Managing Multiple Priorities
Transcript
Increasingly, I find that people believe that they have to do multiple things, multi-task to get through the day. I don’t know where this is written but increasingly people say that unless I do this, this, and this at the same time I’m just not going to make it. Well, all the studies I’ve ever come across point up to the fact that you can’t be as effective trying to tackle multiple tasks as when you simply give your time and attention to one task at a time.
Let me tell you a little story. I belong to a health club in my home town of Chapel Hill, NC. And in this particular health club they have what’s called stair climber machine. Do you know the stair climber machine, yeah I’ll bet you’ve seen one. Now, our stair climbers, in Chapel Hill, NC, all face TV monitors so that while people are on the stair climber they can at least watch television even if they can’t hear the sound. A woman gets on next to me and she’s wearing a walkman. Now, this is nothing unusual I’ve seen this before. You’ve seen this before.
Here’s the part that really throws me: after she puts on the walkman, you know that ledge that sits right over the handle bars? She whips out a book. Not just any book but about a 600 page hardcover book. She opens it up to where her bookmarker is, it’s someplace in the middle, and while she’s on the stair climber, looking at the tv monitor, listening to whatever’s playing on the walkman, she’s reading a book. Now, I’m astounded. I’m the author of Breathing Space, and The Joy of Simple Living. I almost go over to her and say, “would you like some gum?” but I refrain.
The point I’m leading up to is this: The next time you find yourself multi-tasking, whether it’s for work, leisure or anyplace in between, think for a second, “who told you that you have to double up and triple up, even quadruple up on the tasks or activities you’re engaged in?” 99 times out of 100 you took it on yourself to engage in multi-tasking and 99 times out of 100 the perception will be that your time is passing by faster, you don’t enjoy what you’re doing and you’re wondering where the day went.
Let me tell you a little story. I belong to a health club in my home town of Chapel Hill, NC. And in this particular health club they have what’s called stair climber machine. Do you know the stair climber machine, yeah I’ll bet you’ve seen one. Now, our stair climbers, in Chapel Hill, NC, all face TV monitors so that while people are on the stair climber they can at least watch television even if they can’t hear the sound. A woman gets on next to me and she’s wearing a walkman. Now, this is nothing unusual I’ve seen this before. You’ve seen this before.
Here’s the part that really throws me: after she puts on the walkman, you know that ledge that sits right over the handle bars? She whips out a book. Not just any book but about a 600 page hardcover book. She opens it up to where her bookmarker is, it’s someplace in the middle, and while she’s on the stair climber, looking at the tv monitor, listening to whatever’s playing on the walkman, she’s reading a book. Now, I’m astounded. I’m the author of Breathing Space, and The Joy of Simple Living. I almost go over to her and say, “would you like some gum?” but I refrain.
The point I’m leading up to is this: The next time you find yourself multi-tasking, whether it’s for work, leisure or anyplace in between, think for a second, “who told you that you have to double up and triple up, even quadruple up on the tasks or activities you’re engaged in?” 99 times out of 100 you took it on yourself to engage in multi-tasking and 99 times out of 100 the perception will be that your time is passing by faster, you don’t enjoy what you’re doing and you’re wondering where the day went.
Prioritize Your Time
Transcript
Let’s talk about the situation where so much time goes by in terms of the tasks you’re trying to accomplish at work and at home it feels as if you’re never have enough time. How do you decide what to handle, what to delegate, what to not do at all?
Well I have a simple equation I use when I speak to groups around the country. It works something like this, 30 minutes = 1 year. Now that in itself doesn’t mean much, in fact until I explain it is seems rather nonsensical. Here’s how it works. Suppose you got out of college age 22 and worked until age 70. That would mean your career is 48 years long. Now, in the course of those 48 years, any activity that you engage in for an average of 30 minutes a day, such as cleaning your house, in the course of 48 years would take up how much of those 48 years?
Well it seems like it might be complicated but it’s actually a pretty simple equation. This is the way it works. 30 minutes is one half of an hour, obviously, 1/48th of a day. Just as an hour would be 1/24th of a day. So if 30 minutes is 1/48th of a day, 1 year is 1/48th of 48 years. The commutative principle of arithmetic, which you had in third grade, tells us that any activity you engage in for 30 minutes a day, over the course of 48 years, ends up taking a solid year of your 48 years. Said yet another way, if you can find anybody else to clean your house, do it!
Any activity you engage in for 30 minutes a day for the course of your adult career, will take up 1 solid year of your life. Now, it’s not a year of 9 to 5, it’s 24 hours a day 7 days a week for every week of that year. That immediately tells us that the 15 minute segments and the 30 minute segments in your day devoted to activities that you don’t enjoy doing, or that you could delegate, or that you could skip altogether, cumulatively, have a dramatic effect on your career and your life.
People say to me, “well, if I pay somebody to clean my house that’s going to cost a little money.” Yeah, pay it. Independent of whether the economy is booming, money is a little tight, when you pay those extra dollars for somebody to take care of a task that you don’t enjoy doing, you free yourself up to be more vibrant, more alert, more energetic to take care of the tasks that you, and you alone, are best able to handle. More importantly than that, you position yourself to be more valuable to your employer or, if you’re self-employed, more valuable to your business. You put yourself in a position where you are freed from some of the mundane, monotonous, routine, energy draining type activities that you don’t enjoy anyways. And then have more energy, more focus, more direction for those activities that you do enjoy doing and that do make you more money and that do make you more prosperous.
So I say, as often as possible, you look for the helpers in life who are all around you. College students, even high school students, home on vacation or perhaps wan to have a job after hours, after school; $6.50, $7.00 dollars an hour who can take care of the tasks in your life that you don’t want to be doing, and that they can very easily do and do well. Most of these high school and college students would much rather be working for you in odd jobs than flipping hamburgers at you know where. Every time I write a check for the helpers in my life, I smile, because it’s one of the best investments I’ve ever made. Every time I write a check to a young man or woman, who has helped me out in some way, whether it’s cutting the grass, making pick ups and deliveries, what have you, that tells me right there and then that I saved that time for myself. More importantly, I kept my own resources fresh and vibrant. I didn’t wear myself down. I kept myself at a high level of energy, ready to face those tasks that I am best suited to face and, more importantly, that can make me more prosperous.
So hereafter I say to you, you don’t enjoy a task, look for somebody else you can pay to do it or find a way to consolidate the task. In the case of cleaning your home an average of 30 minutes a day, sometimes you can let it slide. If company’s not coming maybe you can go two or three days and have the net result being that it doesn’t average 30 minutes, maybe 3 days worth of cleaning is only 65 minutes hence you’re down to a little under 22 minutes a day average for the three days. Likewise, in all other aspects of your career and your life, look for substitutes, look for helpers, look for ways you can skip doing the tasks altogether. The long term benefit will astound you. You know the old expression, “You can always make more money, but you can’t make more time.” It’s so true for each of us these days.
