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angela inzerilo, Award winning, Business Coaching Fairfax, Business help, Coach James Lawson, Consultant, consulting, small business
Here is a question for you. Did you write a ‘to do’ list this morning, last night or are you in the process of doing it now? How many items do you have on it? 10, 15, 20…..you might not be surprised but on average a ‘to do’ list for most people has more than 10 items on it for any given day. Now ask yourself this, in your life how many times have you ACTUALLY completed the 10 items on the list. I would hazard a guess and say not many times, yet, every day or every week we continue to add more and more things to the list – in essence, setting ourselves up for failure!
In the 20+ years I have been working in business whether it was for someone else or for myself here is something I have learned to believe – Business is about the rule of 5!
Whatever it is, the number 5 always seem to appear.
For example – there are 5 and only 5 areas of your business you need to focus on in order to drive extraordinary profits (more on that in another post).
There are 5 critical areas of your business that if left unattended will absolutely kill your business. When setting annual initiatives, there should be no more than 5, when setting your quarterly goals there should be no more than 5 (though 3 is ideal) so on and so forth.
So what has all that got to do with your to do list?
Ok, Let me tell you a quick story.
One day a management consultant, Ivy Lee, called on Schwab of the Bethlehem Steel Company. Lee outlined briefly his firm’s services, ending with the statement: “With our service, you’ll know how to manage better.”
The indignant Schwab said, “I’m not managing as well now as I know how. What we need around here is not more “knowing” but more doing, not knowledge but action; if you can give us something to pep us up to do the things we ALREADY KNOW we ought to do, I’ll gladly listen to you and pay you anything you ask.”
“Fine”, said Lee. “I can give you something in twenty minutes that will step up your action and doing at least 50 percent”.
“O.K.”, said Schwab. “I have just about that much time before I must leave to catch a train. What’s your idea?”
Lee pulled a bland 3×5 note sheet out of his pocket, handed it to Schwab and said: “Write on this sheet the five most important tasks you have to do tomorrow”. That took about three minutes. “Now”, said Lee, “number them in the order of their importance”. Five more minutes pass. “Now”, said Lee, “put this sheet in you pocket and the first thing tomorrow morning look at item one and start working on it. Pull the sheet out of your pocket every 15 minutes and look at item one until it is finished. Then tackle item two in the same way, then item three. Do this until quitting time. Don’t be concerned if you only finished two or three, or even if you only finish one item. You’ll be working on the important ones. The others can wait. If you can’t finish them all by this method, you couldn’t with another method either, and without some system you’d probably not even decide which are most important”.
“Spend the last five minutes of every working day making out a “must ” list for the next day’s tasks. After you’ve convinced yourself of the worth of this system have your men try it. Try it out as long as you wish and then send me a check for what YOU think it’s worth”.
The whole interview lasted about twenty-five minutes. In two weeks Schwab set Lee a check for $25,000 – a thousand dollars a minute. He added a note saying the lesson was the most profitable from a money standpoint he had every learned. Did it work? In five years it turned the unknown Bethlehem Steel Company into the biggest independent steel producer in the world; made Schwab a hundred million dollar fortune, and the best known steel man alive at that time.
At the end of the day ask yourself the question – ‘If I don’t do this task, what is the worst that can happen’? You might be surprised to find that nothing bad actually happens!!
If you need further help you should Check out Stephen Covey’s Time quadrant in the 7 Habits of highly effective people and get focused on the important (not urgent) activities in your business – after all, what’s the worst that can happen!
This is so true. I love must lists. (Yes, I did my main must today and am breaking until 10 when I pick up the next)
I don’t mind long task lists–in fact, I would prefer the item be on a list rather than in someone’s memory. But you have to re-prioritize.
This is a big part of why I added staff a full 9 months before I planned to this year. Good blog. Hope others will follow your advice–it should be a solid part of any leader’s day even if that person’s sole leadership responsibility is for themselves in a transactional environment.
George, The point is that we put things on a list in order to, well, have them on a list. The key is knowing what the important things are that add value to the business. The difference between doing something because we think it is important without asking the real question of “what would happen if I didn’t do this” also, if all you are doing is adding tasks to be done ‘in’ the business, where is your time to work’ on’ your business.
Try a few weeks of taking your ‘big’ list and pick the 5 most important things to be done and work through them one at a time..I guarantee you will see a major difference in your business.
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