Remember I said, you can do whatever you want? You can but that may seem a little overwhelming.
Here’s the secret sauce:
- Write down anything and everything that you want to do. Write down every good idea that a team member has. Write down every item the boss mentions that pertains to your team (and some items that don’t). Write down every good idea that comes up while you’re mowing the lawn.
- Keep this list on a tracker. Track the item and the next tangible step, including when/if you plan to follow up.*
- Watch the environment. Here’s where your job comes in leader. Watch the environment for opportunity- to connect to other efforts, for cash to flow, for senior leader priorities. Be creative, you’ll be surprised at how many opportunities come up. Watch for your chance to pounce.
- Keep your team agile. On any given day one of our team members may have a list of 57 things. They are likely working on 2-3 of those things at any time. The next week we may be working on 2 or 3 different things, sometimes without getting last week’s 2 or 3 things complete. Make sure everyone knows its ok not to complete a task. Failure is an option too, sometimes we try shit and it doesn’t work. If the project is worth it, try a different way, if not, scrap it.
The environment is what determines which 2 or 3 of the 57 things are. The environment is what determines our priorities. We are agile, we can switch anytime. We are quick. We are quick enough to bring an item near completion in a short time.
This isn’t always comfortable. This requires agility on the doers part and close attention on the leaders part. We are not afraid to fail but failing isn’t comfortable. We drive our initiatives based on the environment in order to make magic.
And magic, we make.
*A task tracker of ours from 2013 is pictured here. Want your own pre-formatted tracker? email us at TheMaxDis@gmail.com