Well I have a simple equation I use when I speak to groups around the country. It works something like this, 30 minutes = 1 year. Now that in itself doesn’t mean much, in fact until I explain it is seems rather nonsensical. Here’s how it works. Suppose you got out of college age 22 and worked until age 70. That would mean your career is 48 years long. Now, in the course of those 48 years, any activity that you engage in for an average of 30 minutes a day, such as cleaning your house, in the course of 48 years would take up how much of those 48 years?
Well it seems like it might be complicated but it’s actually a pretty simple equation. This is the way it works. 30 minutes is one half of an hour, obviously, 1/48th of a day. Just as an hour would be 1/24th of a day. So if 30 minutes is 1/48th of a day, 1 year is 1/48th of 48 years. The commutative principle of arithmetic, which you had in third grade, tells us that any activity you engage in for 30 minutes a day, over the course of 48 years, ends up taking a solid year of your 48 years. Said yet another way, if you can find anybody else to clean your house, do it!
Any activity you engage in for 30 minutes a day for the course of your adult career, will take up 1 solid year of your life. Now, it’s not a year of 9 to 5, it’s 24 hours a day 7 days a week for every week of that year. That immediately tells us that the 15 minute segments and the 30 minute segments in your day devoted to activities that you don’t enjoy doing, or that you could delegate, or that you could skip altogether, cumulatively, have a dramatic effect on your career and your life.
People say to me, “well, if I pay somebody to clean my house that’s going to cost a little money.” Yeah, pay it. Independent of whether the economy is booming, money is a little tight, when you pay those extra dollars for somebody to take care of a task that you don’t enjoy doing, you free yourself up to be more vibrant, more alert, more energetic to take care of the tasks that you, and you alone, are best able to handle. More importantly than that, you position yourself to be more valuable to your employer or, if you’re self-employed, more valuable to your business. You put yourself in a position where you are freed from some of the mundane, monotonous, routine, energy draining type activities that you don’t enjoy anyways. And then have more energy, more focus, more direction for those activities that you do enjoy doing and that do make you more money and that do make you more prosperous.
So I say, as often as possible, you look for the helpers in life who are all around you. College students, even high school students, home on vacation or perhaps wan to have a job after hours, after school; $6.50, $7.00 dollars an hour who can take care of the tasks in your life that you don’t want to be doing, and that they can very easily do and do well. Most of these high school and college students would much rather be working for you in odd jobs than flipping hamburgers at you know where. Every time I write a check for the helpers in my life, I smile, because it’s one of the best investments I’ve ever made. Every time I write a check to a young man or woman, who has helped me out in some way, whether it’s cutting the grass, making pick ups and deliveries, what have you, that tells me right there and then that I saved that time for myself. More importantly, I kept my own resources fresh and vibrant. I didn’t wear myself down. I kept myself at a high level of energy, ready to face those tasks that I am best suited to face and, more importantly, that can make me more prosperous.
So hereafter I say to you, you don’t enjoy a task, look for somebody else you can pay to do it or find a way to consolidate the task. In the case of cleaning your home an average of 30 minutes a day, sometimes you can let it slide. If company’s not coming maybe you can go two or three days and have the net result being that it doesn’t average 30 minutes, maybe 3 days worth of cleaning is only 65 minutes hence you’re down to a little under 22 minutes a day average for the three days. Likewise, in all other aspects of your career and your life, look for substitutes, look for helpers, look for ways you can skip doing the tasks altogether. The long term benefit will astound you. You know the old expression, “You can always make more money, but you can’t make more time.” It’s so true for each of us these days.
Managing Your Collections
Transcript
Have you noticed that your collections, the things you’ve accumulated over the years, probably have been growing? Increasingly, as I speak to people across the country and around the world, people tell me that their collections, sometimes, get out of hand. Whether it’s coins, stamps, postcards, you name it, maybe it’s books, maybe it’s CDs, cassettes. Is there a way we can continue to collect those things that bring us pleasure, but at the same time, not have those collections get out of hand? Well I think there are. Here are a couple of strategies:
For one, especially if you collect things that are rare and have value, beyond your immediate assessment of them, such as coins and stamps. Focus on the best of the best. By that I mean, if you have a voluminous coin collection for example, if you were to only take the most valuable 20% of the coins I other words, those coins that are listed in the various directories as having the most value. You probably would have 80% or more of the total value of your collection.
By retaining the best of the best you literally have far less volume of coins, in other words, they can be housed in far less of a space, while maintaining most of the value of your collection. Indeed, you could even take many, many coins of lower value and trade them in for one single coin of great value, thereby, greatly reducing the value of what it takes to store that collection. Well likewise you can do the same with stamps. You can do the same with a variety of other things people collect.
Now, another technique is to identify somebody in your family or a friend or somebody at work who would greatly appreciate a starter set. So you have a friend that wants to get started on a certain collection; you give a small portion of your collection to this friend, or maybe it’s a relative, a niece or nephew, son, whomever. You’ve pared down your collection somewhat and at the same time helped somebody else to get started on their own collection. Hence, you both win in that situation.
Another thing is to recognize that people who are on the move, who pay movers to literally transport their items are much more vigilant about what they decide to retain. When you have to pay money to move things from one location to another, you’re far more concerned as to what indeed you will transport. So, if you see someone who has just moved t a new house, chances are that house has got rooms and drawers and closets that are in control. Why? The people who just moved in didn’t bring all this stuff from the other house.
You can adopt this same mentality, this same mind set even if you don’t move frequently. Pretend that you were moving into your bedroom for the first time, or into your den or you were going to fill a closet for the first time. Some people, in order to get their garage clean, literally move everything outside and put it all back, leaving out those things that are no longer necessary. The same principles apply to our collections. Look, it’s not great trick these days in our over materialistic society, to accumulate masses of stuff. Great amount of things these days, we’re awash with material goods.
By focusing on the best of the best, by helping other people to have starter collections, and by adopting the same mentality of those who move frequently, you can keep your collections in check.
For one, especially if you collect things that are rare and have value, beyond your immediate assessment of them, such as coins and stamps. Focus on the best of the best. By that I mean, if you have a voluminous coin collection for example, if you were to only take the most valuable 20% of the coins I other words, those coins that are listed in the various directories as having the most value. You probably would have 80% or more of the total value of your collection.
By retaining the best of the best you literally have far less volume of coins, in other words, they can be housed in far less of a space, while maintaining most of the value of your collection. Indeed, you could even take many, many coins of lower value and trade them in for one single coin of great value, thereby, greatly reducing the value of what it takes to store that collection. Well likewise you can do the same with stamps. You can do the same with a variety of other things people collect.
Now, another technique is to identify somebody in your family or a friend or somebody at work who would greatly appreciate a starter set. So you have a friend that wants to get started on a certain collection; you give a small portion of your collection to this friend, or maybe it’s a relative, a niece or nephew, son, whomever. You’ve pared down your collection somewhat and at the same time helped somebody else to get started on their own collection. Hence, you both win in that situation.
