If your executive calendar is packed back to back, you have no room for fires, customers, or serendipities. You've traded all your availability for efficiency. That's a bad deal.

Executives of old used to know this! That's what the long lunches, early escapes to the golf course, and reading the paper at work were all about. A great fictional example of this is Bert Cooper from Mad Men. He knew his value was largely in his network. He didn't have to grind every minute of every day to prove otherwise. His function was to leap into action when the critical occasion arose or decision needed to be made.

But modern executives are so insecure about seeming busy 24/7 that they'll wreck their business trying to prove it. Trying to outwork everyone. Sacrificing themselves thin so they can run a squirrel-brain operation that's constantly chasing every nutty idea.

Now someone is inevitably going to say "but what about Elon!!". He's actually a perfect illustration of doing this right, actually. Even if he works 100-hour weeks, he's the CEO of 3 companies, has a Diablo IV addiction, and keeps a busy tweeting schedule too. In all of that, I'd be surprised if there was more than 20-30h per company per week on average. And your boss is not Elon.

Wide open calendars should not be seen as lazy, but as intentional availability. It's time we brought them back into vogue.