Week 16 :-: Prioritization – Putting first things first.

Objectives:

• Understand the importance of prioritization in leadership
• Evaluate your ability to prioritize
• Develop strategies through effective time management for greater prioritization

Show me your weekly schedule and I should be able to predict where you will be in a few months. One thing, God has blessed everyone on earth with is, an equal supply of time. We all start each day with a credit of 24hrs which can be expended as desired. How do you distribute your time among your different daily activities?

"Putting first things first means organizing and executing around your most important priorities. It is living and being driven by the principles you value most, not by the agendas and forces surrounding you." ~Stephen R. Covey

“When we are busy, we naturally believe that we are achieving. But busyness does not equal productivity. Activity is not necessarily accomplishment.” ~John C. Maxwell

“But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” ~Jesus Christ

Why Prioritize?


As earlier stated, we all receive a daily credit of 24hrs and mostly have the freedom to determine how to invest this important resource called time. Investing time into relevant priorities which are related to your individual and team goals should be a priority for the determined Servant Leader. Whatever you invest time in will grow. Are you giving priority to the things that are relevant to your growth as a Servant Leader? A person who is not driven by their priorities is susceptible to being carried away by anything happening around them. They become involved in many things not necessarily because they have to but simply because, they seem to have excess time and are willing to donate it to others even if the activity they are involved in does not reflect their life mission, visions and goals. This is called, wasted time! As Maxwell said, being busy does not mean you are achieving anything. You can be so busy, yet doing things that add nothing positive to you, your vision and/or your people. When we read the gospels, it is almost as if Jesus was always busy. He invested in time in:

· Ministering (teach, heal, deliver etc.) to people;
· Praying to His Father;
· Empowering His disciples.

These activities reflected His mission statement:

"The Spirit of the Lord is on Me, because He has anointed Me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim deliverance to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to release the oppressed...” Luke 4:18

Do your activities reflect your mission statement? Are you ensuring that the most important priorities are given the necessary time investment? If you sow time in the right things, you will reap the right results.
Do you prioritize?
Let us take a brief look at your weekly program. Think about how you spent the last 5 days. Take a sheet of paper and do the following:

1. Write your mission statement at the top.
2. Write Monday and from memory, write the different things you have been involved in over the last 5 days. Focus only on activities that took at least 30 minutes of your time on a daily basis. Do not include time spent sleeping unless your sleep time exceed 8 hours on a daily basis.
3. Write the next 4 days and repeat the same exercise in number 2.
4. Add up the time you spent for similar activities for the whole 5 days.
5. On average, where are you spending the majority of you time and where are you spending the least of your time?
6. Are the top three time consuming activities relevant to your life mission? What does this tell you about your dedication to your life mission, visions and goals?

Tools for effective prioritization

Some practical tools I have been using to help me invest time wisely include the time management quadrant as well as a weekly planner which are all based on the goals I have. The time management quadrant helps you prioritize tasks by listing them in terms of urgency and importance, while the weekly planner helps you to prioritize the week in terms of relevant goals.

a. Time Management Quadrant.

  

As a leader, you want to ensure that you are spending the majority of your time in box 2 (Not Urgent, Important). This where planning occurs (Mission, Vison, Goals) as well as where you remind yourself of your values. Effective planning will help you reduce time on activities that waste time as well as instances of urgencies. They also help you manage better box 3 activities which may sound as urgent, but are not necessarily important. The Time management quadrant can be complemented with the weekly planner.

b. Weekly Planner.

The weekly planner can help you plan ahead for activities which are relevant to your values, mission, visions and goals. You can add activities as the week goes by but it is important not to add too many activities which may bring about discouragement.

Week 16 Assignment

1. Are you consistently putting first things first?
2. Draw up a blank time management quadrant and populate it following the activities that take up a majority of your time at the moment.
3. How do you plan to increase time spent in quadrant 2 and less time in the other quadrants?
4. Using a weekly planner, prioritize your activities for the next week?
5. Share this lesson with at least one person in your inner circle and get them to do the same exercise.
6. Write a brief summary of what you learned this week and explain why it is important for all leaders. Post on your blog and share the link in your group.