Another thing is to recognize that people who are on the move, who pay movers to literally transport their items are much more vigilant about what they decide to retain. When you have to pay money to move things from one location to another, you’re far more concerned as to what indeed you will transport. So, if you see someone who has just moved t a new house, chances are that house has got rooms and drawers and closets that are in control. Why? The people who just moved in didn’t bring all this stuff from the other house.
You can adopt this same mentality, this same mind set even if you don’t move frequently. Pretend that you were moving into your bedroom for the first time, or into your den or you were going to fill a closet for the first time. Some people, in order to get their garage clean, literally move everything outside and put it all back, leaving out those things that are no longer necessary. The same principles apply to our collections. Look, it’s not great trick these days in our over materialistic society, to accumulate masses of stuff. Great amount of things these days, we’re awash with material goods.
By focusing on the best of the best, by helping other people to have starter collections, and by adopting the same mentality of those who move frequently, you can keep your collections in check.
Checklists and Systems
Transcript
Have you ever realized by making simple checklists and simple systems you can make your day go easier and smoother? Let me tell you how this works.
Suppose you travel a lot for your business and find yourself checking into hotels, sometimes late in the evening after a long and hectic flight. Well, this is not the time when you’re usually at your best. You’re tired, you’ve been on the road, you can’t think straight.
All you want to do is get to your room and plop down on a bed. But, this is no time to let down your guard because you need to have the right kind of room and you need to have some good information while you’re checking in. They way to systemize your efforts and get the best of this particular hotel situation is to prepare in advance a small checklist. This could be no bigger than a business card and could literally fit in your wallet.
Now, when you check in to that hotel, maybe 8:00, 9:00,10:00 at night and you’re tired, you’ve been on the road, you pull out your checklist, which you prepared well in advance and it has all the key things you want to know and all the key bits of information you want to transfer over to the desk attendant. For example, can I get a no smoking room on a no smoking floor? That’s one of my favorites. Can I get a room far from the ice machine and the elevator and everything else that makes noise in the middle of the night? Do you have a pool? Is there a health club? Is there a charge for them? Do you have a free shuttle back to the airport? Is there coffee service? Is there complimentary breakfast? Is there an ironing board?
In other words, you load up this card with all the questions and concerns that are important to you. The ones, of course, which I just gave you are some of the ones that are most important to me. By having such a checklist, prepared in advance, you avoid forgetting some crucial item that you’re pretty likely to forget when you’re checking in late at night.
Likewise, you can make the same kind of checklist and thereby systemize your efforts when you’re making a plane reservation, when you’re going to be renting a car, when you’re going to be undertaking any kind of purchase prepare checklists in advance that guide you through and enable you to ask the key questions and raise the key concerns so that you can rather effortlessly get the best of what you’re looking for. The beauty fo this is that none of these checklists need to take up more than 2″ to 2.5″ which means it will fit in your wallet and since it resides on your hard drive, you can constantly be honing and improving your checklists. You can add new questions when it becomes apparent that they ought to be added, you can drop others as they no longer fit your needs.
All you want to do is get to your room and plop down on a bed. But, this is no time to let down your guard because you need to have the right kind of room and you need to have some good information while you’re checking in. They way to systemize your efforts and get the best of this particular hotel situation is to prepare in advance a small checklist. This could be no bigger than a business card and could literally fit in your wallet.
Now, when you check in to that hotel, maybe 8:00, 9:00,10:00 at night and you’re tired, you’ve been on the road, you pull out your checklist, which you prepared well in advance and it has all the key things you want to know and all the key bits of information you want to transfer over to the desk attendant. For example, can I get a no smoking room on a no smoking floor? That’s one of my favorites. Can I get a room far from the ice machine and the elevator and everything else that makes noise in the middle of the night? Do you have a pool? Is there a health club? Is there a charge for them? Do you have a free shuttle back to the airport? Is there coffee service? Is there complimentary breakfast? Is there an ironing board?
In other words, you load up this card with all the questions and concerns that are important to you. The ones, of course, which I just gave you are some of the ones that are most important to me. By having such a checklist, prepared in advance, you avoid forgetting some crucial item that you’re pretty likely to forget when you’re checking in late at night.
Likewise, you can make the same kind of checklist and thereby systemize your efforts when you’re making a plane reservation, when you’re going to be renting a car, when you’re going to be undertaking any kind of purchase prepare checklists in advance that guide you through and enable you to ask the key questions and raise the key concerns so that you can rather effortlessly get the best of what you’re looking for. The beauty fo this is that none of these checklists need to take up more than 2″ to 2.5″ which means it will fit in your wallet and since it resides on your hard drive, you can constantly be honing and improving your checklists. You can add new questions when it becomes apparent that they ought to be added, you can drop others as they no longer fit your needs.
Information Overload
Transcript
As I speak to groups around the country and around the world, I find increasingly that people are besieged by too much competing for their time and attention. In a word they face a situation that’s akin to information overload, just too much bombarding them on both sides. Reminds me of a story when I was 21.
I took the summer off to go to Europe. I went backpacking throughout most of the western European nations. When I got to Spain I looked forward to the opportunity to take an overnight cruise to one of the islands off the coast of Spain. There was Minorca, Majorca, and Ibiza. Ibiza was a wonderful resort area. Majorca was word renown, but unfortunately tickets were left for passage only to Minorca. So I figured, Majorca, Minorca what’s the difference? Majorca, Minororca they must be the same except the size.
Well, that night on board, I slept on deck. That’s all you got for the amount of money I paid. My backpack was my pillow my blanket was the sky. In the morning when we got to Minorca, something was amiss. When we got off the dock, I didn’t see any high-rise buildings. I looked around; I didn’t see any kind of development of any type whatsoever; Just small shacks and little two-story buildings at best.
When I got to the town square I kept thinking to myself, there’s got to be something more here. And it turned out that there wasn’t. Now, unfortunately, the boat wasn’t going to return for two and a half days. So, I was stuck. There I was in Minorca. As it turned out, not another person on the island spoke English. Eventually, I found a pensión, which is their term for a room you rent in someone’s home. So, I unloaded all my stuff, put on my bathing suit, took my flip-flops out, put them on, wrapped a towel around my neck and decided to make the best of my two and a half days there. I was going to explore the island, find those swimming holes, do everything that was fun and exciting.
Now, I’m walking for two and a half hours in the Spanish sun, with no protection, in the days when I thought I was indestructible, without a bottle of water and I’m starting to get delirious. I’m walking down a hill, when all of the sudden three wild dogs come upon me. The likes of which I hope you’ve never experienced.
