Are You Doing Your To-Do List Wrong? – #70

If you’ve been a long-time subscriber of The Random, you know how often I’ve talked about Warren Buffett’s 25/5 Goal-Setting Strategy. It basically goes like this:

First, list 25 things you want to accomplish in the next year.

This should take a week or two. Look at all areas of your life. Ask yourself:

What do I want to accomplish in my career?

What financial goals do I want to tackle?

How’s my health? What can I do better?

How about my family? How do I find more quality time?

What about charitable goals? Is there a cause I should align with?

Don’t stop until you get to at least 25.

Then narrow it down to five.

Take the entire list and select the MOST IMPORTANT five goals.

Once you have selected the five, circle each one. Remember, circle five. No more, no less.

Then you detail your plan for five and go to work.

Okay, that’s great for the annual goals, but what about your daily “to-do” list?

Charles Duhigg, a writer at the New Yorkersays most people do this completely wrong.

He says that most of us create a list of things that need to be done, and then we cross them off as we complete them.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

The solution? Look at your to-do list and “…ask yourself what is the most important thing I could do today? Write that on your to-do list, and then stop writing.”

Duhigg says we need to force ourselves into this habit so that everyday we start to focus on making a greater impact, instead of doing what’s easiest or most rewarding.

Think about this for a second.

We can spend our entire day answering emails or on social media or binge watching The Squid Game. Being busy is not being productive. It’s not necessarily meaningful. It doesn’t help others. It won’t help us grow.

I don’t know about you, but this is challenging for me. Here are some things that helped.

Create your “one thing” first thing in the morning.

Do your “one thing” before you open email or review social media.

If you have an office door, close it until the “one thing” is complete.

I’m thinking of this a little like Ted Lasso has the word “Believe” taped everywhere he goes. I’m considering posting “One Thing” on the wall, to make sure I stay focused during the day.

Integration? Theoretically, these two goal-setting formulas can work well together. Each day, look at your Buffett goals and do “one thing” to move that goal along.

Bullish on In-Person Events

Exactly a week ago today I was on the keynote stage at Content Marketing World 2021 in Cleveland, Ohio. It had been two years since I spoke in person at this event, and it was great being back on stage again.

If you’d like the details on my keynote, I shared them in my latest Content Inc. podcast available here.

For obvious reasons, the event was a bit smaller than normal, but what was lacking in numbers was made up in enthusiasm. Simply put, people were overjoyed to be around other human beings again. NOTE: To attend, you either needed to be vaccinated or show proof of a negative test.

I had a number of conversations at the event with attendees about the future of events. There was no consensus. Some felt that the future of events would be small, niche events. Others believed that most events would stay online.

Me? As I’ve said before, 2022 and 2023 are going to be HUGE for in-person events. And, at the same time, attendee expectations have gone down.

Boxed lunch instead of hot meal? Totally fine.

Fewer breakouts and more general sessions? Yes please.

Errors and miscommunication? Lots of forgiveness going around.

Even the sponsors seemed happy with fewer leads.

All this means that it’s going to be the perfect environment for profitable shows in the next few years. AND, the largest and most impactful events will be launched in the next few years. Economic recessions work that way (HP, Hyatt, Uber all launched during recessions) and the same will happen for this event recession.

Do you smell that? That’s opportunity.

The Death of Emojis in Subject Lines

best practice is to not use emojis in email subject lines.

You know that in almost every one of these newsletters I put an emoji in the headline. Well, I went back over the last 15 issues to check on what worked well and what didn’t.

Of the 15 editions, 10 contained emojis in the subject line and five did not contain any emojis.

Guess what?

My top five performing enewsletters DID NOT CONTAIN ANY EMOJIS. No kidding.

And…you might not be seeing any more emojis from yours truly in the near future. 🙂

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