It seems every day we make decisions about what we should do and what we can afford not to do. Or more accurately, prioritize activities based on too little time and too much to do. When faced with limited resources and tight budgets, are there criteria to consider when prioritizing your activities? Several business leaders recently discussed this very thing.
The discussion yielded a set of criteria in two areas. The first is the business or return-on-investment consideration: What is the optimal return on an individual’s time? The second area is the personal consideration: What is the impact of activities on a person as a contributing member of the organization and its culture?
Begin with the 80/20 rule. Understand the strengths and value someone delivers. Focus on activities that capitalize on those strengths and deliver value. It’s a simple application of the 80/20 rule where one spends 80 percent of their time on the 20 percent of activities that deliver the highest value, both personally and for the company. For those activities that are not strengths and value drivers, delegate, automate, outsource or eliminate them.
Consider work flow and production output. Everyone is already running flat out. Therefore, any new activity requires a choice — what am I going to stop doing, or compromise doing, in order to take on the new activity? This is an ROI question. The activity with the greater ROI should receive top priority.
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Activities Require Choices
Consider cultural impacts. This entails looking at activities from the individual’s point of view. Rather than being an asset manager and calculating ROI, assess the impact of an activity on corporate culture and individuals. A company, its organization, and its culture are tangible and real. Individuals and activities define that culture every day. Prioritizing your activities simultaneously prioritizes the values of your culture.
Calculate start-up costs, time frames, and the impact on cash flow. The length of time for an activity to produce tangible financial results directly impacts the decision on whether to do it. This is a question of cash flow. The longer the ramp-up time is, the longer the drain on cash flow occurs. An activity can have a great ROI potential, but if you can’t afford to do it, so what?
Weigh the profitability impact of competing activities. If an activity passes the affordability threshold, then you can accommodate the ROI and profitability calculation. You’re in business to make money. Determine the profit return of an activity over a specific time frame, and assess if it meets your profit goals. If the activity does not drive that result, seriously consider whether it is worth doing.
What happens if I don’t do an activity? This is a question of assessing the impact of inactivity. You can elect to take no action, and that will produce a result. Is that result from non-action viable, affordable and acceptable?
Your choices are relatively simple and limited. You can do it, not do it, delegate it, automate it, outsource it, or eliminate it. Make your choice and prioritize activities with both the financial and the personal impact in mind. Then proceed, looking for progressive improvement instead of delayed perfection. If an activity is able to be done, start doing it. Don’t plan for perfection. Achieve results through action.
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Ken Cook is managing director of Peer to Peer Advisors, an organization that facilitates business leaders helping each other. You can reach him at kcook@peertopeeradvisors.com.
