Why we aren't more productive

Productivity has little to do with tools and technique. These are incremental things, capable of incremental gains. Productivity is about alignment and focus. If every calorie you expend goes towards the singular thing you aim to change or improve, you’ll be much more productive.

So why aren’t we?

I think it’s a goal-setting problem, and not in the typical way we discuss goals. In fact, I’d propose that we rethink how we set goals entirely.

There are three steps to doing this:

1. Recognize that a metric is not a goal. Saying "grow our email list 50% this quarter" is not a goal. It's a measure of the goal. This type of "goal-setting" makes the work feel like a chore, like the only real win is skipping to the result faster, cheaper. We stop paying attention to the craft and the process as a result. We need a better goal. That brings us to Step Two...

2. Articulate the actual goal. Goals should be plain language, not stats, describing a future state of being that is different from today's status quo. With the example above, the real goal is something like, "Create an email newsletter worthy of subscription." Growing subscription 50% is a signal that we've achieved the real goal.

Now that we're focused on the process, we know what to do: make a better newsletter. But this still doesn't get specific enough, not does it align us around how we’ll achieve this goal. That brings us to Step Three...

3. Articulate an aspirational anchor, not a “goal." Whereas goals tell us WHAT to do, aspirational anchors show us HOW we'll do it. So, rather than say, "Create an email newsletter worthy of subscription," try crafting an aspirational anchor, which sounds something like, "Let's show the world how fun and relevant we can be in our writing."

Aspirational anchors are personal or team-wide statements that prompt us to apply who we are to our work more fully. These statements combine (A) your intent for the future, i.e. "a newsletter worth subscribing to," and (B) your dissatisfaction with today's work, which in our example above was implied. What’s wrong with our current newsletter or our current writing? Why wouldn’t people subscribe? “Our writing is too bland and too stale.” Perfect. So: “Let's show the world how fun and relevant we can be in our writing."

Using an aspirational anchor aligns the team (and all our work as individuals) and unleashes their and our best. Together, we can focus on bringing our full selves to the work, and we begin to care more about the process than the results ... which gets us better results.

Do all three things, and you'll be wildly productive and, I'm betting, much more fulfilled.

PS: You can read more about aspirational anchors in this article, or MUCH more about them — with more stories and science added — in my book, Break the Wheel.