A Sense Of Urgency = Faster Results

People who know me are usually astonished by my ‘keen’ sense of urgency. I’ve been told I have the attention span of a goldfish (3 seconds)… But the reality is that I can focus on ONE thing for HOURS if and ONLY IF it is the highest and best use of my time. I never could have completed my Ph.D. thesis in 3 months without that level of singular focus and concentration…

That being said, several people in the last few weeks have asked me where I got this ‘sense of urgency’ and even though I was partially ‘born with a proactive’ and optimistic attitude, my training in the printing / reprographics industry is where it was ingrained in me at the tender age of 15 when I started working full time as a student.

Printing is NOT about the photocopies, the prints, the binding of the reports, the business cards…

It’s ONLY about TIME.

Doing it FAST.

It doesn’t matter that the brochures are perfect if they are delivered the day AFTER the trade show.

Some people just don’t get that.

Of course you have to do the job right, but that is SECOND to doing it ON TIME.

We used to manage our priorities by changing them AT LEAST EVERY 15 minutes – ALL DAY LONG… Can you imagine juggling 10, 20 or even 30 balls in the air at the same time?

That’s what it was like. I learned from the best. The SINGULAR focus on DELIVERY and SPEED was pervasive.

Back in the 1980’s we spent $1 Million out of +/-$10 Million in Revenue picking up and delivery jobs.

$1 Million.

How’s that for commitment? We ran our own fleet of cars and trucks with a full-time dispatcher across 5 branches.

What’s the point?

You need to know WHAT INDUSTRY YOU’RE in so you can have a sense of urgency and IMPORTANCE about what you need to focus on.

  • A sit-down restaurant is NOT about the food – it’s about the EXPERIENCE, FEELING, ENVIRONMENT with food as one of the MAJOR COMPONENTS, but not the singular one.
  • A hire car is NOT about the driving. It’s about WAITING for you and the CONVENIENCE of NOT having to be worried catching a taxi.
  • A hotel is about treating a guest like a king or queen – everything else is SECONDARY – I blogged about this recently.

So how can you learn to be more PROactive?

Set your deadlines and FORCE yourself to meet them. If that means you have to stay up late until 2 AM – DO IT. Set deadlines that SEEM to be unrealistic and see what happens. I just did a website makeover for a client in 3 days “for the fun of it” to see if it could be done. Now I know that it could be done in 24 hours with ONE day of planning.

Push yourself to keep chasing the clock and you’ll soon realise that your competitors will be left in the dust with nowhere to go.

Or just ignore this blog post and hope your competitors don’t lift their game!

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