These dogs had mangy looks to them. Their coats were terrible and uneven. Their teeth were showing, there was saliva dripping from them. Unlike American dogs, even American attack dogs, these dogs offered no warning. They immediately stood in front of me in the form of a peace sign: one to the left, one straight ahead and one to the right. Had they encircled me I would have been a goner, but for some reason they maintained this stance. Now, I had no weapon, nothing in sight, no apparent help. I took the towel from the back of my neck and wrapped it in the form of a rat tail thinking maybe just maybe they’d perceive that as a stick or some kind of weapon. So I held it there for what seemed like forever.
If you’ve ever been in an earthquake, they say that even 15 seconds is the longest 15 seconds of your life. I have to say, in retrospect that the dogs kept me at bay for probably no more than 15-20 seconds at most, but it seemed like a long time. I had no alternative and no clue as to what to do.
Suddenly, a man comes running down the hill. He’s got a broad rim hat, he’s got a sombrero. He’s got a stick. If you can imagine a Spanish man running down a hill, whatever your stereotype dictates, this is what he looked like. He was smiling and he was yelling something, and he came upon the dogs and he seemed to know them. He grabbed one of them, moved the dog off to the side of the road and then, for the first time, I could see there was a pen. There were leaves and vines and everything obscuring the pen. He put the dog in the pen, came back, got the second. And now it’s just me and one dog and I realize I’m actually gonna get out of this.
He comes back, gets the third dog and now I’m home free. He smiles at me, says something in Spanish; I don’t understand a word of Spanish. I say something to him in English; he doesn’t understand a word of it. I take off up the hill. I’ve got a two and a half hour walk back to my pension. I’m more delirious than ever. The Spanish sun is beating down on me. It turns out, I’m so badly sunburned by the time I get back to the hotel room, I cannot leave for the rest of the two and a half days. I must stay indoors. Well, I had a lot of time to reflect then and a lot of time to reflect over the years. I had help on that day and if I had not I could not be telling this story now.
In your own careers and your own lives aren’t you besieged by the hound of faxes, the hound of emails, the hound of information overload, the hound of too much in your in basket, the hound of too much competing for your time and attention? Yeah, we all are. And the reality is: no help is coming. Individually we have to recognize, with the clarity of death, that unless we take stringent measures to keep our name off of lists, to pare down the piles, to reduce them to their lowest possible volume, to strip away those files that no longer serve us, to make sure that in all the spaces in our lives we remain in control. No one else is coming to help us. It’s up to us and fortunately, we have the wherewithal to take care of the problem. The first and critical step is to have the awareness.
I took the summer off to go to Europe. I went backpacking throughout most of the western European nations. When I got to Spain I looked forward to the opportunity to take an overnight cruise to one of the islands off the coast of Spain. There was Minorca, Majorca, and Ibiza. Ibiza was a wonderful resort area. Majorca was word renown, but unfortunately tickets were left for passage only to Minorca. So I figured, Majorca, Minorca what’s the difference? Majorca, Minororca they must be the same except the size.
Well, that night on board, I slept on deck. That’s all you got for the amount of money I paid. My backpack was my pillow my blanket was the sky. In the morning when we got to Minorca, something was amiss. When we got off the dock, I didn’t see any high-rise buildings. I looked around; I didn’t see any kind of development of any type whatsoever; Just small shacks and little two-story buildings at best.
When I got to the town square I kept thinking to myself, there’s got to be something more here. And it turned out that there wasn’t. Now, unfortunately, the boat wasn’t going to return for two and a half days. So, I was stuck. There I was in Minorca. As it turned out, not another person on the island spoke English. Eventually, I found a pensión, which is their term for a room you rent in someone’s home. So, I unloaded all my stuff, put on my bathing suit, took my flip-flops out, put them on, wrapped a towel around my neck and decided to make the best of my two and a half days there. I was going to explore the island, find those swimming holes, do everything that was fun and exciting.
Now, I’m walking for two and a half hours in the Spanish sun, with no protection, in the days when I thought I was indestructible, without a bottle of water and I’m starting to get delirious. I’m walking down a hill, when all of the sudden three wild dogs come upon me. The likes of which I hope you’ve never experienced.
These dogs had mangy looks to them. Their coats were terrible and uneven. Their teeth were showing, there was saliva dripping from them. Unlike American dogs, even American attack dogs, these dogs offered no warning. They immediately stood in front of me in the form of a peace sign: one to the left, one straight ahead and one to the right. Had they encircled me I would have been a goner, but for some reason they maintained this stance. Now, I had no weapon, nothing in sight, no apparent help. I took the towel from the back of my neck and wrapped it in the form of a rat tail thinking maybe just maybe they’d perceive that as a stick or some kind of weapon. So I held it there for what seemed like forever.
If you’ve ever been in an earthquake, they say that even 15 seconds is the longest 15 seconds of your life. I have to say, in retrospect that the dogs kept me at bay for probably no more than 15-20 seconds at most, but it seemed like a long time. I had no alternative and no clue as to what to do.
Suddenly, a man comes running down the hill. He’s got a broad rim hat, he’s got a sombrero. He’s got a stick. If you can imagine a Spanish man running down a hill, whatever your stereotype dictates, this is what he looked like. He was smiling and he was yelling something, and he came upon the dogs and he seemed to know them. He grabbed one of them, moved the dog off to the side of the road and then, for the first time, I could see there was a pen. There were leaves and vines and everything obscuring the pen. He put the dog in the pen, came back, got the second. And now it’s just me and one dog and I realize I’m actually gonna get out of this.
He comes back, gets the third dog and now I’m home free. He smiles at me, says something in Spanish; I don’t understand a word of Spanish. I say something to him in English; he doesn’t understand a word of it. I take off up the hill. I’ve got a two and a half hour walk back to my pension. I’m more delirious than ever. The Spanish sun is beating down on me. It turns out, I’m so badly sunburned by the time I get back to the hotel room, I cannot leave for the rest of the two and a half days. I must stay indoors. Well, I had a lot of time to reflect then and a lot of time to reflect over the years. I had help on that day and if I had not I could not be telling this story now.
In your own careers and your own lives aren’t you besieged by the hound of faxes, the hound of emails, the hound of information overload, the hound of too much in your in basket, the hound of too much competing for your time and attention? Yeah, we all are. And the reality is: no help is coming. Individually we have to recognize, with the clarity of death, that unless we take stringent measures to keep our name off of lists, to pare down the piles, to reduce them to their lowest possible volume, to strip away those files that no longer serve us, to make sure that in all the spaces in our lives we remain in control. No one else is coming to help us. It’s up to us and fortunately, we have the wherewithal to take care of the problem. The first and critical step is to have the awareness.
Achieving Completions
Transcript
I’m going to talk to you about the concept of completions. So often in the workaday world it feels as if our attention is diverted to so many different directions and we don’t get the productivity or peace of mind we’d like to enjoy. Yet, there’s a very simple mental process we can all undertake that will give us clarity, focus and direction and it only takes seconds. Would that be something of interest to you? I thought so. Okay, here’s how it works.
