Tweet

The Tyranny of the Urgent Can Cause Priority Overload

Guest post by: Jim Clemmer

Article Overview: A frantic manager burst into a travel agency and exclaimed, "I need an airplane ticket immediately!" "Where would you like to go?", the travel agent asked. "I don't care, just get me on a plane. I've got business everywhere," was the desperate reply. Time management author and consultant, R. Alec Mackenzie once observed, "Urgency engulfs the manager; yet the most urgent task is not always the most important.

The Tyranny of the Urgent Can Cause Priority Overload

"He that is everywhere is nowhere." - Thomas Fuller, 17th century historian, scholar, and author A frantic manager burst into a travel agency and exclaimed, "I need an airplane ticket immediately!" "Where would you like to go?", the travel agent asked. "I don't care, just get me on a plane. I've got business everywhere," was the desperate reply. Time management author and consultant, R. Alec Mackenzie once observed, "Urgency engulfs the manager; yet the most urgent task is not always the most important. The tyranny of the urgent lies in its distortion of priorities. One of the measures of a manager is the ability to distinguish the important from the urgent, to refuse to be tyrannized by the urgent, to refuse to manage by crisis."

Unsuccessful organizations are often beehives of activity and hard work. Reflecting on the performance of his struggling company a departmental manager observed, "We have lots of projects, goals, and priorities. We're constantly making lists and setting action plans. But we seldom see anything through to completion before some urgent new priority is pushed at us. Our division manager's thinking seems to be 'random brain impulse.' He's like a nervous water bug that flits from one half-baked strategy to another."

In the midst of tumultuous change, many managers are confusing "busywork" activity with results. Missing what's really important to long-term growth and development, they allow themselves to be tyrannized by short-term urgencies. But we just can't do it all. The list of dreams we could pursue to realize is a lengthy one. The number of improvements we could make to our performance gaps are countless. Searching and exploring to create tomorrow's markets and customers can uncover endless innovation possibilities.

So we've got to choose. From all our long-range options, alternatives, and possibilities we've got to establish short-term goals and priorities. There are as many things we've got to stop doing, as there are actions we've got to start taking. Some actions will drive us forward, many will hold us back, and some won't matter much either way. But without clear targets and a strong sense of what's most important, I - and everyone on my team or in my organization - won't be able to tell the difference.

Effectively establishing goals and priorities has both strategic and tactical components. The strategic decisions are what goals and priorities we choose to pursue. Tactics are how we get organized and manage our time to reach those goals.

Related Articles
  Urgent or Important? Learn to Prioritize
  Four Square Organizer
  J.P. Morgan Quotes
  How Important Is Your Urgent?
  SACRIFICE THE SACRED COWS
  Information Overlaod: 5 Ways to Cut Through the Clutter
  How to Prioritize
  Seven Simple Ways To Prioritize
  How to Manage Your Email & Inbox – Lessons 31-35
  Why do we put off the really important things?
  How to Use the Time Management Matrix
  The Urgency of Importance
  Keyword Overload can Kill a Web Page
  Is It Urgent?
  Are you too Busy to be Productive? Why customers shouldn’t be your first priority
  Prioritizing Emergencies to Cut Down on Interruptions
  Focus - it's harder to do, and more important.
  Organization & Productivity: Can Disorganized Managers be “Trained”?
  Don't Freak Out During Follow Up
  Maximize Focus - Reduce Distractions

Article Tags: leadership
Referred by: http://www.searchengineworkshops.com



Related Forum Posts
Re: Subject line Etiquette - [quote="jvprosperity":btyoa0j1]Another email rant: Is there some place on the internet that outlines proper "Subject line" headings? There mus be a system out there that people use to be more efficient email senders. Not everything that comes into my mail box requires my immediate attention. I would love to educate myself and the people who send me emails on proper subject lines. Maybe something like: "Urgent Review: <<Title of document>>" "Decision Required: "<<Subject matter>>" just something for me to quickly scan the subject lines and decide which ones need my immediate attention. Anyone know of such email standards that exist out there?[/quote:btyoa0j1] Hi Andy, The only system I know of at the moment is the "Set Priority" feature on MS Outlook. It allows you to add an exclamation mark to flag the message as being of high, normal or low priority. However, I'd say that a "sender" is still better off using the phone rather than sending an email that's labeled "urgent".
Re: Subject line Etiquette - [quote="jvprosperity":b50c4a20]Another email rant: Is there some place on the internet that outlines proper "Subject line" headings? There mus be a system out there that people use to be more efficient email senders. Not everything that comes into my mail box requires my immediate attention. I would love to educate myself and the people who send me emails on proper subject lines. Maybe something like: "Urgent Review: <<Title of document>>" "Decision Required: "<<Subject matter>>" just something for me to quickly scan the subject lines and decide which ones need my immediate attention. Anyone know of such email standards that exist out there?[/quote:b50c4a20] The only messages I get that say Urgent or Decision Required etc are spam. I tell people to put something relevant to their business with me in the subject line - this is especially important for the people who fall into my junk mail. Chris
Subject line Etiquette - Another email rant: Is there some place on the internet that outlines proper "Subject line" headings? There mus be a system out there that people use to be more efficient email senders. Not everything that comes into my mail box requires my immediate attention. I would love to educate myself and the people who send me emails on proper subject lines. Maybe something like: "Urgent Review: <<Title of document>>" "Decision Required: "<<Subject matter>>" just something for me to quickly scan the subject lines and decide which ones need my immediate attention. Anyone know of such email standards that exist out there?


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

Why Use an Advertising Agency

Basic Operating Question (BOQ) for Empowerment

SEO Gurus, Software and Ebooks

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.