15/Feb/17- Pareto Principle
I feel very good with the way I’ve spent time in the college today. I was able to learn and think through many things like considering different possibilities and choosing the best alternative for a situation. I spent majority of my time reading book, The 4-Hour Work Week written by Timothy Ferriss. This book contains lot of contrarian views on the idea of retirement, time management etc. The key ideas I took out from the reading activity are:
- Whenever you are starting out on a new project, define the three critical steps: STEP NOW, TOMORROW, and DAY AFTER. The first step should be simple enough to do in 5 minutes. If not, then break it down. We often feel uncomfortable in initiating something new and when we do, we cling on to most complex tasks which makes it impossible to continue.
- Doing something unimportant well does not make it important.
- Requiring a lot of time does not make a task important.
- Being busy does not mean you are doing important tasks or being productive.
- What you do(effectiveness) is far more important than how you do it(efficiency).
- Pareto principle(80/20 rule): 80% of the output results come from 20% of the inputs- this principle can be applied to every subject. Ex- 80% of the books containing ideas are derived from 20% of the books.
I really liked the way Tim applied Pareto principle to his busy-scheduled life. He posed some interesting questions before him.
- Which 20% of the sources are creating 80% of my problems and unhappiness?
- Which 20% of the sources are resulting in 80% of desired outcome and happiness?
He sat down an entire day with the goal to figure out inefficiencies in order to eliminate them and focus on strengths to multiply them. He applied it to his customers, friends, relaxation activities, common elements across advertising mediums which were bringing 80% of the revenue. He also gave a very good advice which is very relevant to startups that is, try a lot to identify what pulls the most weight and after that multiply on those. Do this process, but do not take more than month or two to figure out what best suits for you venture.
I have many more ideas to discuss but because this blog is getting too lengthy I may have to stop here. Hopefully, I will discuss more of my ideas in coming blogs.
Originally published at abiduzair.wordpress.com on February 15, 2017.
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