Suppose you’re at your desk, you’re working on a pc and your phone rings. You turn to the phone, maybe a little reluctantly because you were working on something great on your computer, and you pick up the phone and you halfheartedly give the caller some attention. Then you finish the call as quickly as you can and you hang up the phone and you turn back to your pc and you think to yourself, “Okay. Where was I? What was I trying to accomplish?” That is the non completion mode of proceeding in life. Now this is the completion mode.
You’re working at your pc. You get a call. Silently you say to yourself, it’s internal dialogue, no one hears it. You say, “I, Jeff, have completed this segment.” Or “I feel complete, at this moment, with what I’m working on.” Hit Control + S to save where you are, then turn to the phone and give the caller your complete and undivided attention. That alone will shock the caller who probably never gets that in a course of a day, let alone a week or a month. Now, handle the call as professionally as you can. Give yourself a completion at the conclusion of the call. In my case, “I, Jeff, have successfully handled this call.” Or, “I poorly handled this call.” Or whatever I’ve done. But mentally acknowledge the passing of the deed. Or, it could be a thought or activity. Completions work for anything you encounter in life.
Turn back to your pc after having handled the phone call and guess what? You are there; right where you were when you left off. No down time; no start up time. No saying to yourself, “Now let’s see, what was I thinking of?” “Where was I working?” “What was I working on?” You’re right back to where you were and you pick up just like that.
You see, completions give you a mental partition if you will, a partition of the brain. It gives you more energy, more focus and more direction for what’s next. All of us are masters of completion, all day long. When we wake up in the morning; we completed sleep for the night. Whether it was good sleep or bad sleep; we completed sleep for the night. We get to the office; we completed getting to the office. We finish a meeting; we’re complete with the meeting. And so on.
Let me give you an example of a masterful completion. Maria Shriver, who you may have seen on NBC, she’s a correspondent; she married Arnold. Well, Maria Shriver used to have a TV show in New York when she used to live in Los Angeles years ago. She was quoted in a magazine as saying that every Sunday evening she would fly from Los Angeles to New York to do her show for that week and on Friday evening she would fly back to California to be back home. Now she did this week in and week out and in the course of a year this would be 100 cross continental flights. Wouldn’t you say that’s a lot of flying? Yeah, most people would.
Here’s what she did to building a completion. Now, whether or not she used these terms or was thinking in this way, she made completions a normal part of her routine. Every Friday afternoon, at the same time, at the same airport, on the same airline, at the same gate, and the same flight she booked the same seat. Often, she was surrounded by the same passengers, the same flight attendants and even the same pilots flying the plane that day. So now, when she got to the airport and she got to her seat, she achieved a form of completion. Instead of having to fly cross country, get to California, get in a taxi, get to her home, open the door, kick off her shoes and go, “ugh.” She was complete when she got to her seat.
All of us have the opportunity all the time to seek out completions in our everyday lives. Suppose you’re at a seminar and you ask the lecturer a question after the seminar, knowing that it will probably make you late for the next seminar starting down the hall but you ask it anyways. Then you race down the hall, get to the room, you barely find a seat. You’re looking for a seat you find a seat you take it. You sit down. You notice you’re panting a little and it’s two or three minutes before you’re there, psychologically there and ready to give your attention. That’s the non completion method.
Here’s the completion way of proceeding with the same circumstances. You’re at a conference. You choose to ask a question of the instructor of the first seminar you attend. So when the instructor’s finished you say, “I, Jeff, have finished listening to the instructor.” Then you walk up and you ask your question. It might be a short question. It might be a long question. It might be a short answer. It might be a long answer. You receive your answer. You thank the instructor and you give yourself another completion.
You walk down the hall purposefully, but not hurriedly. You get to the next seminar room. Sure enough, the seminar’s already begun. They’re scheduling tightly for this conference. The seminar’s already begun but you give yourself a completion for having gotten to the room. I know it sounds simple but you’ve got to put this in practice to understand the power of it.
Now, you look around the room, you find a seat. You walk over to that seat and you take it and give yourself another mental completion. Silent acknowledgment for the smallest of tasks. You give yourself that completion. You look up at that instructor and guess what? You are there from that first second on. No need to get acclimated, no need to wind down. You are there from the first second on. Why? Because you set up a mental partition in your brain that allowed you to have more focus, more energy and more direction for what is next.
You are a master of completions. You use completions all the time. Now the trick is to simply put them into practice during those times which otherwise seem hectic to you. When you’re asked to do a lot. When you’re pulled in several different directions. When the day seems to be racing by. When there is so much on your plate, keep giving yourself this mental partition and you’ll find that you have more focus, more energy and more direction, not only for what is next, but for the rest of the day, the rest of the week, the rest of the year and even your career.
Suppose you’re at your desk, you’re working on a pc and your phone rings. You turn to the phone, maybe a little reluctantly because you were working on something great on your computer, and you pick up the phone and you halfheartedly give the caller some attention. Then you finish the call as quickly as you can and you hang up the phone and you turn back to your pc and you think to yourself, “Okay. Where was I? What was I trying to accomplish?” That is the non completion mode of proceeding in life. Now this is the completion mode.
You’re working at your pc. You get a call. Silently you say to yourself, it’s internal dialogue, no one hears it. You say, “I, Jeff, have completed this segment.” Or “I feel complete, at this moment, with what I’m working on.” Hit Control + S to save where you are, then turn to the phone and give the caller your complete and undivided attention. That alone will shock the caller who probably never gets that in a course of a day, let alone a week or a month. Now, handle the call as professionally as you can. Give yourself a completion at the conclusion of the call. In my case, “I, Jeff, have successfully handled this call.” Or, “I poorly handled this call.” Or whatever I’ve done. But mentally acknowledge the passing of the deed. Or, it could be a thought or activity. Completions work for anything you encounter in life.
Turn back to your pc after having handled the phone call and guess what? You are there; right where you were when you left off. No down time; no start up time. No saying to yourself, “Now let’s see, what was I thinking of?” “Where was I working?” “What was I working on?” You’re right back to where you were and you pick up just like that.
You see, completions give you a mental partition if you will, a partition of the brain. It gives you more energy, more focus and more direction for what’s next. All of us are masters of completion, all day long. When we wake up in the morning; we completed sleep for the night. Whether it was good sleep or bad sleep; we completed sleep for the night. We get to the office; we completed getting to the office. We finish a meeting; we’re complete with the meeting. And so on.
Let me give you an example of a masterful completion. Maria Shriver, who you may have seen on NBC, she’s a correspondent; she married Arnold. Well, Maria Shriver used to have a TV show in New York when she used to live in Los Angeles years ago. She was quoted in a magazine as saying that every Sunday evening she would fly from Los Angeles to New York to do her show for that week and on Friday evening she would fly back to California to be back home. Now she did this week in and week out and in the course of a year this would be 100 cross continental flights. Wouldn’t you say that’s a lot of flying? Yeah, most people would.
