We all struggle with the onslaught of professional and personal demands. It’s easy to be distracted from the most important tasks by small, seemingly urgent interruptions, such as email, someone walking by our office, a phone call or a staff issue. This is human nature.

No matter how disciplined we are, we still respond to at least some distractions, mitigating our overall effectiveness. However, I know a successful strategy to address this. This one tip has greatly improved my effectiveness, even when I have multiple demands on my time. I’ve discovered that it works well for everyone, from CEOs to students.

Every morning before you do anything else in the office – check voicemail, read email, stop by someone’s office to ask about their weekend …

• Write down the 6 things you would want to accomplish, even if you completed nothing else during your day.
• Take action.
  
• Complete these 6 tasks before you do anything else.

My clients’ lists have included: call Customer A and B; arrange medical appointment; prepare for Board meeting; schedule a difficult conversation with a colleague; set a date for a planning session; review the most recent sales report.

If your current practice is to arrive at the office and immediately jump into meetings and activity, you have a few options:

• Create your list every evening for the next day
• Create your list before you leave the house
• Arrive earlier to the office
• Block off 30 to 45 minutes in your calendar every day – first thing – to action these items

What you will discover is that these 6 items are typically ones with longer-term benefits: to your health; to relationships with others; to refreshing your leadership capabilities; to your company’s brand; to raising the bar on your performance. They are frequently priorities that are small but powerful.

The time required to complete them will vary; sometimes it’s an hour, sometimes as long as two hours, depending on your most important priorities at the time. I expect you will find, like others have, that most days you will knock off these tasks in less than 30 minutes. If you have a large, (and potentially daunting, project in front of you – use one of your 6 tasks to schedule blocks of time in your calendar to work on the large project.

Don’t say this to yourself:  “This is a great idea and I’ll just alter it a bit to suit me better…I’ll plan an hour at the end of the day to wrap these up.” That’s analogous to saving whatever money is left from your pay cheque two weeks after you’ve been paid. That just doesn’t work – we usually spend what we have, whether it’s money or time. In this case, we fill up our time with activities that are presented to us. Instead, do this:

Every morning. 6 items. Write them down. Do them. Now. First. The results will be greater than you imagine.

If you found this beneficial, click here for more ideas.

Acknowledgment to Bob .Proctor