The Case for Urgent > Important in Entrepreneurship
How reframing what’s important can help you actually get it done
We talk about important, and we talk about urgent. But we forget that some things are both.
Last week I was sitting with my Sunday morning coffee reflecting on where the year’s been and where it seems to be headed, and decided to ask my LinkedIn friends to join me in one of my favorite exercises:
“If you had $50M in the bank, what would that change about how you spend your time?”
For some of us it would change everything about how we spend our time; for others not as much. But I think that if we stop to think, we can all derive some incredible personal insights about what we really want.
(The psychology experts all say we actually suck at figuring out what we really want, by the way.)
My takeaway from the exercise was this: It feels nice to think about having time to work on more important things. But what do we lose when all of a sudden nothing feels urgent?
The trades we make
Here’s how I answered the question myself:
—> On the home front, with $50M in the bank I’d probably have my house professionally cleaned more often (I’d never do it). And I’d add in some housekeeping help too, things like laundry, changing bed linens, running errands, dinner prep. Probably some kind of fractional personal chef and maybe a driver, or maybe just use Uber Black everywhere so I don’t have to find parking then walk…
But there’s a catch: I’d lose the mental space those mindless tasks provide. I’ve had some of my best ideas while I was vacuuming, pulling weeds, clearing out the garage. And ideas or not, those are fabulous ways to decompress.
Some of my favorite moments during the week lately have been: “Oh good, I have to drive somewhere now. My brain is about to have a vacation for the next 15 mins.” Same can happen with watering plants, cooking a meal, grocery shopping, decluttering the house.
What would a day actually feel like without giving our minds time to decompress?
—> On the business front, with $50M in the bank, I might start working with only one client at a time instead of the handful I need to generate a profit. I love client work, but I really love working on the business…
Yet there’s a catch: I’d lose everything I learn from getting in the reps. The dots connected and insights generated from working with client after client after client, year in and year out. What a loss.
I might be more picky with how many business development meetings I take. Meetings with new people can lead to exciting new opportunities, but so many are just duds. And I’m more introverted than extroverted, so they can be draining.
What I could lose there is impossible to say. A volume of relationships is critical to growing the business. What would happen if I didn’t “have to” and so chose not to?”
I might block more time to work on the important not urgent…but this is what would scare me the most. You can’t grow a business by always focusing on the urgent…but you also can’t grow it by never focusing on the urgent.
The case for urgency
Just this past week I nixed my quarterly business review day. It’s been an important time for me to reflect and to plan, but instead I decided to finish up an email campaign.
For a split second I felt guilty: “Here we go again, focusing on the urgent over the important. I’m doing it wrong...again.”
The campaign is sort of urgent, but also sort of important because I want the feedback it will bring as soon as possible. The results from the campaign should enable me to make certain business decisions that impact the coming months or years.
If everything feels urgent, we get stuck. But if nothing feels urgent, we get stuck in different ways.
3 ways to reframe the important as urgent
So if you tend to forget that there are two other quadrants in Eisenhower’s Matrix besides Important and Urgent (one being important/urgent, the other neither important nor urgent), maybe a refresher will do you some good.
Here are 3 ways to reframe that important goal into something urgent so that it actually gets done:
1 - Set an ambitious “done by” date
Simple and seemingly obvious, yet still grossly underutilized. What’s that “important” initiative you need to get done? Identify the first step, set a date, tell somebody who can actually keep you accountable, and get to it.
2 - Outsource your discipline.
Speaking of accountability…
Relying on friends, employees, or peers is great. But sometimes, accountability works only when the other party has skin in the game. As in, money.
Think of the personal trainer who calls if you don’t show, and takes the thinking out of your workouts when you do. The therapist who provides a safe space for you to pause and reflect on your life, and come to your own conclusions about how to move forward.
The last time I hired a business coach, I was 100% I already knew what to do and how to do it (and I was right). But I also knew I might not get it done without another person lighting a fire under my butt. Sometimes it pays to outsource our discipline.
3 - Calendar the time blocks.
Half the battle is just changing our habits.
If we haven’t built time into our day, week, or month to work on whatever our project is (running a marathon, executing on that email campaign, documenting our processes), when will that change?
Start by carving out the space.
Embrace the urgency to get unstuck
If “important” work and “urgent” work feel like enemies in your business right now, like a constant tug of war…
Maybe it’s time to make them friends, instead.
By reframing the important as urgent—whether it’s setting bold deadlines, investing in accountability, or breaking tasks into manageable chunks—you’ll unlock the momentum you need.
This Fall, I’m leading a cohort of business owners who are ready to stop putting off process and finally get it done (and followed by all).
6-week sprint
8-12 business leaders
The methodology, work blocks, and outsourced discipline you need to finally get unstuck
It starts in September. Register for more details.
