What does Warren Buffett say about focus?
With 75 Billion to his name, Warren has consistently led at the top of wealth in the world…
It stands to reason that given his success in business, Warren has an excellent understanding of focus and time management. There’s a great story that caught my attention recently between Mr Buffett and his personal pilot, that can teach us all a lesson on how to find focus. It’s a simple 3 step process, involving two sheets of paper and a pen…
The Mike Flint story
Mike Flint was Buffett’s personal pilot. (He was a damn good one too, previously flying US presidents). One day Warren jokingly said to Flint — “The fact that you’re still working for me, tells me I’m not doing my job. You should be out going after more of your goals and dreams.”
Warren then asked Mike to get a sheet of paper and write down his top twenty-five career goals. He explained it could be anything he wanted to achieve in the next few years or even his lifetime. Mike spent some time and writing them down.
Later on, Warren asked him to review the list of twenty-five, and circle the top five he wanted more than anything. Mike eventually made his way through the list and found the most important goals and circled them.
Mike then brought the list back to Warren and they discussed it for a while. At the end of the conversation, Mike said he would begin working towards the top five goals immediately. As he left the meeting Warren asked, “And what about the ones you didn’t circle?”. Mike replied “Well, the top 5 are my primary focus, but the other 20 come in a close second. They are still important so I’ll work on those intermittently as I see fit. They are not as urgent, but I still plan to give them a dedicated effort.”
To which Warren replied, “No! You’ve got it wrong, Mike. Everything you didn’t circle just became your Avoid-At-All-Cost list. No matter what, these things get no attention from you until you’ve succeeded with your top five.”
Moral of the story?…
You can’t be a superstar if you focus on everything.
I love simplicity, but I can only grasp at it when I learn the power of elimination. Remember: Every behaviour has a cost.
Buffet’s lesson here reveals how easy it is to justify spending time on things that truly don’t matter. That’s probably why I have 10 half-finished projects and only 2 finished!#guilty
What’s the antidote? …Eliminate ruthlessly. Stop spinning the wheel — find focus and take action.
