If your in any kind of leadership position, whether leading your family or a major corporation, you want to be productive and get results. You want to see your family communicate and grow closer together and for your children and spouse to develop and grow. You want your company to be profitable and your employees to succeed. You want to deliver on what you promise.
There is always resistance to getting results or productivity. Every day we wake up and that resistance is there to greet us. Here are some of things we must face everyday and overcome in order to be productive and get results.
- Procrastination – we can over-analyzing things, and talking ourselves out of doing something. We convince ourselves that we will do it later.
- Interruptions – every day we have distractions. Things that are urgent, things that pop up, people that pop in and bunny trails we pursue.
- Stress – The higher the level of stress the harder it is to function, make decisions and get results. Stress limits our thinking and allows emotions to overcome us.
- Multitasking – No one can actually multitask. Some people are better at jumping from one thing to another, but when you do that, you are distracted and end up not doing either thing well. You also don’t tend to finish things.
- Blaming Others – When you start blaming other people it shifts the focus onto things you cannot control. It also distracts you from seeing how you contributed to the problem or allowed it to happen.
- Fear – fear can stop us in our tracks and feeds all of the things I mentioned above. Fear of failure, rejection, being misunderstood, not being good enough – those are just a few of the fears that greet us daily.
So what can we do to overcome these forms of resistance and be productive on a consistence basis?
- Commit to Excellence – whatever you do, do it the best you can. This is not perfection but doing it right and not cutting corners. When you do it right the first time, you don’t have to go back and do it over later.
- Plan – This is probably the most important step. Putting a plan together with clear, specific goals and timelines will help get results.
- Focus – People that have the ability to block out all the resistance and distractions and focus for an hour at a time on a project get great results. To keep that focus, take frequent breaks and refresh your mind, then come back to the project.
- Do the Hard thing first – If your facing a difficult conversation, complicated problem or hard task, tackle it right away. The faster you accomplish that hard thing, the more productive you will be the rest of the day.
- Stick with it – people that get results have the ability to hang in there and keep at it until it’s finished. It’s having the tenacity to work through all the obstacles and keep focused on the bigger picture. It’s showing up every day and doing what needs to be done.
Everyone can improve in this area of productivity and getting results. Think about one thing that if you finished it would bring great results or move you further along as an individual, family or organization. Now go do it.