A Lesson From A Cereal Box

The other morning I was having breakfast with my children. We’re not an overly talkative bunch at 7:00 am but there was some conversation. Things like, what is going on at school today? What are you taking for lunch? Do you have any after school plans? Just idle chit chat.

Then my son Josh finished his bowl of cereal. He was still hungry and wanted more. He got up, went into the kitchen, got the cereal and brought the box with him to the table. He poured himself more cereal and put the box down on the table.

As soon as he put the box down the quiet talking at the table stopped and all four of us stared intently at the cereal box.

Sounds perfectly normal right? It was, but the question is why did this happen? None of us had any interest in what the box said. In fact, we had all seen the box before and had read everything on it before. The point was that it was in front of us and therefore drew our attention away from the casual conversation we were having.

Sure our little chit chat wasn’t that important but connecting with your family is certainly more important than reading the side of a cereal box again. Yet, the box called to us.

The same thing happens in our business. We might be focusing on something intently and working on it when something new is put into our line of sight and distracts us from the doing what’s important.

It might be something as insignificant as a “you’ve got mail” notification that pulls you off course. You know what happens, and an hour (or two) later you realize you’re still “doing email.”

These little seemingly unimportant things somehow garner our full attention. It’s up to us to stop the distraction or pour what we need out of the cereal box and then put that box away.

Here are five strategies you can take to help you assess what is important and keep your attention where you want it to be.

1. Be aware of the types of unimportant things that call your attention.
2. When you begin to work, purposefully decide what you want to be doing.
3. Clear the deck (your desk, your mind, your to-do list, your conscious) of other ideas and should they come up while you are working remind yourself of your goal.
4. Permit yourself to focus on the things that are really important and more importantly, permit yourself to say no to focusing on the other things.
5. Keep your eye on the prize. What is the most important thing for you to be concentrating on that will help you, your business and your clients?

Bonus strategy…shut off your email notification!

I’d love to know how you apply these strategies to your business. Please share your thoughts with me below.