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Back in the early 1900’s Charles Schwab (Andrew Carnegie’s right-hand man) and president of Carnegie Steel, granted an interview to an efficiency consultant called Ivy Lee.
Schwab told Lee that he needed to apply what he already knew more effectively.
Lee told him he could give him a simple method that would increase his efficiency by at least 50 per cent.
He then handed Schwab a blank sheet of paper and said, “Write down on this paper the six most important things you have to do tomorrow.”
“Now take a second sheet of paper and number those items in the order of their priority to the achievement of your goals.”
First thing tomorrow morning take out the paper and start with item number one. Don’t look at the others, just number one, and start working on it. And if you can, stay with it until it’s completed, or you have taken it as far as it you can for the time being.
Then take item number two the same way, then number three, and so on, until you finish work for the day.”
Don’t worry if you only complete a couple; the others can wait. Just work through them in order of priority.”
“Do this for a month and then send me a cheque for whatever you think the idea is worth.”
The entire interview including writing down the tasks in order of priority had taken just 20 minutes.
At the end of the month, Schwab assessed how valuable the method had been in improving the fortunes of the company.
He sent Ivy Lee a letter saying what he put into practice was the most valuable lesson he’d ever learned.
Enclosed with the letter was a cheque for $25,000.
Allowing for inflation, that would be worth $855,666.67 in 2022… Not bad for 20 minutes of work!
This simple idea of taking one thing at a time and persisting with it until it has been completed has been responsible for some of the biggest company successes in history… What could it be worth to your business?
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