Some time ago, during our annual walk to the Cold Hollow Cider Mill in Vermont, DH and I stopped at a glassblowing studio/shop.
One piece in particular caught my eye. The artist called it “Time is Money,” shredded some bills, and then created the blown glass hourglass around it.
While, from a purely business sense, it is true that time is money, it is also true that time is a resource (in this case like money) that can be invested, wasted or appreciated in the way we use it.
When you walked into your office this morning, did you sit down and start with your top priority for the day (did you know what it was?) or open your email or Facebook account and let other people’s schedules take precedence over your own? ?
However, do you have a routine, a ritual that you follow every day, week, month and year? If you’re not getting the results (whether in business or in life) you’re looking for, chances are you’re going through the same old routine.
It’s time to shake things up a bit.
You’ve probably been told that it’s important to have goals, and more importantly, that those goals need to be written down.
However, goals for goals’ sake alone will not result in things happening, things actually getting done.
What if you started to see your goals as a part of the whole?
For example:
• What is your mission? Your true mission, that one thing you want more than anything (even if it feels selfish)?
• What purpose does your mission serve? It only has to matter to you.
• What impact do you want to have (for yourself and/or others) that supports that purpose?
• What specific goals do you need to have to have the impact you are looking for?
• What should be your priorities to achieve those goals?
• What specific activities need to be completed to achieve your priorities?
Can you see how we start with our mission and then reverse-engineer all the steps until we get to the activities we need to do today, this week, this month…
Now that you have that online, a lesson on Stephen Covey’s 7 Habits of Highly Effective People:
1. Draw 4 quadrants on a piece of paper (or use a table to do it in MS Word or Mac Pages)
2. Label them as shown below
To achieve your goals, you will spend most of your time working on items that are in the “Important, Not Urgent” quadrant, as this is where you have the best chance of spotting opportunities as you make things happen. .
Items in “Important – Urgent” and “Not Important – Urgent” are usually the result of others taking you off your schedule.
Tasks that fall into the “Not Important – Not Urgent” quadrant essentially amount to heavy lifting and should be avoided/delegated as much as possible, and never, ever paid attention during peak productivity times.
3. When you’re not sure what to work on, first check with the “Mission Summary” above, then refer to these quadrants and ask yourself “Where does X fall?” and make your decision from a place of conscious choice rather than routine or knee-jerk reactions.
Imagine the difference it would make if the majority of each day were focused on those things that would make your dreams come true.
“What are some of your favorite time management and productivity strategies? Share them below.”