It doesn’t matter if you are the sales professional, the small business owner or the mom (and maybe all 3!), life can throw lots of distractions our way!
None of us our immune to it. You mix our professional lives with our personal lives and the instant access technology that we have on us all the time and it is a recipe for distraction.
This is one of the main reasons that certain people excel over the rest. I’ve observed this working with sales professionals. The top producers are not just the best “sales people,” but they maintain their focus more consistently. They keep the main thing, the main thing.
This isn’t always easy to do, especially when we feel we have several “main things.” Afterall, our family is certainly a main thing. Of course, we have to allocate enough time to a given task, but then the key is to be fully present.
I’m very serious about my office worspace. Both my physical desk as well as my online workspace like email and apps that I use. I wasn’t always this way. I used to have stacks of things (distractions) all over. These are things that I didn’t want to deal with, but I was always looking at them. I learned it not only distracted me, but also drained my energy to look at it all the time. For me, I learned I don’t want all these things to create even more negative energy by thinking about them all the time.
I created systems for myself. When a distraction pops up, I have to ask myself is this both important and urgent? Rarely is it both. If not, I put it away to be dealt with in the appropriate time. This allows me to focus my energy on the main thing and be more present. That is the thing that if I do it, I’ve been productive. If I allow the other stuff to crowd my space, it is so easy to be worn out at the end of the day, but totally drop the ball on the main thing.
I don’t always do this well. It is much easier said than done. But it is a secret among the most productive.
What is your main thing? What distracts you from it? What can you do to better eliminate those distractions so you can focus on your main thing?
Rich Florence 