You have a big presentation coming up & just discovered a stain on your favorite outfit. Quick, to the cleaners! Your regular shop is perfect but they have a standard 3-day turnaround so that won't work. There is a 99 cent shop a couple miles away, they could get it done but you can't risk them not taking great care of your expensive suit. Your only choice is a designer shop, the one in the fancy part of town, they'll do a special for you. And you're off!
We all pay companies for services and there are all kinds of criteria we use to decide which companies they will be. We trust them; they've given us the evidence they are trustworthy. Or maybe they align with our values. And, just like the dry cleaner dilemma above, we use these 3 criteria.
We often do this without thinking. It's an almost automatic thought process driven by circumstances. Do we approach all the decisions we make like this? Are we constantly reacting to these situations? Here's a quick take on this from Seth Godin...
Understanding the automatic self
How we handle situations provides a lot of evidence to those around us about who we are. It's actually how we lead. Once we've made this connection, the question is: How do we decide what to spend our time on?
Urgent or Important
If you feel like a firefighter putting out one emergency "fire" after another & feel completely exhausted at the end of the day then perhaps you're confusing the urgent with the important.
“What is important is seldom urgent and what is urgent is seldom important.” -General Eisenhower
Here's an article explaining how a former U.S. President & 5-Star General used this principle and how it might help you use time more effectively & efficiently!
Eisenhower's Urgent/Important Principle
Yes! There's an app for that!
Eisenhower Decision Matrix App
Einstein says "the only reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen at once." So, because we can't do everything first, understanding how to prioritize is essential to becoming our most effective selves.
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