Apple CEO Tim Cook starts his day at 3.45am – can following his daily routine lead to professional success?
- Dave Johnson takes a leaf out of Apple CEO Tim Cook’s book and finds a new way to approach his day, much like other top executives around the world, such as Richard Branson, Jack Dorsey and Bob Iger
Starting the day ludicrously early seems to be a badge of honour for CEOs like Apple’s Tim Cook, who gets out of bed at 3.45am every day.
Cook is far from the only one. Richard Branson, Jack Dorsey and Bob Iger are just some of the executives who wake up hours before the rest of us.
Could keeping that kind of schedule be some sort of magic elixir that unlocks the keys to productivity and success?
I am a full-time work-from-home freelancer, so in principle I have the flexibility to set my own hours. Typically, I get up around 6.30am, and after exercising, I’m ready to start my workday around 8am.
But there are never even remotely enough hours in my day. I constantly juggle endless tight deadlines, phone interviews, a daily deluge of email, and the need to record, produce and edit a weekly podcast. I generally work until about 7pm, but there are days when I sit in front of a monitor until bedtime.
Starting the day ludicrously early seems to be a badge of honour for CEOs like Apple’s Tim Cook, who gets out of bed at 3.45am every day
Could something as simple as sliding my wake-up time back a few hours help me to take better control of my day? I decided to reset my alarm for a week – Monday to Friday – to see if Cook’s routine could make a difference.
Here’s how my week of waking up like Apple’s CEO went.
Sunday: I went to bed at 8.30pm, which ended up being the earliest I’d go to sleep for the rest of the week.
The experiment started on Sunday night, of course. We all know what Ben Franklin had to say about sleep; I can’t lay claim to wealth or wisdom, but it’s clear that you can’t successfully get up early unless you go to bed correspondingly early.