There is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all. ~Peter Drucker
That is one of my favourite quotes. Many of us enter positions, companies, roles, where things have been done a specific manner for years. We sometimes forget to take a good hard look at many of our actions and worry about efficiency in those tasks rather than thinking about whether those tasks should be done at all.
Strategy sessions often take a good hard look at ‘where do we need to go’ but forget one important component. ‘What are we doing that is not working or has no effect on our goals or direction. How can we eliminate it?’
In this post I would like to suggest you as a leader take a look at your own actions and do a little self analysis:
- Take a few minutes every week, find some quiet time and look carefully at your actions from the previous week.
- Identify those actions into which you have been trying to build efficiency.
- Using careful analysis of those actions, determine if you truly believe they are necessary to your role and the important goals in front of you.
Time is of a premium, demands are high and the economy has you working harder for less money. It’s important to ensure every action you take as a leader is effective to the success of the company and the people within that company.
Once you have a little practice in your leadership role, I encourage you to take this same exercise out at the management levels of the company rather than wait for a yearly strategy session. Build a “What are we doing that is not working?” item into the agenda and truly work to eliminate those things which are unnecessary or take too much time for too little return.
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Strategic Sense is a Leadership Development, Plans of Action and Facilitation organization who’s mission is to change the world for leaders and their employees everywhere. We believe each individual comes with their own unique talents and skills that can be enhanced and utilized to help them become the very best leaders only they can be.
