On the April 25 episode of my Lykken on Lending podcast, we had the opportunity to discuss the FHA with Dr. Edward Golding—the Administration's Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Office of Housing. In our conversation, one my cohosts asked a very important question—in an organization like the FHA, how do you go about prioritizing your workload?
It's really a question, not just for a leader in federal organization, but for all of us. How do we decide what's most important and what takes precedent over all else? There are many tips and tricks that you can use to organization your tasks and decide how to go about carrying them out. But, if there's one thing to keep in mind with regard to priorities, it's this: know your central mission.
The secret to prioritizing is knowing what you're trying to accomplish. I don't mean what you are trying to accomplish in any given activity; I mean what you're trying to accomplish overall in your organization. If it doesn't feed into your mission statement, then it isn't a priority. If it feels like it should be a priority, but it doesn't feed into your mission statement, then maybe you need to rewrite your mission statement. But, if you really want to get the most important things done first, the key to doing so is knowing what's most important. If you don't know who you are, you cannot possibly know what you should do.
David Lykken, a 43-year veteran of the mortgage industry, is president of Transformational Mortgage Solutions (TMS), a management consulting firm that provides transformative business strategies to owners and “C-Level” executives via consulting, executive coaching and various communications strategies. He is a frequent guest on FOX Business News and hosts his own weekly podcast called “Lykken On Lending” heard Monday’s at 1:00 p.m. ET at LykkenOnLending.com. David’s phone number is (512) 759-0999 and his e-mail is [email protected].
