13 Jul Should you be using the 80/20 principle to better manage the time in your business?
The business world itself, the way you run your own business and the way you plan and manage your time are all unbalanced – not with intent or deliberately, but they are.
How often in your business do you and your team spend time, far too much time, on the little things?
And when you really look at these little things, how important are they to your business’s success?
Let me ask a more direct question:
If you stopped doing those little things, how would that impact your business?
Remember, choosing what NOT to do matters when it comes to freeing up time and improving your business.
The Pareto principle, also known as the 80/20 rule, states that roughly 80% of effects come from 20% of causes. In other words, a small percentage of causes have an outsized effect.
The principle is named after Vilfredo Pareto, an Italian economist who, back in 1895, noticed that 80% of his garden peas came from 20% of the peapods he planted.
This concept is especially important when it comes to analysing how time is spent in your business because it is likely that:
- 80% of your profits come from 20% of your products, services and customers
- 80% of your results come from 20% of your time and effort
This basically means that you are wasting 80% of your time on just 20% of your customers, profits and results.
When you identify this in your business, the importance of focusing on the things that deliver maximum returns seems obvious.
When working out what not to do in your business, it’s important to analyse and determine the tasks that will contribute most significantly to the success of your business.
Using the 80/20 principle, identify 20% of tasks that generate 80% of the desired outcomes and results and work out how to do more of them.