On personality tests, I’m one of those guys who likes people and ideas and stuff like that.

That means I don’t like paperwork and processes and processes that involve paperwork. We feel that “I’s” should remain undotted and the only reason to cross “T’s” is to make sure nobody mistakes them for L’s or I’s.

But alas, as a professional services provider, the details are amazingly important. Without attending to the details, the strategic broad brush strokes become irrelevant.

Lack of execution renders brilliant ideation and good relationships useless (especially when we’re talking about delivering a service).

Today, I punted ideas and spent time focused on shoring up processes – doing the little things that, over time, will help deliver important results

While I know that it’s important to spend most of my time doing the things that leverage my strengths, but the details sill must get done.

Unless you are able to set up your organization to delegate all such things, you still will have to perform process-oriented tasks (although it’s a good idea to identify the things that you’d love to offload over time and do it as soon as possible).

My suggestions to tackle those tasks in a way to get ’em done without infringing too much on the time you want to dedicate to your more effective work:

1. Batch Your Tasks: Do a bunch of the mundane things at one time. Just clench your teeth and push straight through them.
2. Pomodoro Technique: Set a timer a couple times a day within which you will do process type tasks – respond to emails, note whatever CRM or other system that you have to keep notes in, make phone calls, and so forth.
3. Save It Till the End of the Day: Get your thought work done early while you’re sharp. Knock out the

How about you? How do you get done the things that you have to do but feel like the conflict with your more effective work? Leave a comment below.

Today’s Listening and Reading: 

I listened to a few episodes of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast with John Jantsch. I especially enjoyed his podcast with David Meerman Scott talking about the ‘new rules of selling’.  The men are pioneers in the inbound marketing world.

Until tomorrow…

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This blog is a response to Dan Miller’s unintentional challenge from his podcast on August 15, 2014: If you read or listen to 30 minutes of quality content a day, you’ll double your income. 

From September 1, 2014 through March 1, 2015, I will be doing the following:

1. Listening or reading to 30 minutes of success, growth, business, spiritual, or other mindset-shifting, skill-sharpening content.
2. Selecting one action item from that content (with some leeway to select an action from a previous day’s content).
3. Doing that one action.
4. Writing about the action or some other idea from the reading and listening of the day.