Cultivating a sense of urgency

Those that interacted with me regularly last year should know that my theme for the year was stamina. Put concisely, stamina is the ability to consistently deliver high-quality output under severe conditions over time. I spoke about stamina in the context of working through illness, triumphing during long travels, and persevering through weeks of project crunch-time. But, that was last year's theme.

This year's theme, I have determined is: sense of urgency. Urgency is the attitude that a task should get done speedily. That it is important. That time is of the essence. A sense of urgency, therefore, is behaving as if every action is purposeful, every aspect of your work-life is urgent. It is about resolving to get things done and to project that resolve and purpose to those around you.

I first became aware that a sense of urgency could be cultivated in Basic Training (US Army Infantry that is). Drill Sergeants would routinely yell "Private! Move like you have a purpose!". In eating, in training, and in just walking from place to place, this mantra was repeated time and again. At first, I followed this command to avoid the shouting and occasional extra push-ups that would come with a perceived infraction, but in time, I found that moving with a purpose became second nature. You may notice that I often walk too fast, eat too fast, and talk too fast. I didn't always. These are habits born from following that simple directive: "Move like you have a purpose."

I came to recognize the imperative behind the mantra: one never knows when time previously wasted could have been used to handle an emergency task. In the army, this may mean the lives of people around you. In business, it may mean the livelihoods of people around you. No less serious, I assert. When you adopt a 'sense of urgency' attitude, people around you will notice. They respect your time: after all, you are busy taking care of business. Most powerfully, those for whom you perform your tasks will appreciate that your attitude toward completion mirrors their own attitude about the request. Dealing with someone with a properly honed sense of urgency is reassuring. When you move like you have a purpose, good things start to happen. I guarantee it.

Some notes of caution lest you confuse sense of urgency with an urgency addiction:

1. Don't mistake a sense of urgency for panic. Panic is what happens when the demand for immediacy outstrips our capacity to act. It is motion without focus, action with purpose. Urgency is motion in focus, purposeful intent. Panic is the enemy. Urgency is the weapon we use to defeat the enemy. When tasks are handled with a sense of urgency the backlog tends not to grow and overwhelm.
   
2. Don't mistake moving with a purpose for rushing. Being in a rush prevents observation, thoughtfulness, and care. Moving with purpose is thorough, powerful, and filled with motion. Rushing and moving purposefully may look the same, but the trail left behind each is quite different.
   
3. Not all tasks can be MOST urgent. You must always prioritize your goals. And having prioritized, ruthlessly pursue those top goals until they are completed. Often the strategy for completing the most things in the shortest amount of time is NOT TO DO MORE THAN ONE THING AT A TIME. Rather, to complete each task with focus and decisiveness—a fast serial approach rather than a parallel process. Careful pruning and feeding of your 'plate' is important career skill.
   
4. Finally, a cultivated sense of urgency doesn't require that EVERY task be handled immediately. Indeed, part of cultivating a sense of urgency involves choosing which tasks require action to deliver value and those that do not. Those that do are handled with purpose. Those that do not are not to be handled at all. If it isn't important, in other words, why are you doing it? Instead, get a handle on tasks that deliver value. I ask you: do you jump when every new email arrives?
   

Side Note: [I am not a Coveyite, but if you haven't read the 7 Habits book, you probably should.]