Karl Edwards presents Working Matters

Tag: priorities

  • Loving Monday: Popcorn and Perspective

    loving_mondayOur important issues always feel big. That’s as it should be.

    Sometimes they feel bigger than everything and everyone else. That might become a problem.

    Yes, it is awful when someone burns the popcorn, and the entire office smells horrible, and you can barely keep from gagging much less get your work done.

    No, uncovering the mystery of who is the negligent and insensitive popcorn burner is is not something to interrupt a manager’s meeting with.

    I begin with a smaller and possibly silly example to point at that issues get their importance relative to the issues around them.

    Perspective derives from proximity.

    This photo of the person holding the sun is an exaggerated example in the other direction.

    From where we stand, the person is obviously bigger than the ball of light in his hands.

    Our problems, challenges and opportunities are always big because they are ours. (Let’s give ourselves that much.)

    But can we also walk over to another vantage point and look at the issue from that perspective?

    The perspective of a busy co-worker, the perspective of our supervisor, the perspective of a tight budget, the perspective of the worried client, the perspective of a competing project, etc., etc.

    The ability to walk over to a variety of vantage points and look at an issue from different angles is key to keeping our issue in perspective.

    We don’t have to make our issue smaller in order to make room for the others, but we may need adjust how, when and with whom we approach it.

    On your side,

    – Karl Edwards

    Loving Monday is a weekly column designed to encourage us to step into our weeks with an intention to show up authentically, engage fully, and choose to make it a good week for ourselves. Explore past columns here.

  • Listen In -> Posture of Strategic Readiness with Van Wray #2: The Stop and No Lists

    Stationery stores are packed with a myriad of clever and cute to-do lists for purchase. Some have check boxes to mark off as each task gets completed. Some have prioritizing systems to help you rank today’s duties in order of importance.

    But have you ever seen a not to-do list?

    Strategic plans are jam-packed with the meat and potatoes of what you will be doing over the next several years.

    But have you ever seen a plan that delineated what you would stop doing this year?

    In this week’s podcast discussion with special guest Van Wray of Amperant Advisors we confront the reality that all ideas are not good ideas.

    In other words, the good ideas from yesterday may not be the good ideas we need for tomorrow. Which means there will come a time when we need to stop.

    Stop certain programs. Stop certain lines of action. Stop offering certain products. Stop certain practices.

    Hence the intentionality of thoughtfully developing a “Stop-list” and/or a “No-list.”

    Have you thought about what you need to stop doing or what you need to say “No” to?

    Listen in.

    Just now joining the conversation? Catch up on the entire series here.

  • Loving Monday: Getting One Thing Done

    loving_mondaySo many goals for the week.

    So many voices shouting for attention.

    The distractions and demands can confuse us, alter our priorities, or even overwhelm us.

    That’s when I find it helpful to commit simply to getting one thing done.

    One thing that will take precedence over everything else.

    With a single goal settled for the day, other important tasks and issues can be scheduled in light of it.

    Instead of losing your most important priority in the mix of the many important things, it becomes the stable anchor around which everything else can be organized.

    Daily Focus Pad

    Daily Focus PadHave you seen our Daily Focus Pad?

    Three simple questions with which to begin each day.

    • If I accomplish one thing today, that one thing must be…
    • What one complicating reality can I anticipate and head off?
    • What one element can I include in my day that will keep me energized?

    Get a copy for yourself. Or purchase a discounted set for the team. (Click here.)

    Before anything else…

    Before you do anything else, pause and decide what one thing you will commit to accomplish today?

    Give yourself the gift of focus and accomplishment today.

    On your side,

    – Karl Edwards

    Loving Monday is a weekly column designed to encourage us to step into our weeks with an intention to show up authentically, engage fully, and choose to make it a good week for ourselves. Explore past columns here.

  • Loving Monday: Kids Pulling in Different Directions

    loving_mondayImagine that each of the tasks you need to complete today is a small child pulling at your arms. Not only pulling, but all pulling in different directions.

    Being small children they are not reasoning with you calmly or waiting patiently to take turns. They are screaming and begging and tugging for all they’re worth.

    No matter which child (task) you choose to go with, all the others are going to scream and pull all the harder.

    You don’t stand a chance. You lose no matter what you choose.

    And so some of us try to go in all directions at once. Give a little something to every child.

    You can see what is going to happen. Pulled in every direction, you go nowhere at all.

    We need to do one thing at a time. This involves making a choice.

    We need to address the angry, screaming “kids” who have to wait. This involves a conversation.

    When we are willing to choose and converse, we put ourselves in a position to make concrete progress on our to-do list.

    Working on one thing at a time allows us to focus and follow through. No partial efforts. No incomplete processes. No hanging decisions.

    Conversing with the other, unchosen priorities (whether people on the team or voices in our heads) allows us to assure them of their importance so that they don’t need to kick and scream in order to be noticed.

    Next time you have a to-do list longer than Santa’s, imagine yourself in the center of a group of screaming children pulling you in all directions at once.

    The fantasy of being able to actually move in every direction at once quickly explodes. (Hopefully in laughter.)

    Make a choice and have a conversation.

    You’ll be amazed at how much you get done today.

    On your side,

    – Karl Edwards

    Loving Monday is a weekly column designed to encourage us to step into our weeks with an intention to show up authentically, engage fully, and choose to make it a good week for ourselves. Explore past columns here.

  • Quote to Consider: Not Enough Time!

    quote-to-consider“There is time enough for everything in the course of the day if you do but one thing at once; but there is not time enough in the year if you will do two things at a time.”

