GSD: Do What Matters

I feel particularly privileged to make a living having great conversations with smart people. Today, a client shared a pet peeve about her boss who finishes every team meeting and every email to the team with “Let’s get s**t done!” or “Let’s GSD!” Now, this client is one of the most ambitious and focused people I know, and yet, she says that despite always being busy, when she looks back at each day and her weeks, she does “a lot of s**t” that doesn’t matter. She feels like she can’t seem to stop wasting time on things that don’t really add value to her work, or her life for that matter. Her boss’ battle cry does nothing to actually prioritize what s**t really matters. It’s like telling a new manager “just be a good leader” without defining what being a leader means. We live in an extremely noisy world. Often, we feel overwhelmingly busy while the results we are seeking end up being underwhelming, or even disappointing, in terms of the investment of our time and efforts. Being very busy at work is like running through an obstacle course covered in mud from head to toe. It can still be great fun, but our pace will be much slower than normal, and we become progressively less steady on our feet as we continue to run along.

In my experience, people can’t be divided into just two categories of “productive” or “unproductive,” “rockstars” or “slackers,” “A players” or “C players.” We all have the potential to be top performers, and when we don’t perform up to our potential, or are ineffective, it can most likely be attributed to either the work environment or personal routines. To really do what matters, we need to focus on a narrow sphere of attention and activity. And here’s the million-dollar-question: “what matters?” Although it sounds simple, defining objectives and setting priorities is where people repeatedly mess up. Unfortunately, there’s no magic formula to success. It is our habits and routines that enable us to improve over time through consistent repetition and gaining experience. When we get in the habit of checking-in inwards to honestly identify the things that cause us to be unproductive, we can then develop new habits and build new guardrails to become more effective. There’s no one-size-fits-all style of GSD. One of my favorite methods for keeping attention on and doing what matters is Warren Buffett’s 25-5 Rule. This is a 3-step process to determine priorities and actions. Here’s how it works:

1. List 25 things you need to accomplish (every day/week/month/year/next 3 years.)
2. Carefully consider your list and circle the top five that you most urgently want to get done.
3. Spend all your time and energy on these 5 items and ignore the other 20.

As you can imagine, and I can confirm from my own experience, step number three is where we have our work cut out for us if we want to stay focused throughout our day. No action is energy-neutral. Everything we do, or think about, requires a certain amount of emotional investment and focus. Our challenge is to ruthlessly eliminate the things that do not contribute to our top 5 list. I love this practice because it forces me to make the tough choices to only focus on what would be a great use of my time. Trust me, I could easily rationalize spending time on those things that would be a good use of my time but would still derail my efforts. Picking the top 5 priorities is making a commitment to direct all my efforts and energy toward specific goals. Secondary goals are the biggest challenge, the biggest distraction. To keep focus, along with each priority on our top-5 list, we need to write down our goal in specific and measurable action words. This helps maintain focus on what is important and track progress by figuring out what really works in light of real improvement. Personally, it is only through tracking numbers that I know I am getting better and closer to reaching a goal. For example, it is only when I started tracking my habit of reading 20 minutes of nonfiction every day, that I was able to read one business book a week. I love reading, but I tend to read novels, and so I needed to find a way to expand my reading list to increase my business acumen.

I will not go as far as Zig Ziglar to say that distractions are the enemy of greatness; however, I think we can all agree that they do erode the greatest of plans and the best of intentions. And there’s no way to cut them out of our life. We all have to-do lists running a mile long of trivial things that need to get done like driving kids to school, or trimming the dog’s nails. But we can still be very selective about what we set to accomplish each and every day by setting aside 5 important tasks to complete correlated to our top 5 priorities. While we may have no control over the unexpected, we must own our planned tasks and activities. Here’s a life hack to master the 25-5 rule:

1. Like the Jewish holidays, productivity starts the night before: at the end of the day, visualize the next day being a great day and set the five most important tasks to be completed come hail or high water.
2. Begin every day as if it were your birthday: bounce out of bed ready to conquer the world. Make sure you plan something to be excited about and look forward to waking up in the morning, for me it’s my 20 minutes of yoga to John Denver’s songs. What gets you excited to get out of bed? As you get moving, keep your focus on what matters with the intention of doing it.
3. Astonish yourself: as you go through your day, seek out something new and extraordinary to connect with the world at a deeper level. This will stop you from sleepwalking through your day and shake you to observe the world with curiosity rather than preconceived certainties. And thus, you’ll be more likely to make creative breakthroughs as you work towards your goals.

In sum, to GSD: first focus on your own s**t, then choose the top 5 things that you want, make a plan to keep your priorities straight, and keep working it every single day.