Here’s what she did to building a completion. Now, whether or not she used these terms or was thinking in this way, she made completions a normal part of her routine. Every Friday afternoon, at the same time, at the same airport, on the same airline, at the same gate, and the same flight she booked the same seat. Often, she was surrounded by the same passengers, the same flight attendants and even the same pilots flying the plane that day. So now, when she got to the airport and she got to her seat, she achieved a form of completion. Instead of having to fly cross country, get to California, get in a taxi, get to her home, open the door, kick off her shoes and go, “ugh.” She was complete when she got to her seat.
All of us have the opportunity all the time to seek out completions in our everyday lives. Suppose you’re at a seminar and you ask the lecturer a question after the seminar, knowing that it will probably make you late for the next seminar starting down the hall but you ask it anyways. Then you race down the hall, get to the room, you barely find a seat. You’re looking for a seat you find a seat you take it. You sit down. You notice you’re panting a little and it’s two or three minutes before you’re there, psychologically there and ready to give your attention. That’s the non completion method.
Here’s the completion way of proceeding with the same circumstances. You’re at a conference. You choose to ask a question of the instructor of the first seminar you attend. So when the instructor’s finished you say, “I, Jeff, have finished listening to the instructor.” Then you walk up and you ask your question. It might be a short question. It might be a long question. It might be a short answer. It might be a long answer. You receive your answer. You thank the instructor and you give yourself another completion.
You walk down the hall purposefully, but not hurriedly. You get to the next seminar room. Sure enough, the seminar’s already begun. They’re scheduling tightly for this conference. The seminar’s already begun but you give yourself a completion for having gotten to the room. I know it sounds simple but you’ve got to put this in practice to understand the power of it.
Now, you look around the room, you find a seat. You walk over to that seat and you take it and give yourself another mental completion. Silent acknowledgment for the smallest of tasks. You give yourself that completion. You look up at that instructor and guess what? You are there from that first second on. No need to get acclimated, no need to wind down. You are there from the first second on. Why? Because you set up a mental partition in your brain that allowed you to have more focus, more energy and more direction for what is next.
You are a master of completions. You use completions all the time. Now the trick is to simply put them into practice during those times which otherwise seem hectic to you. When you’re asked to do a lot. When you’re pulled in several different directions. When the day seems to be racing by. When there is so much on your plate, keep giving yourself this mental partition and you’ll find that you have more focus, more energy and more direction, not only for what is next, but for the rest of the day, the rest of the week, the rest of the year and even your career.
Conditioning Your Environment
Transcript
I’m going to talk about the oh-so-important notion of conditioning your environment. It’s probably not a term you’ve heard before, but probably one you’ll want to know after today.
You’ve heard of the term conditioning before, you condition your car, you condition your hair, well what do I mean by conditioning your environment? It means to take control of the immediate spaces in your life. For example, at your office conditioning your environment means setting up your desk the way you work and the way you live, making sure you can be at your best, more productive, more energized. It also means taking care of what goes in your desk and what’s behind you desk and what’s on your shelves. Never mind what your desk looks like to other people. If you need tissues, if you need vitamins, if you need a timer, if you need a pocket dictator, whatever it is, I want you to align your environment such that you’re in control and feel good about where you work.
What about conditioning the other environments of your life? Suppose you belong to a health club and your heath club rents out lockers for an extra fee per year. How can you condition your environment in such a situation? Well the answer is, regardless of how much they charge you to rent that locker, go ahead and pay the yearly fee. Why? Because every time you come to the gym you’ve conditioned your environment. You know that your sneakers are there and ready. Likewise, you can do the same with the trunk of your car, the glove compartment of your car, all the spaces of your life.
You can assemble those small, inexpensive commodity like items that you use over and over again so that you don’t have to be carrying them on your person or worrying about them. For example, a mother could have her child’s medication both in her glove compartment and back in the medicine cabinet.
President Reagan, if you remember way back when, used to keep his favorite book in the White House and in his home in Los Angeles. A reporter asked him why he would have two copies of the same book and he said if he was in Washington he wanted to be able to pick it up and start reading, if he flew to Los Angeles he wanted to know it was there. He never had to pack it. He conditioned his environment so that it was in both places. Likewise, you can go through all the elements of your life, all the items you routinely use and routinely carry and determine what ought to be stationed where so that you know it will be there when you need it.
You’ve heard of the term conditioning before, you condition your car, you condition your hair, well what do I mean by conditioning your environment? It means to take control of the immediate spaces in your life. For example, at your office conditioning your environment means setting up your desk the way you work and the way you live, making sure you can be at your best, more productive, more energized. It also means taking care of what goes in your desk and what’s behind you desk and what’s on your shelves. Never mind what your desk looks like to other people. If you need tissues, if you need vitamins, if you need a timer, if you need a pocket dictator, whatever it is, I want you to align your environment such that you’re in control and feel good about where you work.
What about conditioning the other environments of your life? Suppose you belong to a health club and your heath club rents out lockers for an extra fee per year. How can you condition your environment in such a situation? Well the answer is, regardless of how much they charge you to rent that locker, go ahead and pay the yearly fee. Why? Because every time you come to the gym you’ve conditioned your environment. You know that your sneakers are there and ready. Likewise, you can do the same with the trunk of your car, the glove compartment of your car, all the spaces of your life.
You can assemble those small, inexpensive commodity like items that you use over and over again so that you don’t have to be carrying them on your person or worrying about them. For example, a mother could have her child’s medication both in her glove compartment and back in the medicine cabinet.
President Reagan, if you remember way back when, used to keep his favorite book in the White House and in his home in Los Angeles. A reporter asked him why he would have two copies of the same book and he said if he was in Washington he wanted to be able to pick it up and start reading, if he flew to Los Angeles he wanted to know it was there. He never had to pack it. He conditioned his environment so that it was in both places. Likewise, you can go through all the elements of your life, all the items you routinely use and routinely carry and determine what ought to be stationed where so that you know it will be there when you need it.
Being More Effective
Transcript
There are ways to get the best from yourself, without taxing yourself to any greater degree. One of these processes is what I call contracting with yourself. Here’s how it works.
Suppose you want to accomplish something by the end of the day, the end of the week, the end of the month, any given time period consider this: you can draw up a one page contract that spells out exactly what you want to achieve all the terms and then post it either on your desk, on your wall, give it to your spouse, give it to your co-worker, give it to your children, give it to someone who will hold you accountable. Have the actual date by which you’ll achieve this task or activity.
And if you really want to up your probability of completing what you said you would have the other person hold a small sum and escrow, maybe $500 or $1000 dollars so if you don’t achieve what you said you would, they get to keep that sum. Now that’s just to spice up things.