    Lord Chesterfield

  • Loving Monday: Who’s It For?

    loving_mondayNothing like a brief vacation with the family to raise deeper questions.

    Life on the blog has been quiet this past week because I am enjoying my family on a California road trip.

    Away from schedules and deadlines and expectations and demands, my heart and mind free up in refreshing ways.

    Present with the people who are most important to me, I am reminded that one of the reasons I work has to do with their well-being. One of the reasons I take a job that is a crazy mix of positives and negatives is their provision.

    Vacations are good for perspective resets.

    Do you need a perspective reset? Are you caught up in a whirlwind of activity and feel like you’re losing sight of what it’s all for?

    Try taking a break.

    Get away for a weekend. Go away for a week! Whether brief or extended, step away. Spend some focused time with the people who are most important to you.

    It will recharge and refocus your work. I’m certainly benefiting from mine!

    Loving Monday is a weekly column designed to encourage us to step into our weeks with an intention to show up authentically, engage fully, and choose to make it a good week for ourselves. Explore past columns here.

  • Loving Monday: Holiday Distraction Coming

    loving_mondayAs much as we love our jobs we seldom begrudge a long holiday weekend.

    A shortened work week opens up a couple of possible scenarios for the week ahead.

    One is that we are absent in mind and spirit even while our bodies are present. We’re not off until Thursday, but the anticipation and the preparations fill our minds until we have to admit we have very little space left for the work-related tasks.

    The other scenario is that we are trying to squeeze a full week’s worth of effort into three days. The output requirements haven’t changed but the time frame within which to work has.

    In one case we are finding ourselves quite unproductive. In the other case, we are attempting to be hyper-productive. In both cases, we are distracted by the coming holiday weekend.

    Instead of continuing on as if this were a normal three days like any other, we become distracted by the schedule change. Both are forms of distraction. Neither are lethal, but you aren’t functioning at your best either.

    In one case the distraction removes all pressure. You’ve simply begun your holiday weekend already here on Monday. In the other case the distraction imposes enormous pressure. You somehow need to do everything in practically half the time. In both cases you are underperforming as a result.

    What would probably serve you better is a happy medium of looking forward to the coming long weekend with the awareness that certain adjustments will be required given the loss of two days.

    You can’t think clearly or get much done when you’re either daydreaming about turkey and stuffing or stressed out by the volume of work ahead. Ironically, if you can calm down and focus on what adjustments need to be made this week, you’ll be able to identify your priorities and make the decisions necessary to make good use of the three days available without spoiling the welcome break of the holiday ahead.

    Hoping this Thanksgiving is a good distraction for you in every way possible.

    On your side,

    – Karl Edwards

    Loving Monday is a weekly column designed to encourage us to step into our weeks with an intention to show up authentically, engage fully, and choose to make it a good week for ourselves. Explore past columns here.

  • Loving Monday: Not the “Yes” But the “No”

    loving_mondayWe come into work with a multitude of projects, deadlines, people and tasks competing for our attention. In order to say, “Yes” to the one thing we are going to tackle next, we need to be able to say, “No” to everything else.

    Therein lies the trouble for most of us.

    Not the “Yes,” but the “No.”

    The difficulty arises because all the “No’s” will eventually need to become “Yes’s.”

    It would be easy to say “No” to bad things, wasteful things, useless things, ineffective things, destructive things. The challenge, though, is that in order to focus on one good thing, we need to say “No” to many other good things. Things to which we eventually will need to say “Yes.”

    Once we succeed in selecting the priority that will receive our undivided attention, the battle does not stop there. We find our minds continually justifying our decision to the voices of the “rejected” (i.e. postponed) options.

    All this thinking and rethinking is enough to drive a person crazy.

    I am one of those people who tends to rethink and over-think decisions that I’ve made. Interestingly enough, all the extra processing is not doing me any good. Instead of resulting in better decisions or timely adjustments in my decisions, the extra thinking is merely a stress-inducing and time-consuming distraction.

    Focus is the skill by which we not only learn to concentrate on one thing, but learn to tune out everything else.

    The ability to set other important matters aside in order to give one’s full attention to the matter at hand is no mean achievement and does not come naturally to most of us.

    Helpful to me has been to remind myself that I am saying “No” to so many things in order to get to them sooner. But I will never get to them if I am battling myself all the time. Therefore I clear my desk of everything else in order to have a better chance of eventually addressing everything else.

    We need to stop battling ourselves. We need to learn how to focus and push.

    Try clearing your desk of everything except the one item on which you’ve decided to focus. Use the uncluttered space as a training tool to help you concentrate. One thing on your mind… one thing on the desk.

    When finished pull out the next thing.

    Watch as all those “No’s” transform into “Yes’s… one by one.

    How do you deal with the competing voices calling for your attention? Leave a comment. Give me a call.

    I’m on your side,

    – Karl Edwards

    Loving Monday is a weekly column designed to encourage us to step into our weeks with an intention to show up authentically, engage fully, and choose to make it a good week for ourselves. Explore past columns here.

  • Quote to Consider: What Money Can’t Buy

    quote-to-consider“It is good to have things that money can buy, but it is also good to check up once in awhile and be sure we have the things money can’t buy.”

    George Horace Lorimer

  • Question of the Week #18

    Whose day would be transformed if you paused in your busy schedule and expressed interest in their work?

    The Question of the Week is offered to increase awareness of one’s personal leadership practices and encourage experimentation with creative alternatives.