Doing More With Less (and increasing productivity and effectiveness)

Have you ever felt overwhelmed by the sheer amount of your backlog at work? Do you often feel that the tasks that you need to do keep piling up every single day? Do you drag yourself to work dreading the eventual faceoff with these "monsters"? Then fret no more! the solution to this problem has already been discovered  by an Italian economist named Vilfredo Pareto way back in 1906. In a nutshell, Pareto's principle states that 80% of your results come from only 20% of your efforts. This principle holds true for most things in life, like 80% of your sales come from only 20% of your clients, and 80% of the world's wealth is held by only 20% of the population. The task for us then is to focus on the 20% of our efforts that lead to 80% of our results. Focus on strengths, not weaknesses.

From this principle we can learn that 80% of the things we do do not contribute to our goals. Let's be honest, what ELSE do you do at work aside from doing your work tasks? checking facebook? continuously checking personal emails? writing blogs (hehe)? watching youtube? running or walking around while looking busy? The point is, take a hard look at the things that you do and see whether how much weight they pull in terms of effectivity and productiveness. This is basically an 80/20 analysis, find out what works and focus on that. Take away the clutter and do more with less.

recommended reading:


The 80/20 Principle: The Secret to Success by Achieving More with Less




Tim has a section in his book how he used the Pareto Principle to leverage his time and income.. great read indeed!