Amazingly, if you just contract with yourself, even if you don’t have somebody else around who can hold you accountable the mere fact of your putting your goal on paper, in the form of a contract that you post so you can see it on a regular basis dramatically increases the probability that you’ll achieve that goal. So that’s one way you can be more effective and not tax yourself in any measurable way. It doesn’t take a whole heck of a lot to put that contract together.
Another technique is to be a consultant to yourself. Now here’s how this works. Suppose you’re facing a certain situation and you’re not sure which way to turn. What if you were to refer to yourself in the third person?
In my case, I would say, “Hmm. What should Jeff do next?” Now, by referring to myself in the third person, I automatically gain perspective that normally does not accrue when I simply think to myself silently, “Hmm. What should I do next?” By saying, “What should Jeff do next?” I gain the perspective that an outside party might lend to the situation.
I look at myself as another person who’s seeking guidance. I come up with ideas and insights, almost a self brain storming process if you will, that leads me to behaviors or activities that I might not have otherwise chosen. So when you find yourself in a bit of a bind go to the third person technique and say, “What should Jeff (or whatever your name happens to be) do next?” And you’ll be amazed at the number of answers that might be generated.
Finally, learn to say, “No.” more often than you have. Too often in this workaday world we find ourselves volunteering, getting on lists, being oversubscribed, overbooked and generally overwhelmed. You have to learn to say, “No” so you have the ability to say, “Yes” to the things that are more important to your career and your life.
Now, learning to say no to another requires some tact, some diplomacy, and certainly some good will. The best possible reason you can tell another person that you can’t help them out is to tell them that you’ve already reserved that time for your family and then, of course, make that the truth. But, on a continual basis you need to say, “No” to others so you can free up the time you need to say, “Yes” to those things that are important to you. Here are some quick and easy ways to let others down gently and effectively.
* “You know, I’d really like to but that time is already committed.”
* “I’m booked up right now, but try me again next time that comes around.”
* “I would, but I’m so overcommitted right now I really wouldn’t be giving you my best effort, and that’s what I want to give you when I do say yes.”
Suppose you want to accomplish something by the end of the day, the end of the week, the end of the month, any given time period consider this: you can draw up a one page contract that spells out exactly what you want to achieve all the terms and then post it either on your desk, on your wall, give it to your spouse, give it to your co-worker, give it to your children, give it to someone who will hold you accountable. Have the actual date by which you’ll achieve this task or activity.
And if you really want to up your probability of completing what you said you would have the other person hold a small sum and escrow, maybe $500 or $1000 dollars so if you don’t achieve what you said you would, they get to keep that sum. Now that’s just to spice up things.
Amazingly, if you just contract with yourself, even if you don’t have somebody else around who can hold you accountable the mere fact of your putting your goal on paper, in the form of a contract that you post so you can see it on a regular basis dramatically increases the probability that you’ll achieve that goal. So that’s one way you can be more effective and not tax yourself in any measurable way. It doesn’t take a whole heck of a lot to put that contract together.
Another technique is to be a consultant to yourself. Now here’s how this works. Suppose you’re facing a certain situation and you’re not sure which way to turn. What if you were to refer to yourself in the third person?
In my case, I would say, “Hmm. What should Jeff do next?” Now, by referring to myself in the third person, I automatically gain perspective that normally does not accrue when I simply think to myself silently, “Hmm. What should I do next?” By saying, “What should Jeff do next?” I gain the perspective that an outside party might lend to the situation.
I look at myself as another person who’s seeking guidance. I come up with ideas and insights, almost a self brain storming process if you will, that leads me to behaviors or activities that I might not have otherwise chosen. So when you find yourself in a bit of a bind go to the third person technique and say, “What should Jeff (or whatever your name happens to be) do next?” And you’ll be amazed at the number of answers that might be generated.
Finally, learn to say, “No.” more often than you have. Too often in this workaday world we find ourselves volunteering, getting on lists, being oversubscribed, overbooked and generally overwhelmed. You have to learn to say, “No” so you have the ability to say, “Yes” to the things that are more important to your career and your life.
Now, learning to say no to another requires some tact, some diplomacy, and certainly some good will. The best possible reason you can tell another person that you can’t help them out is to tell them that you’ve already reserved that time for your family and then, of course, make that the truth. But, on a continual basis you need to say, “No” to others so you can free up the time you need to say, “Yes” to those things that are important to you. Here are some quick and easy ways to let others down gently and effectively.
* “You know, I’d really like to but that time is already committed.”
* “I’m booked up right now, but try me again next time that comes around.”
* “I would, but I’m so overcommitted right now I really wouldn’t be giving you my best effort, and that’s what I want to give you when I do say yes.”
Travel Lighter
Transcript
Have you ever considered that you’re carrying an awful lot in this life?
Your briefcase is getting heavier all the time. Your drawers are getting crammed. Your closets at home are getting crammed. When you go on a trip it seems like there’s more and more to pack. Would you like to travel a little lighter this life? Well as I speak to groups around the country, I find increasingly that people almost have a mission to travel at least a little lighter. Here are some ideas as to how you can get back to that hallowed state.
First off, remember when you first moved into your house and the closets looked so big? Well they’re the same size. You jam them with things now and they tend to look a bit smaller. Near your birthday or near New Years Eve or when spring cleaning rolls around why not go through your closets and go through the clothes you haven’t worn in the last year or two, bring them to the Salvation Army or Good Will or some other charitable institution and help other less fortunate than you? At the same time you’ll be helping yourself because you’ll be freeing up space and psychologically you’ll have the feeling of abundance, of prosperity. You’ll literally be lighter in terms of what you’re carrying in your closet. The same technique applies to you filing cabinets at work, your desk drawer, the glove compartment of your car, the trunk of your car and so forth.
If you went to college, think of your college days when you barely had anything by comparison of today. You had some college dormitory furniture, a few books, a few tapes, well maybe you had more than a few tapes or CDs. The point is when you were younger, you had less and you felt freer. So it is today as well. When you’re carrying an excess of stuff in your life, you don’t quite feel as free. I can’t explain why but people have told me repeatedly that this is so.
Henry David Thoreau once said, “The key to life is to simplify, simplify, simplify.” All of us have the opportunity all day long to travel lighter. We can do this by casting off files that no longer serve us, creating dossiers of information that’s only a quarter inch thick rather than 3″-4″ thick that represent the essence of what we need to know, casting off excess information that might help junior people on your staff or new with the organization, but information that represents the tried and true, old hat dust that we really don’t need t hang on to anymore.
We can do the same with our cars, our possessions; anywhere we turn we can get rid of the multiples. We can get rid of the excess. We can agree that less, indeed, can turn out to be more.
