The best people know something. They know that you will not reach your full potential in your career if there's no true process for getting done what you want to do. If you and your systems aren't set up properly, even if you're doing well, you could do much better. The good news is you don't have to know how to do it; you just have to know it needs to be done. You don't have to know how to unclog the sink, you just need to know water can and should be running faster. That's the impetus. It's similar to when Donald Trump was quoted way way back in the 1970's as saying, "I don't have to believe in Feng Shui; I just know that it makes me money." That was long before most of us ever heard of Feng Shui and certainly didn't think it had a place in business.

Here's what the research tells us. "Whether you're a business owner or you work for a company, you probably spend most of your waking hours in your office, doing "stuff" and interacting with others who are doing "stuff." And whether you get your "stuff" done on time is impacted by when others get their "stuff" done. Sound familiar? That's why it's imperative to create an environment that inspires and empowers you to get more "stuff" done! The best way to get stuff done and done on time is to set parameters for how the work "stuff" flows; hence the term workflow. It sounds so processed or technical, but it doesn't have to be. And while we all know what I just said is true, what we sometimes don't know is what can be done to make things better...the "how" of making things easier. The goal is to have a flow to things, rather than a big clog in the drain that slows things down regularly or worse, makes us run to the garage for a plunger or call an expensive plumber. You can establish a productive workplace only when people are happy with how things are "flowing".

A great way to get started is to pick one thing, just one, that if it was running smoother would have a good chance of boosting your finances, focus, clarity and productivity FAST. To make this work you have to find the people involved in the process that share your frustration with the way things currently work and have vision. Notice, I didn't say you have to convince everyone who is part of the process; just those who have some level of frustration and the willingness to change. That's the most important part. Start small so the results come faster. Speed of change is more important than size or scope of the change. Don't try to take on something big or you can't get the flow going. Simple changes can make you happy. The best workflow tools are easy to tweak and user-friendly. Plan to keep discovering new things in the software and process over time. Plan to reward in some way those people  who find new ways to improve the processes you use and the software that you have now or new software you should be looking at. Keep everything simple, really simple. Over time, lots of "simple" add up to something really worthwhile and time saving. Don't settle for clogs in the process any more than you'd allow your sink to stay perpetually backed up until it bursts and gets really costly to fix.