#005 The Dark Side of Prioritization

When facilitating planning meetings, a favorite item that people react to with anticipation is “what can we stop?”. Overworked and overwhelmed people like the idea of prioritization and stopping some things. But frequently when they get to that agenda item it does not go as they expected.

THE UGLY TRUTH

By our behaviors we show we don’t really like bringing our actions in line with our priorities. It confronts us with the dichotomy of what we say we want and what we really want. In our personal lives, we say we want to “learn to play the guitar” but we don’t want to make the time by saying no to something else. In the business world, we say we want to be “provide the best round widgets in the world”, but we don’t want to give up short term revenue from the few people who want “square widgets”. The square widgets are siphoning off precious resource that could be used to create better round widgets, but most organizations can’t stop unless forced.

THE JOY OF STOPPING

I remember one management team, faced with extreme economic downturn, made the difficult decision to trim all its low or no profit products AND its low or no profit customers. Many account they had worked with for decades. Although the decision was very difficult, the result, in their words, was “freeing”. Their lives became must more focused, they executed better, and in a downturn, they grew their business 50% with no increase in headcount. At the same time the construction industry they were in was down 30%.

THE PRINCIPLE

When you are in some chaotic situation where things are not going the way you want, step back and see if there is misalignment between what you say you want and what you are actually doing. Jesus makes this point about our inner turmoil when He says, “seek the truth and the truth will make you free”. The cure for chaos is purpose and foundation for purpose is truth.