First off, remember when you first moved into your house and the closets looked so big? Well they’re the same size. You jam them with things now and they tend to look a bit smaller. Near your birthday or near New Years Eve or when spring cleaning rolls around why not go through your closets and go through the clothes you haven’t worn in the last year or two, bring them to the Salvation Army or Good Will or some other charitable institution and help other less fortunate than you? At the same time you’ll be helping yourself because you’ll be freeing up space and psychologically you’ll have the feeling of abundance, of prosperity. You’ll literally be lighter in terms of what you’re carrying in your closet. The same technique applies to you filing cabinets at work, your desk drawer, the glove compartment of your car, the trunk of your car and so forth.
If you went to college, think of your college days when you barely had anything by comparison of today. You had some college dormitory furniture, a few books, a few tapes, well maybe you had more than a few tapes or CDs. The point is when you were younger, you had less and you felt freer. So it is today as well. When you’re carrying an excess of stuff in your life, you don’t quite feel as free. I can’t explain why but people have told me repeatedly that this is so.
Henry David Thoreau once said, “The key to life is to simplify, simplify, simplify.” All of us have the opportunity all day long to travel lighter. We can do this by casting off files that no longer serve us, creating dossiers of information that’s only a quarter inch thick rather than 3″-4″ thick that represent the essence of what we need to know, casting off excess information that might help junior people on your staff or new with the organization, but information that represents the tried and true, old hat dust that we really don’t need t hang on to anymore.
We can do the same with our cars, our possessions; anywhere we turn we can get rid of the multiples. We can get rid of the excess. We can agree that less, indeed, can turn out to be more.
Avoid Multi-Tasking
Transcript
So often in our society today, we find people who are managing multiple priorities. They are trying to balance 6-8 things at a time. They feel as if they never have enough time. They frequently feel stressed. They frequently feel as if there isn’t enough time in the day to get done what they need to get done. Is that your situation? Well, guess what? Welcome to the club that has millions of people! How is it that we all feel as if we have too much competing for our time and attention?
Well, as it turns out, society has changed. There are more TV stations, more radio stations, more magazines, more newspapers, more online zines, more email, more of everything competing for our time and attention. In the workplace, particularly, we’re asked to do more with less. Very often, the budges shrink in our departments, sometimes our staff is taken away from us, sometimes we’re simply asked to do more in a given amount of time. So, frequently people find that they’re managing multiple priorities. They’re trying to take care of many things at the same time. How do you deal with a situation where there’s 3, 4, 5, 6, 8 or 10 items that all demand your earnest attention and concentration? Well, the answer is quite simple: you tackle one thing at a time.
That’s not an easy message to deliver in contemporary America and in the western world these days where people have almost been taught to multi-task. And yet, studies will show, time and time again, that if you will tackle the most important item first, take it to completion or as far as you can. Then tackle number two, then number three and so forth. You’ll be faster and more efficient than any other way you could get through that pile.
If you doubt that, think of this test that you could do with a friend right at home or right in your office. It wouldn’t take more than a few minutes and you would have conclusive evidence that the best way to manage multiple priorities is to stick with one task until its completion. Here’s the test, are you ready?
What you want to do is put yourself against a friend on three types of tasks. Task one will be to stack 20 pennies up and up and up so you have all 20 in a stack. Task two will be to link 20 paperclips and task three will be t draw 20 stars on a page.
Now, here are the ground rules. Your friend stacks all 20 pennies at once and then goes to the paperclips and links all 20 paperclips and then goes to the page and draws 20 stars on the page. You on the other hand, stack a few pennies, then switch over to the paperclips, then switch over to drawing stars on the page. Then switch back to the stack of pennies, and then go back to the paperclips and so forth only doing 3-4 at a time, continually switching between tasks.
Who do you think is going to finish first every time? If you guessed your friend who gets to stack all 20 pennies, gets to link all 20 paperclips, and gets to draw all 20 stars in succession, you are correct.
So it is with the priorities we face in life. If we play the game that, “Oh, I’ll just dabble with this one and I’ll deal with that one a little and I’ll work on this one when I have a little here and then turn back to this one.” Hey, mentally that can be actually satisfying. It’s as if you’re saying to the world, “Look at me. Look how important I am. Look how I’m balancing all these tasks that compete for my attention.”
The reality is, you’re not nearly as efficient as the person who tackles the most important task first, takes it to completion, goes to number two, takes it as far as they can. Sometimes there can’t be completion. Sometimes you have to sign off or have somebody else sign off on it. But, you take each task as far as you can after you’ve ranked them. That will be the fastest and easiest way to manage multiple priorities.
Well, as it turns out, society has changed. There are more TV stations, more radio stations, more magazines, more newspapers, more online zines, more email, more of everything competing for our time and attention. In the workplace, particularly, we’re asked to do more with less. Very often, the budges shrink in our departments, sometimes our staff is taken away from us, sometimes we’re simply asked to do more in a given amount of time. So, frequently people find that they’re managing multiple priorities. They’re trying to take care of many things at the same time. How do you deal with a situation where there’s 3, 4, 5, 6, 8 or 10 items that all demand your earnest attention and concentration? Well, the answer is quite simple: you tackle one thing at a time.
That’s not an easy message to deliver in contemporary America and in the western world these days where people have almost been taught to multi-task. And yet, studies will show, time and time again, that if you will tackle the most important item first, take it to completion or as far as you can. Then tackle number two, then number three and so forth. You’ll be faster and more efficient than any other way you could get through that pile.
If you doubt that, think of this test that you could do with a friend right at home or right in your office. It wouldn’t take more than a few minutes and you would have conclusive evidence that the best way to manage multiple priorities is to stick with one task until its completion. Here’s the test, are you ready?
What you want to do is put yourself against a friend on three types of tasks. Task one will be to stack 20 pennies up and up and up so you have all 20 in a stack. Task two will be to link 20 paperclips and task three will be t draw 20 stars on a page.
Now, here are the ground rules. Your friend stacks all 20 pennies at once and then goes to the paperclips and links all 20 paperclips and then goes to the page and draws 20 stars on the page. You on the other hand, stack a few pennies, then switch over to the paperclips, then switch over to drawing stars on the page. Then switch back to the stack of pennies, and then go back to the paperclips and so forth only doing 3-4 at a time, continually switching between tasks.
Who do you think is going to finish first every time? If you guessed your friend who gets to stack all 20 pennies, gets to link all 20 paperclips, and gets to draw all 20 stars in succession, you are correct.
So it is with the priorities we face in life. If we play the game that, “Oh, I’ll just dabble with this one and I’ll deal with that one a little and I’ll work on this one when I have a little here and then turn back to this one.” Hey, mentally that can be actually satisfying. It’s as if you’re saying to the world, “Look at me. Look how important I am. Look how I’m balancing all these tasks that compete for my attention.”
The reality is, you’re not nearly as efficient as the person who tackles the most important task first, takes it to completion, goes to number two, takes it as far as they can. Sometimes there can’t be completion. Sometimes you have to sign off or have somebody else sign off on it. But, you take each task as far as you can after you’ve ranked them. That will be the fastest and easiest way to manage multiple priorities.