When the Answer is “No”

Have you ever experienced a toddler’s wicked temper tantrum? Yes, that melt-down all parents dread when their little angel turns into a red-faced monster kicking and screaming on the floor. These unfortunate incidents typically happen when children do not get what they want. And they usually happen at the worst possible time and in public places. Learning to accept “no” and delay gratification is a necessary part of growing up. Yet, even as adults when we ask for something we want, or feel we deserve, and get a “no”, we are likely to experience strong negative feelings. “I want it now” is a powerful emotion. While, hopefully, by adulthood we’ve learned to control the emotions and impulses we express outwardly, when strong emotions are evoked, our inner child may be screaming and kicking inwardly. But as unpleasant as being turned down is, it is part of life, a part of everyone’s professional experience if they work long enough.

Rejections are a common hurt we experience in our work life: the deal NOT closed, the interview NOT landed, the job NOT offered, the promotion NOT gotten, the raise NOT granted, and the job recognition NOT expressed. Whether small or large, rejection stings. Growing up in Israel, a country blessed with a spectacular coastline, I can say with confidence that nothing ruins a summer day at the beach faster than a jellyfish sting. Similarly, nothing ruins a good day on the job faster than the full sting of rejection. Now, no one willingly seeks out rejection. But achievement always involves taking chances. Professional growth requires the willingness to be vulnerable, to fully embrace the fact that putting ourselves out there we never know what we’ll get in return – acceptance or rejection, wishes come true, or plans fall through. One of my elementary school teachers used to tell our class that we had to always try and reach for the moon so that if we fail, we’d still be falling through the stars. Achievers thrive on rejection; it is the fuel that drives their motivation to succeed. Being comfortable with the uncomfortable is a great element of success. When we want to have things, or wish to do things, we must open ourselves to a plethora of emotions that come with both struggle and satisfaction and joy as well as pain. Additionally, we need to be willing to stand out there in the cold, right underneath the glaring streetlight, and knock on opportunity’s door long enough and loud enough until it is opened for us. Trying to avoid pain will hurt us in the long run. We cannot get to the top of the mountain unless we are willing to schlep some baggage along, literal and emotional.

Here’s the simple truth, to master anything we have to first master the art of rejection. A few years ago, because of my perfectionistic tendencies, and after a heartbreaking dream job rejection, I was challenged by a friend to play Rejection Therapy. The game has only one rule: to get rejected every day for 30 consecutive days. She diligently made us a “dare” card for each day of the month to push our personal boundaries and face the fear (and embarrassment) of venturing beyond them. I took the challenge and failed; meaning I aced the game. For a whole month my life was full of rejection (as an overachiever, I took on bonus challenges.) As it turned out, rejection had been a blast. Of course, real rejection when it really matters really sucks. But by desensitizing the fear and pain associated with rejection, I could train myself to handle it in a productive manner. If I’ve learned anything from a month of being rejected every day, it’s that things rarely went the way I imagined they would, and nothing silly I did mattered all that much. Since then, I try to challenge myself to do something scary, embarrassing, or silly at least every couple of days as a reminder to self to never pass up something important to me because of fear of embarrassment, criticism, rejection, or failure. Not convinced? Check out this little gem of a talk about rejection by Laurie Petrou.

Here are three productive steps to handle rejection like a pro:

1.    Acknowledge the emotions

Feelings are complicated. Recognize the fear, pain, disappointment, sadness, and anger in all their illogical power and hold over you. Sit with your negative feelings, cuddle them, and pay your respects. Then let go and replace them with positive ones, one negative thought at a time.

2.    Push through the discomfort

Widen your lens to the bigger perspective and re-focus your attention on the bigger picture beyond the temporary set-back. The art of living means pushing the boundaries by continuously reaching out for new experiences and new possibilities outside your comfort zone. You know you are putting yourself out there pushing yourself to your limits when you get turned down.

3.    Discover the wisdom

Rejection can be a good teacher. Be sure to ask good questions and learn as much as you can about what happened in order to learn the applicable life lessons. Turn the “no” into an opportunity for self-growth, to keep moving forward with more wisdom and go to new levels of challenges and skills.

Rejection is an invitation to do self-inventory. Think back on your life. Isn’t it true that many times when you thought you were denied something you wanted, with the perspective of time, you came to realize you were directed to something you needed? I know that this is true for me. Those times when rejection was a tough pill to swallow were merely an early “no” forcing me to find the “yes” in the mess, the opportunities in disguise. If we try to shield ourselves from disappointment, we’d be denying ourselves the joy of the discovery of our value proposition, a creative process that will always leave us stronger, smarter, and having a firm grasp on who we are and what we have to offer.

If you are currently experiencing rejection at work, I hope the following quote will guide you towards success: “Do not waste yourself in rejection; do not bark against the bad, but chant the beauty of the good.”    ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson