It’s not a new idea. In fact, it’s been knocking around for nearly two decades. “Manage your energy, not your time” — that’s the headline from a 2007 piece in Harvard Business Review. The BBC picked it up in 2017. Countless wellbeing workshops, HR decks, and leadership retreats have echoed the same message ever since. And yet, here we are in 2025, still structuring most of our working lives around time rather than the one thing that actually fuels us: energy.

The idea makes sense. It always has. Our energy is finite and deeply personal. Some are night owls, while others experience their peak energy in the morning. It doesn’t move in perfect sync with a 9–5 schedule, and it certainly doesn’t respond well to constant pressure or performative productivity. We know this, not just theoretically, but intuitively. We feel it during our Monday morning brain fog or in the post-lunch crash. Our best work doesn’t happen in perfect blocks of time; it happens when our energy is aligned with the task, the environment, and the support around us.

So why hasn’t this idea taken root? Why, nearly 20 years after it was first written about in business journals, are we still defaulting to time as our primary lens for performance?

The truth is, time is easy to measure. It looks tidy on spreadsheets, and it reassures managers. Energy, on the other hand, is harder to quantify. It asks more of leaders as it forces them to tune in emotionally, not just administratively. Most importantly, it requires trust that people will work when they feel best able, but that deadlines will be met so that deliverables are well…delivered. And, let’s be honest, most systems still aren’t set up for that kind of trust.

But is this the moment to change that? Because the future of work isn’t about optimising every hour. It’s about designing systems that understand how humans actually function. Emotionally intelligent businesses are already starting to shift: not just offering flexibility in theory, but building cultures that regulate energy as a baseline. They create rhythms that allow people to pause, not just power through. They recognise that energy varies not just by individual, but by season, by role, by neurotype, by caregiving responsibilities, and they design with all of that in mind.



This isn’t about letting people coast. It’s about recognising that sustainable performance can’t be squeezed out of depleted teams. And when teams have enough energy, the payoff is huge. Not just in wellbeing, but in the quality of ideas, the strength of collaboration, and the consistency of delivery.

So the question now isn’t whether we should design around energy. It’s why we’re still hesitating. We don’t need another article to convince us. We need action from leaders who are willing to do things differently, and from organisations ready to build cultures that flex around the humans inside them, not just the metrics on the outside.

Want to design for energy, not just hours?
We can help you build a culture that doesn’t just survive — it sustains. Let’s talk.