A Senior Team Member at The Collier Companies was encouraging someone to get out on site more often (we rent Apartment Homes). The response? “But Then I Won’t Have Time to Finish My Emails!”
Folks, call it what you like (the front line, the field, the factory floor, out on site) but there is the real world and then there is secondary reality and the first is generally far more important than the latter. For sure, experiencing the FIRST 20% of the real world is significantly more important than the LAST 20% of emails. (PS: nada magical about the percentages, could be 15%, could be 30% or even 50%).
At any meaningful level of responsibility, you will NEVER be able to finish it ALL, it will be IMPOSSIBLE to do EVERYTHING. You must learn to prioritize, you must learn triage. Frequently having more to do than I could possibly do has forced me to Step Back; go to the mountain top and examine HOW I worked, look for ways to work smarter, re-examine my priorities. Often I found I was doing certain things or a certain way or order out of habit, not because it was the highest and best use of my time. Thus, I was able to move to a higher leverage point and become more effective, more productive.
Closing Quotes:
“Lack of time is actually lack of priorities.” – Tim Ferriss
“The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.” – Stephen R. Covey
“It is not enough to be busy. So are the ants. The question is: What are we busy about?” – Henry David Thoreau
As always, I share what I most want and need to learn. – Nathan S. Collier