As an entrepreneur and a manager, I’ve met many people who are “very busy,” but it wasn’t exactly clear with what.
In one of my first high-tech jobs, I met an employee who constantly complained about being overwhelmed and busy, how he couldn’t get anything done during his day and had to take work home. After several conversations, I realized this was his way of projecting how important and successful he was in his role, and I stopped trying to offer help.
As I progressed in positions and managing my time became a job in itself, I implemented several task prioritization methods.
Alex Hormozi wrote in his second book in the 100m Dollar Leads series about three value levels for our activities:
$10, $100, and $1000 activities
Some examples:
$10/hour activities
These are basic operational tasks that, while necessary, provide minimal strategic value:
– Answering emails
– Simple data entry
– Routine administrative work
– Basic scheduling
– Filing and organizing
$100/hour activities
These are tasks that require your expertise but don’t necessarily expand the business:
– Client meetings
– Team management
– Project supervision
– Content creation
– Sales calls
– Solving ongoing operational problems
$1,000/hour activities
These are high-leverage activities that grow the business exponentially:
– Strategic planning and vision setting
– Building systems and processes
– Developing key partnerships
– Creating intellectual property
– Making critical hiring decisions
– Working on business model innovation
Of course, it’s slightly different for everyone, but the basic idea is the same.
Try to delegate low-value activities and work on those with high value.
It sounds easy but is very difficult to execute daily:
First, most of us are used to “doing everything ourselves” .
Second – if I don’t do it the way I want, it surely won’t be done properly.
Additionally, it’s very hard to prioritize long-term tasks like strategic planning over someone knocking on the door with a question or an email that suddenly pops up.
Finally – people are drawn to what’s easy, familiar, and can be “checked off” relatively quickly.
The result? Strategic tasks are postponed despite recognizing their importance, in favor of ongoing operations.
So what do we do?
- I personally reserve time in my calendar for such tasks. It doesn’t have to be every day, and doesn’t have to be more than a few hours per week. But it must be time when you don’t answer phones, check emails, etc., so either early morning or right after lunch are typically classic hours. 2 PM is reserved for me to “work on the business” not in it. How to grow it, what actions I’m doing (or not doing) that need to change, business models that might not be working and need to stop, etc.
- Reserve time for brainstorming. Nobody said these tasks must fall only on you; you can and should dedicate team meetings for structured brainstorming.
- For those whose calendar reflects their activities – go through and see which meetings you don’t have to be in, which actions someone at a lower level can take (and even thank you for it!), etc.
- Generally, force yourself to make time. Being busy doesn’t equal being productive. In one interview with Bill Gates, he mentioned a conversation with Warren Buffett. Both discussed their success and how it changed their lives. Bill talked about the number of hours he works per week and was surprised to find that Warren was quite opposite to him.