The excellent wife and mother

In the early 1900s, a businessman persisted in securing the appointment with a very prominent business owner. He did not ask for any fee for his services, but only told him to send him a check for what he thought was appropriate after he had followed his advice for one month. Intrigued, the business owner agreed and asked the gentleman to proceed with his advice. 

The advice was to write down the top 10 priorities that would have the most impact on his company’s profitability. After he spent a few moments doing so, the businessman then asked him to choose the most important task from that list of 10 and to devote at least 80% of his time to that task until it was completed. Once that is done, move on to the next most important task from the list of 10, and so on. 

He also suggested that he spend the first 10 minutes of each day reviewing, updating, and adjusting his list of 10. One month later, the business owner sent this man a check for $20,000, which was an enormous amount of money in the early 1900s.

Many of us understand the benefits of creating a to-do list. A few understand the importance of prioritizing that list. Fewer still understand that prioritizing that list according to what is truly important instead of what is easiest to get out of the way, is the difference between genuine success and simply staying busy. 

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