Productivity Improvements - Number 2: Your Key Results

Now, we have a "To Do" list. Your "To Do" list should include EVERYTHING you have to do. It can be on a clean sheet of paper. Just use a sheet of paper and list everything - every day - that you have to do. You may have several sheets of paper with your "To Do's".

Next - Your KRAs.

Think about this question; What have you been hired to do?

List out the five to seven things or areas that contribute the most to your ability to be successful. If you are a consultant, one area might be getting business. Another might be, completing your project on-time and well. Another might be, training and growing your staff.

Whatever you do, you have only five to seven key areas that will contribute to the results that you have been hired to do.

Write these seven down on a separate sheet of paper. You may scratch through any one of these seven - after you start thinking about it. In other words, you may be revising your list as the week goes on. But write them out. You may think and feel that you know what your seven KRAs are, but until you write them out, you cannot crystalize them.

One last thing - on the "To Do" list you created. Always work from a "To Do" list. Don't do anything without first writing it on your To Do list. The power of writing forces you to think through what it means and starts to put a priority behind it.