How you can achieve high levels of personal performance

Have you noticed how successful people just seem to get things done and everything just falls into place.  Is this just luck.  No it is not, they have a plan and know how to put first things first.  Let me explain…

Being successful at anything required, amongst other things, discipline.  It doesn’t matter whether it is in sport, business politics or any other endeavor.  Success requires direction, a plan to get from where you are now to where you want to be in future and the discipline to do the work necessary to get there.

So What is First Things First?

It’s a time management philosophy and practice built on the hypothesis that if you focus your time and energy on those things that will give you the best chance of success.

Here’s how it works

Firstly you need to create a personal strategy for the future.  This is a process that involves:

• Describing your current situation – this could be a list of points that describes the external factors impacting on you, the challenges you face and perhaps some facts about your current situation
• Future State – This is a vision of where you want to be in future.  Try and capture this in a sentence.  I find it useful to imagine what it would be like when you get there.  Then list a few goals that you would like to achieve (no more than 5 to 7)
• Strategies – This is where you list 5 to 7 strategic levers to get you from where you are today to the desired future state.  You may consider taking advantage of some of your strengths or perhaps you might work on a weakness that you see inhibiting progress if you don’t address it.
• Key initiatives – this is a list of the major initiatives that you will undertake over a period of time (typically 3 years or more) to achieve your goals.

Once you have done all the above, you are ready to develop your project plan.  From the key initiatives listed above, write a few activities that you need to do to achieve your strategic goals.

Now we get down to the concept of first things first.

Start planning your week ahead on the same day of the week, every week.  I like to use Sunday evening to do this.  Here’s how I like to do it

1. Spend 5 minutes re-reading your strategic plan
2. Review how well you dis last week.  Did you complete all your tasks?  Is there still some left over work to be done?
3. Now plan your week ahead by scheduling the most important activities that you need to undertake.  Make sure that you lock these in!
4. Plan other activities that do not contribute to your plan around these key ones and make sure you leave time aside for the unexpected.

OK, here is where the discipline kicks in.  Make sure that you do every key task that you scheduled during the week!  Do not let anything get in the way of completing those tasks!  Nothing! Note:  there are some unforeseen events that may arise and which may take priority over your key tasks; that’s life and you will just have to reschedule but on the whole, don’t let your schedule change for the key tasks.

Now you see where first things first comes from?  It is about making sure you do the most important things to achieve your goals.  The more disciplined you are, the more likely you will achieve success!