The 14th installment in our series: How to Leave on Time and NEVER Take Papers Home Again … Today, we’re gonna share the secret for “How to always get the most important things done every day!” Watch the YouTube video here >>> https://youtu.be/4ESLJfevk-8

I’ve heard this concept a number of ways from a number of different people over the years. Steven Covey, author of 7 Habits of Highly Effective People talks about putting the big rocks in first. Jim Collins, author of Good to Great, and Patrick Lencioni, author of many fantastic leadership books, both talk about choosing 3 big rocks to focus on. We’re gonna combine these ideas all into one for you today.

We’ve all likely experienced the feeling of reaching the end of the day and being bummed that we didn’t get everything done we wanted to. And often there are even a couple of big things we just never get around to, but they really need to get done.
        So we either flip the candle over and burn it from the other end and exhaust ourselves … or we wait until to tomorrow and hope life’s demands won’t keep us from getting them done.
Let’s look at a simple but powerful strategy to make sure we get the important things done.
So let’s look at the illustration I heard from Covey’s book. This jar here represents our day, before we’ve done anything with our time. A fresh opportunity … or burden … depending on how we’re feeling about it. If we’re not careful, strategic, even defensive, our promising empty day gets filled up quickly and before we know it, it’s over, right?
Back in Episode 12, we showed you how to make a daily schedule. This is gonna go deeper on that. We need to put our big priorities in first, our big rocks. Make sure you can fit those in. Give them time slots. Be realistic with the amount of time you need for them so you can fit in what you want to. Remember, keep them few or they aren’t really big rocks.
After you’ve given these their own time slot, fill in the smaller rocks (priorities). These could be small errands or conversations others are asking you to do throughout your day. Many of these will be unpredictable and unplanned. They are going to fill in the rest of the spots, whether you like it or not. They key is that they shouldn’t bother you as much because you fit in your important stuff.
YOU SAY NO. You kindly say that you can’t do that right now because you need to get your second big rock of the day done for your day to be successful. I’ll talk with you again at … and give them a time, because you know the time.
The rest of your minutes will fill in. It always does.
We could even fill this in with water because all the nooks and crannies of time fill in. Every day.
This is what a well-structured day looks like. It feels good. And if all of our days, or let’s just give us grace and say many … if many of our days looked like this, we’d end up feeling good about our time. And we’d feel the freedom to not work after hours, at home, when we really want to be resting, or playing with family and friends, or doing whatever we want, not what the work wants.
So, let’s remember to do it this way. Because it’ll feel so good. Then we’ll get to go home and relax, not worrying that the important things didn’t get done.
And if people are asking for your time when you’re supposed to be doing your big rock …
Conversation of the Day: What are your big 2-3 rocks for today?

Hop on over to watch the video and share your thoughts in the conversation.