Priorities

If you’re in a new job or have started a new business or are currently running a business in the very challenging market conditions we are experiencing I’m betting you have your hands full. Each day you have a lot of work to do that keeps you busy all day and prevents you from getting anything else done.

And that’s exactly what’s wrong with work.

When we get to the point where is completely absorbs us, we lose the ability to be objective about it. That means our goals suffer. We may lose sight of where we are going. We might even no longer understand the purpose of what we are doing.

As Lewis Carroll is often paraphrased:?“If you don’t know where you’re going any road will take you there.” In order to understand the value of work we need a direction. A direction creates choices that are based on values. Values, in turn, create priorities that allow us to plan better and execute our planning with confidence.

We think it’s easy to set priorities in business because the business itself demands it for its day-to-day operations and long-term viability. But that too is wrong. A business will certainly make daily demands on those working in it but unless someone is working on it, there is no guarantee that the demands it makes are in keeping with the long term viability of the business.

That sounds a little like a paradox until you think about it. A business is a system. Every system is plagued with errors that are part of its operation. Corrections to those errors occur only when the system has a self-diagnostic routine of some kind and an external means of measuring its performance. This is where people, values, direction, priorities and planning come in.

As a prime example consider Mars, the chocolate bar maker, whose internal practices give a new meaning to the phrase “we eat our own dog food”. And whose external choices are guided as much by a sense of responsibility to its workers and communities as to its shareholders. Mars gets the balance right because it is willing to set priorities that are not guided just by the operational needs of its factory business. As a result it exhibits remarkable resilience and revenues that make the company bigger than Coca-Cola.

If you want to apply a similar approach to your business here’s how to start:

• Make it all about your people. If you’re not focused on retaining, helping and growing the skills, understanding and sense of value of your people you’re unlikely to do anything of real merit towards your customers.
• Work is more than just working hard. Daily operations will always demand attention, energy and focus. But a business is more than that. Think of it like a car. Unless you have a direction and a purpose it really doesn’t matter how good a driver you are, you will wonder aimlessly on the roads until you run out of fuel or crash.
• Feel pride in what you do. You only become responsible when you take your work seriously. We take work seriously only when it fulfils us. Filling up eight hours a day with work is never fulfilling, unless it is linked to a sense of shared purpose.
• Embrace the challenge. Work is always difficult. Change is always challenging. Resenting the first and resisting the second is never helpful.
• Define your priorities. Make this part of what holds your team together. That way everyone is responsible for where you’re going, what you are doing and why.

Nothing is simple when it comes to work and the interpersonal interactions that arise from it. But that doesn’t mean that the work we do can’t have meaning and make us happy.?