Bullseye Prioritization

I have found effective prioritization as a key to success as my world has become more and more complicated. As you become more senior in you organization, it will be incumbent on you to choose where you spend time. Your boss is likely to give you less direction on what priorities make sense. At the same time, others will be look for help from you on how to prioritize. I have found a simple bullseye as an effective visual for prioritization.

When asked to prioritize, the first reaction for many people is to write a list of things. Maybe it has a specific order, often times it’s a laundry list of all the things that they may be spending time thinking about or working on. The list is useful as a starting place. The challenge truly comes in limiting the list to the most important priorities.

I use a bullseye as a physical representation of my priorities because it allows me to “feel” the crowding of top priorities. Draw a bullseye that has a small circle in the middle, with two more rings that define a middle and an outer ring. You now have three rings in which you can write your priorities. 

The obvious implication of using a bullseye is that the inner circle, where you put your most important priorities, is the smallest. Maybe you can write two or three priorities here. Even with only these few items it will feel full. The outer ring can hold the largest volume and this is where the lowest priority items can go. These are probably also the easiest to push to someone else or skip.

The middle ring is the hardest to manage because the priorities here feel important in their own right. They may not be as important as your bullseye priorities. They still need to be done. Your challenge as a leader is to prevent this middle ring from stealing your time from the bullseye priorities. 

The middle ring priorities are ripe for delegation to someone on your team ready for a new challenge. Consider who in your sphere of leadership would see the middle ring priority as a development challenge. Plan out a way for this person to get it done with support from you in the minimum amount of time (check-in, review, feedback). You can now both develop someone else, get things done and focus the majority of your time on the bullseye.

Draw a bullseye. Place your top two or three priorities into the center ring. Identify those time stealing middle-ring priorities. Make a plan to get those done without preempting your bullseye priorities.  

Consider the outer ring items as "optional" items. A colleague recommended these items may also be the items to be done when you aren't at your best. He tags his outer ring items as to-do when he's tired, such as expenses, because they don't require a lot of mental energy.

How can you use the bullseye to focus on the key items?