consulting Partner · Writing on agentic AI, venture building, logistics platforms and transformation leadership.
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