"Starve your distractions"

I remember being taught to "feed a cold, starve a fever" when I was young.  I'm not sure where that adage came from, but it is a medical myth.  A better recommendation (and most certainly not a myth) is to "Feed your focus, starve your distractions."  In other words - prioritize!  Our priorities are those things in our personal and professional lives that are very important and must be dealt with before other things.  Our distractions are the things that keep us from focusing on what is important (our priorities).

The leadership and management consultant John Maxwell wrote a book called The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership with the admonition, "Follow them and people will follow you."  Number 17 on the list is his "Law of Priorities."  Maxwell writes, "When we are busy, we naturally believe that we are achieving.  But busyness does not equal productivity."

I've recently posted about setting priorities (see "Eat that frog!"), but I didn't necessarily offer any advice on how best to do that.  I thought Maxwell's method was perfect.  Simply stated, he recommends setting your priorities (personal, professional, or both) based upon how you would answer the following questions, which he call's "The Three R's":

1. "What is required of me?"  How much time and effort is going to be required for me to complete this task?  Do I have the time and resources necessary to complete it?

2. "What gives me the greatest return?"  What is the return on my investment of time and energy?  Is this particular task going to help me achieve my personal and/or professional goals?

3. "What brings me the greatest reward?" Importantly, does my involvement with this project fit with my personal mission, vision, and values?

Importantly, these three questions are designed to be answered in the above order.  Maxwell also mentions a version of the well-known Pareto Principle (commonly known as the 80/20 rule).  Applied in this context, 20% of what you prioritize will yield 80% of your productivity (assuming that you focus your time, attention, and energy on the 20%).  

I have mentioned Cyril Parkinson's eponymous law a few times in the past (see "What does the musical Hamilton have to do with procrastination?" and "The bicycle shed effect").  Basically, Parkinson's Law states that "work expands to fill the time that is available."  Several years ago, after a long day on the internal medicine service as a third-year medical student, my senior resident told me that I should go home for the night.  I responded that I had a few more things to check on before I left.  He replied, "Derek, always remember that the longer you stay, the longer you stay."

As Parkinson recognized, no one is ever likely to have spare time at work.  First of all, I've never been to an organization where there wasn't something that always needed to be worked on or addressed.  Second, we tend to procrastinate - particularly when we think that we have "plenty of time" to finish a project or task.  Lastly, whenever we think we have "plenty of time" to complete a project, we tend to expand the scope of said project, thereby filling the allotted time completely.

How do you overcome Parkinson's Law?  Here is where Maxwell's "3 R's" and "Law of Priorities" become particularly useful.  Asking the "3 R's" in sequence is a particularly useful exercise in this regard.

The 19th century American transcendalist philosopher, Ralph Waldo Emerson admonished, “Guard well your spare moments. They are like uncut diamonds. Discard them and their value will never be known. Improve them and they will become the brightest gems in a useful life.”  Focus on your priorities.