Meridian Magazine : : Print

Leadership for Saints, Part 15:
Planning the Work, Working the Plan
by Rodger Dean Duncan and Ed J. Pinegar

Great leaders have a clear vision of what they want to accomplish. And because they know it’s often easier to conceive than to deliver, they invest plenty of energy in organizing and planning and executing. They tend to be very deliberate in their use of the finite resource called time.

You’ve probably noticed that “time poverty” is a challenge faced by every servant who cares. But you don’t need to fall into what one church worker described as “a chronic state of overwhelm.” A more strategic use of your time enables you to serve with more passion and less panic. Making time decisions on the basis of mission and values boosts effectiveness and reduces guilt. Service then feels like the blessing it is instead of the burden it was.

It was the Spanish novelist Cervantes who reminded us that “by the street of By-and-By, one reaches the House of Never.” The street of By-and-By, like another metaphorical thoroughfare, is paved with good intentions. Our progress and performance are frequently hindered by procrastination or frustration. Opportunity is lost.

Fortunately, a carefully crafted mission statement (as we described in Part 11—a living document that can grow right along with you) can help you reach “the House of Now.” Good planning can also play a vital role in the quality of your marriage and family life.

Even for a seasoned worker, receiving and accepting a call to serve in the Church can be an intimidating experience. Most of us have a wide range of priorities tugging at us – our families, our friends, our community obligations, our occupations, our need for physical exercise, our determination to keep up with our scripture study. We have only so many hours in a day, and a lack of balance in handling these priorities can launch us on a guilt trip and hamper our effectiveness.

This is why we so strongly recommend crafting a personal mission statement—a mission that motivates.

In conjunction with your personal mission statement, a process that can help you bring better focus and balance into your life is to examine—precisely—how your time is used. Many time management specialists refer to the Time Management Matrix.

This is a simple box divided into four equal portions or quadrants. Notice that each quadrant is numbered and labeled.

Something that falls into Quadrant 1 is both Urgent and Important. It demands immediate attention. If you’re a Sunday School president and a teacher fails to show up on Sunday, you are faced with an urgent and important matter. If you’re a bishop and a married couple in the ward suddenly notifies you they are getting a divorce, you have a Quadrant 1 issue on your hands. If you’re a parent and your teenager announces she’s running away from home, you know full well what “urgent” and “important” feel like when they happen at once.

Quadrant 3 consists of those time-consuming activities that are Urgent but Not Important. This would include interruptions such as a ringing doorbell and even some meetings that are regularly on your schedule but have begun to lose their value.

Quadrant 4 includes those activities that are Not Urgent and Not Important. Much of what falls in this quadrant shouldn’t even be done at all.

Quadrant 2 could be called the “power” quadrant. This is where the most productive activities occur. Quadrant 2 activities are Not Urgent, but they are Important. They include such things as planning, prevention, bridge painting (strengthening relationships), steward development and pursuing opportunities.

In this context, “Urgent” signifies something that appears to require immediate attention. “Important” signifies an activity that contributes to your mission and your significant goals.

Some people find themselves forced to expend an inordinate amount of their time on Quadrant 1 activities—crises and pressing problems. They are fire-fighters, constantly dousing the flames of problems that are mostly preventable. Investing more in Quadrant 2 activities—planning, prevention, steward development, etc.—tends to shrink Quadrant 1, preventing the fires of crisis.

In fact, we might look at the Time Management Matrix in this way. Quadrant 1 is the “symptom” quadrant. It is here that we see the symptoms of our poor time management. Symptoms include missed deadlines, poor meetings, low motivation, weak performance. Quadrants 3 and 4 are the “cause” quadrants. Time spent in Quadrants 3 or 4 inevitably results in less that desirable performance.

Remember, regardless of your education, experience, age or any other factor, you still have only 24 hours a day. Every minute invested in Quadrant 3 or Quadrant 4 is a minute that’s no longer available for investing in Quadrant 2.

It’s that simple. When we neglect the activities represented in Quadrant 2, we seem to face more crises, more problems, more “fires” that must be extinguished.

The key to effective management of our time, then, is to say “no” to Quadrant 3 activities and to say “Yes” to Quadrant 2 activities. We solve our time management problems by giving priority to Quadrant 2 activities – those that may not be Urgent but which are clearly Important.

Quadrant 2 activities take a variety of forms. The most important, of course, includes any and all activities that strengthen our relationship with the Lord.

For the active Church worker, they also may include planning a Relief Society enrichment meeting or a bishopric meeting or a Sunday School in-service lesson. They might include conducting a careful stewardship interview with a newly-called servant, giving the worker a detailed understanding of the responsibilities and expectations associated with the assignment (see more about this in later installments on Stewardship Delegation). They might include a carefully planned regimen of physical fitness to increase energy and vitality and to reduce stress. They can include pleasure-reading or concert-going or any other worthy pursuit that brings needed balance to our lives.

Don’t expect Quadrant 2 ever to eliminate the other three quadrants completely. That’s simply not reality. But with a careful and persistent application of your Mission Statement and with a more deliberate strategy in your planning, you’ll discover that you’re getting much more leverage from your time.

You’ve used leverage before. Remember playing on the teeter-totter in school? If the child on the other end was heavier than you, you simply moved the fulcrum (the center point carrying the entire load) closer to the heavier weight. That slight move affected the physics of the situation.

You can use the same principle in managing your time and responsibilities. As your load changes (your responsibilities increase), you face the frustration of being unable to lift the load.

Focusing on Quadrant 2 activities is the same as moving the fulcrum. Quadrant 2 activities provide the leverage with which you can lift your load.

Remember, part of that leverage is saying “no” to Quadrant 3 activities—those that seem urgent but that in fact are not very important.

Prepare and perform are the key words in how we will improve our time in this life. – Joseph B. Wirthlin

The secret of success is constancy to purpose. —Benjamin Disraeli

The wise use of time helps to fit us for eternity. – Neal A. Maxwell

One of the most serious human defects in all ages is procrastination, an unwillingness to accept personal responsibility now. – Spencer W. Kimball

We are not endeavoring to get ahead of others but only to surpass ourselves. – Hugh B. Brown

Life gives to all the choice. You can satisfy yourself with mediocrity if you wish. You can be common, ordinary, dull, colorless; or you can channel your life so that it will be clean, vibrant, progressive, useful, colorful, rich. – Spencer W. Kimball

Life’s tactical choices actually present the opportunity to our moral agency. Such constitute the calisthenics of choice. The chief impediment, however, is our lack of full spiritual alignment. – Neal A. Maxwell

Time management is really self-management and discipline in how we manage ourselves in the time allotted. It involves making choices, and choosing how to use that time that is sometimes difficult. – Joseph B. Wirthlin

Success requires a lot of careful planning and you are here to form these plans and make decisions to carry you forward in life. – Howard W. Hunter

Note: The excerpts of Leadership for Saints posted on Meridian are only a fraction of the contents of this 349-page book. To learn more about this ground-breaking book and to order copies, click here.

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