The inbox on my desk is the office equivalent of Mary Poppin’s carpet bag. A bottomless pit that seems to hold ideas that are far too big for it. Just when I think I must be nearing the bottom, I discover another half-finished project or article that never got fully fleshed out.
In fact, I have so many ideas that I constantly feel like I am leaving things unfinished, unpublished, unsent. Sometimes I feel so crushed by the pressure of all these ideas, that I stop even reaching into the inbox altogether, and instead turn my focus to other areas.
And therin lies the rub.
Generating ideas has never been my problem. Starting projects, making plans and brainstorming all comes easily to me, however all of these fledgling ideas compete for my attention, and it’s rare that I have the focus to nuture any of them into a fully formed state where they bear fruit. Fortunately, this is where my office manager comes in, whip in hand (figuratively; rest assured that I suffer no physical abuse from my co-workers, although I don’t know if the same would be true if I were to steal her last Diet Coke from staff fridge) and keeps me on track.
I once heard a saying (I’ll credit Michael Masterson, although I can’t be sure he coined the phrase):
Ready, fire, aim.
In other words, action matters more than plans. Sometimes. Of course as a strategist I understand the importance of planning, but if you spend all your time thinking up ideas, making notes, forming plans, and no time executing them then you are like the marathon runner who spends all his time training in the gym and never actually enters the race.
Don’t let your creativity cripple your productivity!
I’m putting together a great post about how to decide what plans to put into action first, to be sure to subscribe to get it delivered straight to your inbox or feed reader of choice when it’s ready.
