Working Even Smarter: The Eight Keys to Dramatically Improving Your Personal and Organizational Effectiveness in Just 75 Minutes!

Introduction

• Your presenter: Chris DeVany

• Our objectives

• This presentation will be available online after the conference. You will receive an email for the Summit session website approximately 1-2 weeks after Summit.

• Follow Sage on Twitter: @Sage_Summit– Use the official Summit hashtag: #SageSummit

• Follow me on Twitter: @cdevany

Our Objectives

• Prioritizing using urgent and important

• Managing my day more effectively– Plan the day

– Choose Top 3 Priorities

– Review the day mid-day

– Review the day at end of day

– Plan for tomorrow before leaving

• Identifying my top priorities for this week, based on my roles (Goals for Roles)

Urgency v. Importance

im·por·tant (function: adjective)

– marked by or indicative of significant worth or consequence : valuable in content or relationship

ur·gent (function: adjective)

– 1 a : calling for immediate attention, b : conveying a sense of crisis or “near-crisis”

– 2 : urging insistently

The Activities GridIm

port

ance

UrgencyHigh

Low

Low

Must be done now or immediate and

severe consequences.

Consequences for not doing are

severe, but not immediate so we

put these tasks off.

Grab at our attention, but are

not actually important as they

feel.

The things we do when we really should be doing something else.

The Activities Grid Quadrant 1

Urgent and Important Im...

Urgent, but Not Important Not...

•Crises

•Problems that have immediate impact on customer satisfaction

•Mission critical and on a deadline

The Activities GridQuadrant 1, Examples

Urgent and Important Im...

Urgent, but Not Important Not...

•Your boss demands a certain report by 10am tomorrow

•Your engine blows a gasket

•The labor pains are 3 minutes apart

•It’s April 15th and you haven’t finished your income tax forms

The Activities GridQuadrant 2

…nt Important, but Not Urgent

...nt Not Urgent, Not Important

•Strategic Planning

•Personal Development

•Relationship building

•Program Evaluation

•Clarifying vision and values

The Activities GridQuadrant 2, Examples

…nt Important, but Not Urgent

...nt Not Urgent, Not Important

•A special course you want to take to upgrade your professional skills.

•Writing your mission statement.

• That new project you would like to suggest to your boss once you do some preliminary fact-finding.

•A focused planning-meeting

• Starting that retirement account.

•Exercising with your kids.

The Activities GridQuadrant 3

Urgent, but Not Important N...•Many emails

•Some phone calls

•Some meetings

The Activities GridQuadrant 3, Examples

Urgent, but Not Important N...•Someone asks you to chair a fund drive or to give a speech or to attend a meeting (low priority, but b/c someone is standing in front of you, and b/c these have built in time limits, they often get done while Q2 does not.)

•A co-worker interrupts you several times a day with information that’s not that important.

The Activities GridQuadrant 4

…nt Not Urgent, Not Important

•Junk mail

•Spam

•“Escape” activities

•Time wasters

The Activities GridQuadrant 4, Examples

…nt Not Urgent, Not Important

•You’re planning to do some specific work and end up organizing your desk, straightening up the drawers, re-organizing files.

•TV (more often than not)

•Many things “you feel bad after.”

How Will I Use My Time More Effectively Using Important and Urgent?• Q2 – Important but not urgent

• Q1 – Important and urgent

• Do what is important “first”; make these our Top Priorities

• Review everything on our “To Do List”: what is important?

• Take 3 minutes

• Avoid / reduce the priority on Q3 and Q4 activities (both are low importance)

• Improve our effectiveness 300 to 400% when we just take 3 minutes

Planning Your Day

Plan each day Plan each day beforebefore it begins: it begins:

Before leaving workBefore leaving work At homeAt home Before starting to Before starting to workwork

Planning Your Day--The Steps

1. Acknowledge achievements from previous day

2. Update Task List

3. Review “I have to be there”s (meetings, conference calls) to be sure we have blocked out sufficient time

4. Block out “Routine” activities

5. Start identifying Top 3 Priorities

6 am

What Steps Will I Take to Effectively Prioritize?

• Top 3

• Focus first on importance, then urgency

• Get Q1 stuff done ASAP, get it out of the way

• Focus on Q2 (High importance, low urgency)

• Get the other stuff (Q3 and Q4) done when able

• Begin before you leave home

• Do a recap at the end of the day to see what you actually achieved

• Acknowledge your goals

• Do the most unpleasant thing first, then you’re not dreading it all day long

What Steps Will I Take to Effectively Prioritize?

• Set Goals (personal and professional)

• Set aside time blocks

• Prioritize accordingly

• You need to prioritize your priorities (schedule)

• Gives you a concrete deadline

• “Eating the frog” (Address the worst problems first)

• Super-pleasers: Learn how to say “no” and address my priorities first

So right now, what are my Top 3 Work Priorities?

• Write down on our Action Plan

DelegateDelightful CompanionDesignerDeveloperDiplomatDirectorDomestic EngineerEncouragerEntertainerEntrepreneurExecutiveExplorerFacilitatorFamily MemberFatherFriendGiver of Light

Advisor

Animal Owner

ArtistAssistant

Associate

Athlete

Brother

Caregiver

Chairperson

Citizen

CoachCommunicator

Companion

Consultant

Instructor

Inventor

Leader

Learner

Liaison

Manager

Marketer

Mentor

Mother

Motivator

Musician

Optimist

Parent

Pathfinder

Peacemaker

Provider

Our RolesOur Roles

Identify my top priorities for this week, based on my roles:

• Role:

• Goal:

• Role:

• Goal:

• Role:

• Goal:

To Summarize: Our Action Plan

• What steps will I take to more effectively prioritize using urgent and important?

• What will I do to managing my day more effectively?– Plan the day

– Choose Top 3 Priorities

– Review the day mid-day

– Review the day at end of day

– Plan for tomorrow before leaving

• What are my top priorities for this week, based on my roles? (Goals for Roles)

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• Session code for this session: P-ORG 12

Contact Information

• Presenter Contact Information:– Chris DeVany

– Pinnacle Performance Improvement Worldwide

– cdevany@ppiw.com

– Twitter hashtag #cdevany

• Follow Sage on Twitter: @Sage_Summit– Use the official Summit hashtag: #SageSummit

• Thank you for your participation.