Productive or Just Busy

“Know the difference”

-Nathan Jamail, Keynote Speaker, Bestselling Author

When I ask certain people in my circle of family, friends and peers, no matter what day it is or what they are actually doing, “How are you?”, they always say, “busy, busy, busy”.  And yet, over the decade + that I have been working with CEO’s, COO”s and Leaders from around the world- I have found the most successful people are actually never too busy. But those that seem to struggle, or do just enough, are more often too busy to do anything else.   

Here is what I have learned from this:  the most successful are productive while others are just merely busy.  So what is the difference? 

There are two main differences:

• First: to be productive is when one’s actions are based on a purpose or plan versus a task.
• Second a productive person focuses on the most important tasks versus the most urgent tasks- unless it is a life or death situation (by the way, most urgent issues are not life or death-  in fact most urgent issues happen because someone did not do the important task months or years prior causing it to become an urgent problem. 

There are several more differences, but these two are what leaders in today’s world can relate to the most.

Taking action based on purpose vs completing a task 

A great example of taking action on purpose is with this crazy pandemic.  Let’s use a tale of two leaders to show the difference. 

There is a leader we will call “Productive Paul”; he is calling 3 of his 6 sales reps each morning via Webex.  Why? Paul says, “I know that my sales reps are making over 20 calls a day to clients, future clients and business partners all day and I want to check in with them to discuss that day’s calls and help them practice, scrimmage and prepare for their meetings- not to mention I want to be sure they are doing ok”.   It is important to note that just because a purpose is based on business does not mean a leader does not recognize the needs of the person too.  Paul’s calls and Webex meetings have a purpose and that purpose is to help his people and their preparation. 

The other leader is “Busy Bob”.  Busy Bob is calling three sales reps every morning via Webex too.  Why?  Bob will tell you he is doing it because ‘it is his job’.  He does it because that is what his boss expects from him, also it helps him stay in touch with his team and make sure they are doing their jobs and that they are ok.  Bob is not doing anything wrong necessarily, but he is not doing anything with a purpose, which means his is just doing things that keep him busy.  Do you see the difference?  Bob is doing what so many leaders do, they are doing the activity of their jobs, and in too many cases, they are merely checking the box or going through the motions which is keeping them busy yes, but not productive. 

Important vs Urgent

Let’s focus on the excuses leaders use, versus just the idea of important versus urgent.  All leaders that are coaches will agree that developing and teaching our teams is the most important aspect of a leader/coach’s job, though it would never be described as urgent.   But let’s really look at the way it works;

Leader 1; “Productive Pam” spend 3 hours a week conducting joint video meetings with her team members and once it is safe to do so, will spend 3 days a week on the floor or in the car visiting clients with her team.  Why? Because she believes that this is the best time for her to help develop and coach her employees by showing them through modeling, as well as give feedback and find areas of improvement when she watches her team members lead the meetings.  She understands that a coach must teach, correct and prepare their employees for success.  Pam does not ignore the urgent craziness of being a leader, but she handles the urgent stuff in-between the important activities. Making the important tasks the anchor and core of her day (not to mention she has worked so much with her team, she feel confident to delegate some of the ‘urgent’ tasks to her team members anyhow).

Leader 2; “Too busy” Betty is super busy and when asked to help another leader or her boss, she responds with, “I am really busy right now, but I can do it if you need me to?” (sound familiar?).   “Too busy Betty” plans to spend 3 days a week with her team as well, but because she is so busy, in reality she just can’t.  In fact Betty will tell you she can barely get out 1 day per week because she is so busy taking care of all the ‘problems and issues’, and doing ‘all the work’ that needs done. Dig a little deeper and you will find out that Betty not only is letting the urgent, essentially unimportant, tasks get in the way, she also believes that her people know what they are doing.  She feels they know what they should be doing and although she wants to go out in the field with her team members, she does not really think she is needed or that in the big picture it will make that much of a difference. In fact if Betty were asked “why don’t you coach your employees, spend time in the field, do one on one meetings- or any of the other activities that another successful leader is doing?”, you would hear something like, “Which one do you want me to do, spend time with my employees and have meetings or do you want me to handle the issues and do the reports and all the other parts of my job?” (again, sound familiar?).    Lastly Betty would justify it stating, “my situation is different than the other leader’s situation, and no one really understands” with more excuses to follow.  The real difference, and the only difference, is Pam (and Paul from above) are productive leaders and Betty (and Bob) are busy leaders. 

Which leader are you? 

If you lead leaders, assess your leaders and identify your Pauls and Pams and your Bobs and Bettys.  Trust me- all of us leaders have both, unfortunately.   Now most of us will automatically feel that we ourselves identify with Paul and Pam- but really how many of us will say, “you know what, I think I am Bob or Betty”.   In fact I would even bet that most of us will say there is a little of all four leaders in us.  Because we all have a tendency to let tasks get in the way of our purpose and the urgent stuff stops us from getting to the important stuff. 

So what do we do? 

First- recognize every time you feel like you are too busy and pause.  Go through your items and break it down.  What can be delegated?  How can you prioritize things that develop your team as first priority (remember, when you work with your team as a priority, they can start taking all the other tasks off your plate)?   Second, know your purpose and the actions needed to achieve it. 

The real heart of productivity vs busyness? Intention and mindset– they are what truly differentiates the activity and thus the results.