Are you productive? Or are you just busy?

Don’t confuse busyness with productivity. Work on things that matter/move the needle. Don’t spend time on the trivial…eliminate that which isn’t necessary for you (or anyone) to do, automate that which can be automated (have A.I. help), and delegate that which needs to be done but not necessarily by you.

If you want to grow, you will HAVE to learn how to do these things. We all only have so much time and energy during the day. If we spend all of it doing things that don’t bring us closer to our goals, we are leaving a lot on the table.

Being busy is not necessarily the same as being productive. How can you minimize the busy work and focus on doing the most meaningful and/or dollar-productive work?

Are you helping or hurting?

There’s a spectrum of helpfulness and hinderance. For example, helping (or not) around the house. If you don’t lift a finger around the house, obviously it is not helpful. But on the other hand, if you try to be Superman (or Superwoman) and do everything yourself, you are actually hurting those around you more than you think. Those who live in the household need to contribute to the household. If they don’t have any duties, 1) they won’t feel useful; 2) they will become unaccustomed to building good work habits; 3) they will not learn necessary life skills like doing laundry, doing dishes, taking out the trash, starting a lawn mower/knowing how to use it, etc. They develop a “learned helplessness” because you didn’t let them do anything.

In short, doing everything can give you a sense of accomplishment because you’re checking things off the “to-do” list, but it is hurting those you love in the long run. Another unintended side effect is you will often build a resentment towards that person (“why aren’t they helping me?”)

Just as with everything else in life, there is a balance between doing, delegating, and eliminating. Don’t do everything. See if your partner likes certain chores more than others. Maybe he/she likes loading the dishwasher and you don’t. Great! That can be their chore. Maybe you like folding laundry, but not putting it away. Ok! You can split that task up. Get your kids involved too. Yes, their life should involve a lot of playing, but if you don’t teach them to have responsibilities then you aren’t doing them any favors when they eventually enter the real world.

Increasing your capacity

Work on increasing your different types of capacities…

⁃ Physical: Build a strong, healthy body so that you have the energy and strength to tackle projects and obstacles

⁃ Mental: Build a strong mind by reading books/articles, listening to books/podcasts, attending seminars, and surrounding yourself with others who are smarter/have more experience than you. Prepare your mind to become great at problem solving. Make sure you always remain teachable.

⁃ Emotional: Get used to “failing” and being told “no.” Learn from those mistakes to get better. Strengthen your resolve and do not be discouraged when things don’t go your way.

⁃ Time: Everyone has 24 hours in a day. Automate tasks which need to be done, eliminate tasks which don’t, and delegate tasks which cannot be automated, but aren’t the best/most productive use of your time. If you try to do everything, you will always be stuck doing everything. Learn to delegate tasks that are not necessary for you to do. These can be things that you’re good at, but don’t enjoy doing OR things that you’re not good at and don’t enjoy doing. Teach/train others how to do those tasks well and they will be an extension of yourself! Then when they outgrow that task/position, have them teach/train others to become extensions of themselves! The growth compounds exponentially AND it frees up your time to focus on more impactful activities that only you can do.

Random thought on optimization…

What is something you do everyday? Is there a way that you can automate/delegate/eliminate this? Even if it only takes you 10 minutes, 5 days/week, that could save you 50 min/week, three hours and 20 minutes/month, or 40 hours/year! You can literally get a work week back in your life just by taking this task off your plate.

Are you delegating tasks?

At some point in time, you will have to delegate tasks and responsibilities in order to become more effective. You only have so much time during the day, and if you are in charge of doing everything, the limiting factor of how much gets done is you. You are the bottleneck.

I first noticed this when reading Tim Ferris’s “The 4-Hour Workweek.” He talks of the D-E-A-L strategy, which is summed up by deligating tasks/responsibilities that someone else can do (even if they can only do it 80% as well as you can), eliminating tasks/activities that either don’t matter or are unproductive uses of your/someone else’s time, and automating repetitive low-skill tasks that you do frequently and should not be eliminated (don’t waste your brain power or time thinking about these). Once you do those three things, it liberates you to work on the projects that give you the most joy, are in your wheelhouse, and that only you can do. You’ll have more time, energy, and, if you optimized the first three steps, money to allocate to anything else of your choosing.

The quicker you can begin delegating tasks/responsibilities, the quicker you can grow. Don’t expect it to be perfect though. Other people are imperfect (just like you) and have their own way of doing things. If you don’t provide the proper training and instructions (as well as explaining the reason why you want things done), expect worse results. Even if you do provide adequate standard operating procedures, there will still be bumps along the way. But you have to take the good with the bad. And, ultimately, as long as you delegated power to the right person, you will be able to move forward faster than if you took on everything yourself.