You may have heard that being a high-performance team means you must constantly grind 24/7. True intensity is not about how many hours we sit at some desk. It is about how much focus and energy we bring to the hours that matter. Building an intense and sustainable culture means we need to work like athletes: we are all-in during the game but then prioritize recovery to show up sharp again tomorrow. World-class cultures are built through good strategies and world-class habits. Here are some time strategies and six habits you can develop to win together without burning or flaming out.

I. Own and manage your deep work. High-intensity work requires getting into a zone—that place where only you and the work exist. We have all experienced it and know what it feels like. But constant pings, office drop-ins, walk-ns or quick questions are just some of the detractors that keep us out of that zone. We want to finish our most important task early when we are fresh, not at 5 p.m. because we were distracted all day.

• Habit: Protect your focused time blocks. If you have a complex task, block time on your calendar, turn off notifications, close the door and dive in. The only time you should be interrupted is in the event of an emergency. Ask the people you work with to respect your needs.

II. Try the sprint and reset approach. Working at 100% capacity indefinitely is a recipe for mistakes and exhaustion. We should pace our work to match the reality of the human energy we possess, and it is finite. If we use too much, we borrow from tomorrow’s energy bank, and it becomes a vicious spiral in the wrong direction. To ensure busy does not become burned out, celebrate a little at each completion, and then take some time to recover before the next sprint.

• Habit: Work in sprints. During a push, we bring our A-game to hit the deadline. Once that milestone is reached, we intentionally reset—using the reset time for clean-up, learning or catching our breath before the next big push.

III. Radically prioritize that one big thing you need to do. It eliminates the anxiety of a never-ending to-do list. We must evaluate the impact of the work we do, not just being or staying busy. It is OK to have a little downtime in today’s fast paced world. We should never feel like we are juggling 20 #1 priorities at the same time. Intensity on a work issue is only possible when we know exactly where to point our energy and how long that energy will last.

• Habit: Start every day by identifying your one big thing. If you get that done, the day is a win. If you are overwhelmed, ask, "Which of these is the priority right now?" If the task wears on you, take a coffee break and come back refreshed.

IV. Make use of high-speed, low-drama feedback. In a high-intensity environment, we tend to move fast—too fast at times. That means we can and will make mistakes. The key is to learn from them quickly so we do not repeat them. We need to keep standards high without making things personal. After all, we are human, and no one is perfect. And, we focus on fixing the process, not the person (no finger pointing). If you are a member of a team, do the feedback as a group: either in person, remotely or by phone. Learning organizations do this all the time, and it improves the next project worked on.

• Habit: After a project or a tough shift, conduct a flash review. In 5-10 minutes, ask, "What went well? What did not? What do we change next time?"

V. Respecting the hard stop is one we are all guilty of breaking. A sustainable culture requires a clear boundary between work mode and life mode. When we are off the clock, we want to be completely off. Think of recovery time as an investment. You need to be rested and recharged so you can bring that high intensity back the next day.

• Habit: Practice the hard stop. When your shift or day ends, close the laptop or leave the station. The work is not going anywhere; it will be there tomorrow just where you left it. Avoid the just one more email trap before you leave or check your email when you get home.

VI. Work to communicate in an asynchronistic mode first. Not every update needs a meeting or an instant reply. Constant urgency creates a chaotic and misshapen culture that destroys productivity. Give everyone (including yourself) the breathing room to get work done. Understand what needs to be done now and what can wait.

• Habit: If it is not an emergency, use asynchronous tools (like texting, voicemail or email). Do not expect an instant reply, and do not feel pressured to give one if you are in the middle of an important task. It can wait a few minutes. There are also situations that cannot wait—that is different. In the heat of the moment, it sometimes becomes hard to separate the two.

I leave you with two quotes that seem relevant to this discussion.

“Until I came to IBM, I probably would have told you that culture was just one among several important elements in any organization's makeup and success—along with vision, strategy, marketing, financials and the like. ... I came to see, in my time at IBM, that culture isn't just one aspect of the game, it is the game. In the end, an organization is nothing more than the collective capacity of its people to create value.”
— Louis V. Gerstner Jr., former CEO of IBM

“Employees who believe that management is concerned about them as a whole person—not just an employee—are more productive, more satisfied, more fulfilled. Satisfied employees mean satisfied customers, which leads to profitability.”
— Anne M. Mulcahy, CEO, Xerox

A sustainable culture is never constructed quickly—it takes time and practice. By adopting good habits, we are not just working harder; we are working better. Let us commit to protecting our time so we can do the best work of our careers while living a full life outside the confines of our office.