Colleagues,
 
The first key to getting off the treadmill is to act with intention on a daily basis. This happens in three parts:

1. Develop an awareness of how you spend (or invest) your time by aligning what you do and don’t do with the quadrants of the Eisenhower Matrix.
2. Become strategically responsive:
   1. Give it up
   2. Give it back
   3. Give it away
   4. Give it a C
   5. Give it a bounce
3. Become proactive:
   1. Develop standard operating procedures (SOPs)
   2. Leverage your team
   3. Condition others to respect your priorities

List out all of the things you did this week that demanded your time, attention, or emotion. 

1. Which of the strategically responsive strategies could you have used?
2. If you had proactive measures in place (SOPs, team, conditioning), how might your time have looked different?
3. What is stopping you from adopting these strategies?

Next week we will focus on key 2 of getting off the treadmill, using simple steps to identify root problems.

Do good and be well,

​Frederick

Colleagues,
 
There are three practices we can implement to proactively decrease the number of urgent issues we face. These practices are not hierarchically arranged. 
 
In your effort to get off the treadmill, think about which practice will yield the most immediate results with the least effort (leverage) and begin there.

Develop standard operating procedures (SOPs).
A SOP is a detailed instruction sheet for performing a specific task. SOPs bring structure, support, transparency, and consistency to operations. Benefits:

1. 1. Increase quality of results
   2. Decrease effort and save time
   3. Decrease error
   4. Increase number/role of people capable of completing the process
   5. Decrease stress
   6. Improve organizational resiliency
   7. Ensure compliance with policy
   8. Improve safety
   9. Facilitate building leadership capacity

Need I say more?

Leverage your team:

1. Allow yourself to be managed. If you have support staff, an administrative assistant for example, allow them take over as many tasks as possible. They can screen your email, answer phone calls, and even plan your calendar. The fewer things you need to worry about, the more focus you will have for important things. 
   
2. Build leadership capacity in individuals. Be intentional about grooming others for leadership. Use a gradual release approach to help them learn new skills: 

• Do it while explaining what and why
• Do it with them
• They do it on their own, you watch and coach

  3. Create a coordinated leadership team by:

• Developing clear responsibilities for each member
• Establishing a set meeting time
• Establishing a set agenda
• Providing mutual accountability

Condition others to respect your priorities. When people understand your priorities, they are less likely to ask you for things that don’t align. 
 
Do good and be well,
 
Frederick

Colleagues,
 
Yesterday I asked you to keep track of what you did during the day and how much time it took. Now let’s review your data. For each activity, ask yourself these questions:

• Did I plan to engage in this activity?
• If no
  • Why did I choose to engage in it?
  • What was the opportunity cost of engaging in this action? In other words, what did not get done because I chose to do this instead?
  • What was the benefit?
• If yes:
  • Did I achieve the desired result?
  • Why or why not?
  • Could I have achieved a similar benefit with less effort?
• Am I the only one that could have done this, or could someone else have done it?

 
After reflecting, identify where in the Eisenhower Matrix each activity falls. 
 
Important v. not important: The issue or task is relevant to the core purpose of the organization or is critical to operations or a specific initiative or effort that aligns to the core purpose. 
 
Urgent v. not urgent: Urgent issues or tasks will not be able to be completed at a later time. Ether the thing will expire, or it will trigger an event that will then require a different kind of response.
 
Now reflect again:

• What do you see?
• How much time did you spend in the urgent quadrants versus the important quadrants?
• What didn’t get done in quadrant 2, and how would those things influence the long-term health of your organization?

 
Tomorrow we’ll look at 5 ways to respond strategically to urgent issues!

Do good and be well,
​
Frederick

​Colleagues,
 
There are four keys to getting off the treadmill and, not surprisingly, they correspond to the four traits of strategic leadership:

1. Acting with intention on a daily basis
2. Discern problems from symptoms
3. Enacting cycles of incremental change
4. Developing the right people

 
We will spend the rest of this week on acting with intention, which has three components:

• Developing awareness
• Becoming strategically reactive
• Becoming proactive

 
Where does your time go? There are two parts to tracking time: listing tasks, and measuring time spent on those tasks. Choose the method that aligns most naturally with how you work:

1. End-of the day method: At the end of the day write down all the things you did and approximately how much time you spent on them.
2. Realtime method: Keep a running list of what you do and how much time you spend throughout the day.
3. Front and back method: Begin the day with your anticipated to-do list. At the end of the day, review the list and add the time spent. Also add any unanticipated things that you did and how long those took.
4. Over achiever method: Modify the front and back method by including how much time you anticipate spending on each thing at the beginning of the day. This allows you to make direct comparisons of what you intended versus what the reality was.

 
About 70% of the people that read this email do so before 10:00 in the morning, so here is my challenge for you:

• Review the four methods of tracking your time.
• Decide which one to use.
• Use it today!

 
Tomorrow we’ll analyze what happened and then dive into being strategically reactive. 
 
Do good and be well,
 
Frederick