The 5 Choices: The Path to Extraordinary Productivity - Hardcover

Über die Autorinnen und Autoren

Kory Kogon is FranklinCovey’s Global Practice Leader for Productivity focusing her research and content development around time management, project management, and communication skills. In addition to coauthoring The 5 Choices: The Path to Extraordinary Productivity, Kory is one of the authors of Project Management for the Unofficial Project Manager, and Presentation Advantage. Prior to FranklinCovey, Kory spent six years as the Executive Vice President of Worldwide Operations for AlphaGraphics, Inc.

Adam Merrill is vice president of innovation for FranklinCovey, where he leads the effort for developing award-winning content that helps individuals and organizations become dramatically more productive. Adam has been researching time management and productivity topics around the globe for over twenty-five years, with particular emphasis on the impact of changing technology on how people succeed in a digital world. In addition, he is also deeply immersed in the impact physical and mental health have on one’s ability to be productive and make good decisions.

Leena Rinne is a senior consultant with FranklinCovey. In her role, she works with clients to increase productivity and develop leaders in their organizations. Leena works with a wide variety of organizations, ranging from Fortune 100 companies to small, locally owned businesses.

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The 5 Choices

INTRODUCTION

FEELING BURIED?

Jaivon opened his eyes with a start as the plane shuddered beneath him. He looked around and realized it was just turbulence . . . and that he had fallen asleep again.

He had been dozing on and off for the last hour, trying to stay awake so that he could continue working on his notes. “I’m not supposed to be on this plane at all,” he thought angrily. “I should be at home with Kalisha!” They had gotten married just a few months ago and were in the process of moving into a new home. This trip had come up unexpectedly.

It couldn’t have come at a worse time. Kali had taken some time off from her job to organize the move and he had done the same thing, but one of his company’s largest accounts needed some emergency technical help, and he was the best one to provide it. “At least no one is texting me right now,” he grumbled. “There’s at least one advantage of flying a red-eye.”

As he slid back into his crowded, stuffy middle-row seat, he thought about the past few weeks—one crisis after another. As one of the lead developers in a small but growing software firm, his schedule was hectic. He had also recently taken on more team leadership responsibilities, so now he had more people to satisfy. If it wasn’t questions from the sales team, it was issues from his developers. So many decisions to make! His email, instant messenger, and text messages were filled with questions that, apparently, only he could answer. His life felt like this middle seat—crowded—and the problem was only getting worse.

He was originally excited about the company and its prospects when he took the job two years ago. Their product was a cool bit of software, and it was the kind of programming he liked to do. With Kalisha’s work and his job, they had begun to look for a place where they could finally make a home and maybe start a family. “But at this rate,” he thought, “we won’t be together enough to raise a family at all, much less begin one!”

Kali’s job was busy also. She was in retail and managed a couple of boutique clothing stores. Because they were open into the evening, she usually came home late. And even then, there was often work to do—checking on the next day’s schedules when people called in sick, following up on inventory, and so forth.

As Jaivon rolled all this over in his mind, he began to feel something he hadn’t felt before—despair. “Will this ever end?” he thought.

Does any of this sound familiar?

While this might not match your situation exactly, our guess is that some of it rings true.

When you picked up this book, you probably did it for one of two reasons:

1. You are looking for some new ideas about how to be more productive. You may actually be managing pretty well, but you want to improve. You want to manage your time better, to get more out of each day. You may want to make more of a difference, to progress in your career, to have more time for those people who are important to you, or to achieve some really important goals.

2. You feel buried every day, and you want some serious help. You may, however, feel more like Jaivon—struggling to stay above the growing pile of things to do and the demands and decisions coming at you all day long. You may feel out of balance and that you rarely have time for yourself. You may feel that your health and relationships are suffering and that your primary goal is just to get through the day in one piece. You know if something doesn’t change soon, you just might explode.

If you relate to either of these descriptions, or are somewhere in between, you are not alone. In our experience, an increasing number of people are feeling the challenge of accomplishing what they want to in their lives. They see great possibilities, but also feel overwhelmed, rushing from one thing to another, trying to move ahead but worried that they may be falling behind. For many, it seems the more they do, the more comes their way. It’s a never-ending flow of incoming tasks, appointments, obligations, and responsibilities. In some cases, all these things feel like a giant mountain of suffocating gravel pouring over them and threatening to bury them alive.

The purpose of this book is to help you get out from under that gravel, take a fresh breath, and reclaim your life. We will help you dig out by giving you the principles, processes, and tools to help you change the equation—a practical path to overcome the tyranny of the endless flow of the “incoming.” These are not quick-fix magic formulas. They will require some work, but each chapter is full of simple and powerful things you can do immediately and that will have a significant impact on your life.

As you begin implementing this material, one step at a time, you will begin to change the equation. You will get unburied and move forward in more productive and fulfilling ways. You will get clear and focused on the things that matter and you will both be and feel truly accomplished at the end of every day.

THE PRODUCTIVITY PARADOX

It has never been easier in human history to accomplish great things. A big part of that is the dramatic increase in the power of technology to make us more productive.

Today’s technology allows a child in Bangladesh to learn algebra from the best teachers on the planet. It allows people from around the globe to instantly see each other’s faces and collaborate in real time. We can access the world’s greatest libraries and publish our own thoughts to people everywhere. Modern technology has enabled people to advance medical practice, decode the human genome, overthrow governments, distribute state secrets, and expose corruption.

With advances in interconnectivity, processing power, and wearable technologies that measure everything from the temperature of our skin to the flow of our blood, the interaction between how we live and think and the technologies we use becomes more inseparable each day. And the revolution is just getting started.

Yet, paradoxically, these same technologies can make it harder than ever to accomplish the things that are important to us.

THE PRODUCTIVITY PARADOX

It is both easier and harder than ever before to achieve extraordinary productivity and feel accomplished in our lives.

The incoming flow of information enabled by today’s technology fills our lives with tasks and demands for our attention which, in the end, may not matter that much. Technology allows anyone who feels like it, anywhere in the world, to drop something into our digital inboxes, requiring us to respond, even if only to say no. We become buried alive by the unstoppable flow of everything that comes our way, which robs us of the energy we could be spending on higher-value activities. In many cases, we have redefined success as simply getting things done on time (barely!) rather than doing the important things with the attention and quality that makes us feel like we are, in fact, doing extraordinary work.

The tech-enabled, hyperpaced nature of our work has impacted our lives to such a degree that people feel overwhelmed like never before. They feel buried in things to do and simultaneously drained of their capacity to do them. They feel agitated and anxious, stressed when they are working and stressed when they are not. It is a semipermanent state of worried restlessness that pervades our...