Delegate It...

Heya.

Welcome back. We've been taking a look at some of the 4 quadrants on the?Eisenhower Matrix over the past few articles.

And. Yeah, there is a LOT written from other people about this topic.

One of the goals for THIS newsletter (Focus. #deliver) is to give you ONE actionable tip in each article for becoming a better slacker.

Err... OK... not really a slacker (lol) but I hopefully got your attention for a moment.

There is a difference of being a slacker and figuring out how to DO LESS to increase your productivity.

So.

In this article, you are going to learn something that WILL increase your productivity by doing less TODAY.

Like.

Right now.

The Problem:?I Like Control

This week, imagine you and I are [ DOING SOMETHING] together.

We are [ SOMEPLACE RELAXING ].

You decide what we are doing and where we are.

ME: "Hey, how are you?"

YOU: "I am a control freak. Full Stop."

I'll leave the problem for you to think about for a sec.

Could be you.

Could be someone else.

If you think that statement describes someone else, cool...

That is THEIR problem, not yours.

Spoiler Alert

The problem is you (and if it's not, go ahead and stop reading this article, go listen to some Taylor Swift, and have a great day lol).

Still reading this?

Own it (even if you just pretend for a moment with me).

And continue reading because this will help YOU become a better leader (or be a slacker depending on how you look at it right now).

The Actionable Tip: Delegate It

Did you notice what I did when I introduced the problem before the actionable tip today?

I delegated the responsibility and authority for YOU make two decisions.

I defined the parameters for the outcome I want us to get to together.

(Scroll up and read the problem again and don't watch that Taylor Swift video again and I'll wait here).

Consider that lower left corner of the matrix...

URGENT

NOT IMPORTANT

Full disclosure

I had to go look at the matrix more than once (sigh) to make sure I got that right.

And notice.

The world is still spinning. Unless it's not, then well, we've got a very different problem -- or no problems at all -- heh.

It's urgent that the world is spinning and doing its thing.

It's NOT important for ME to make this happen.

ALSO Notice...

• As a person who likes control, I might struggle with identifying when things should move from IMPORTANT and URGENT down to this quadrant (see some tips about "Getting Naked" I wrote about in this article).
• As a person who likes control, I have to do this (let things drop down into the lower left quadrant) to become an even more effective leader.
• As a person who likes control, I have to trust that when I delegate the URGENT and NOT IMPORTANT stuff to someone else that it'll get done.
• As a person who likes control, I STILL must own the responsibility of any of those outcomes. Even if how the person -- or team -- I delegated it to does it differently than I would have. Even if the outcomes are different than expected (hmmm... there's a future article here about getting clear on outcomes I guess).

Phew.

Lot's to untangle up there (and the actual untangling of this in your own brain is outside of the scope of this article).

Your Next Step...

Scroll back up to the actionable tip and read those four bullet points one more time and replace "I" with "YOU" (or whatever works to have you think this is about you and not someone else [like me lol]).

Good? Ok.

Think about the problem I've described and my actionable tip above.

Here is the part where?I need YOU to contribute YOUR actionable tip?for others who are reading this short article....

Please share ONE actionable tip in the comments below about what benefit you've seen by delegating the stuff in the URGENT and NOT IMPORTANT quadrant.

Go.

Thank you.

Michael Vizdos