Prioritize for Productivity

Being productive is more than just getting stuff done.

Being productive impacts your brand. In a world of ideas, vision, and get-rich-quick, people who actually get stuff done are highly valued.

I appreciate vision as much as the next person but you gotta have someone who can execute on the vision. Maybe I should say: you gotta have someone who WILL execute on the vision.

Meetings get in the way of execution. Changing roadmaps and priorities get in the way of execution. Procrastination gets in the way of execution.

I came to realize that in my last real job (in 2018) I was hired because my boss, who *could* execute on things, needed a wingman. His higher value was in the strategic, executive, negotiating space, not in the heads-down-get-it-done space. He could have done one or the other, but not both.

He hired me because I had proven I got stuff done. I had written three books. I had done somewhere around 30 Pluralsight courses. I had launched a business that was still alive. I had taught myself the ins and outs of being a professional speaker. I wasn't sitting around thinking about and visioning all day. I was getting stuff done.

When I say being productive is more than just getting stuff done, I'm saying that being productive and getting stuff done is reinforcing your brand.

In 2018 when I was looking at various job descriptions there was a theme: Companies, especially small IT companies, where looking for people who GSD. This was their take from David Allen's super popular book and movement, Getting Things Done (GTD). That seemed to become it's own religion.

GSD started out being Getting Stuff Done... then morphed into Getting Sh*t Done (people think it's cooler if you throw a swear word in there).

I was fascinated that I saw a requirement that candidates were the type of person that actually got stuff done.

My question for you: Do people around you know you as someone who gets stuff done? Are you a performer, a finisher, a doer?

This is an aspect of my brand I didn't appreciate about myself until someone else saw it and pointed it out. But I promise you, there are people around you who have already noticed whether you are a GSD person or not. If you are, they might want you on their team. If you are not, you better have some other important value-adds you bring before they want you on their team.

Oh yeah... the title. If you have a list of 20 things to do today, finishing one of those things might be more important than finishing the other 19. This is a seemingly hidden secret of the GSD people... ignore lower priority stuff if there really are higher priority, important, tasks.

I talk more about prioritizing and productivity in my Pluralsight course: Prioritizing Tasks and Managing Time for Greater Productivity .