First Things First (5, The Effective Executive)

5: First Things First

If there is any one "secret" of effectiveness, it is concentration.

For doing one thing at a time means doing it fast.

The first rule for the concentration of executive efforts is to slough off the past that has ceased to be productive.

The executive who wants to be effective and who wants his organization to be effective polices all programs, all activities, all tasks.

Social organizations need to stay lean and muscular as much as biological organisms.

The need to slough off the outworn old to make possible the productive new is universal.

The most important thing about priorities and posteriorities is, however, not intelligent analysis but courage. Courage rather than analysis dictates the truly important rules for identifying priorities:

•  Pick the future as against the past;
•  Focus on opportunity rather than on problem;
•  Choose your own direction—rather than climb on the bandwagon; and
•  Aim high, aim for something that will make a difference, rather than for something that is "safe" and easy to do.

In business the successful companies are not those that work at developing new products for their existing line but those that aim at innovating new technologies or new businesses.

 --  From "The Effective Executive" (Peter Drucker)