How to Prioritize Tasks

Speaker 1: Welcome to the Process Breakdown Podcast, where we talk about streamlining and scaling operations of your company, getting rid of bottlenecks, and giving your employees all the information they need to be successful at their jobs. Now, let’s get started with the show.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Dr. Jeremy Weisz here, host of the Process Breakdown Podcast, where we talk about streamlining and scaling operations of your company, getting rid of bottlenecks, and giving your staff everything they need to be successful at their job. There’s really very few people who just hit those boom, boom, boom, and today’s guest, Geoff Woods, is going to talk about that. And past guests include [inaudible 00:00:00:48], check out David Allen of Getting Things Done, Michael Gerber of the E-Myth, Joseph Grenny of Crucial Conversations. When I talked to him, Geoff, I was like, "This has sold four million copies." That’s insane, the impact. And the one thing is no different.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: So, before I introduce Geoff properly, this episode is brought to you by SweetProcess. If you had a team members that ask you the same questions over, and over, and over, and it’s the tenth time you spend explaining it, well, that should probably hit you over the head and be like, "There’s probably a better way, there’s probably a solution." SweetProcess is a software that makes it drop that easy to train and onboard new staff, and save time with the existing staff.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: And Geoff, when I was talking to Owen about it, I realized, universities, banks use it, hospitals use it, but first responder, government agencies use it in life or death situations. I was like, "Oh, and why do you not tell people that, that’s crazy, that’s awesome." So, I go, "I’ll tell people on the podcast." So use SweetProcess to document all the repetitive tasks that eat up your precious time, so you can grow your organization. There’s a 14 day free trial, no credit card. Sweetprocess.com, sweet like candy S-W-E-E-T process.com.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Today, I’m super excited. When they were like "We’re going to have a rockstar guest today, Geoff Woods," I’m like, "I know Geoff. Yeah, he’s awesome. I know The One Thing." Geoff Woods is vice president of The One Thing, along with Gary Keller, who founded Keller Williams Realty and Jay Papasan, coauthor of The One Thing. Bestselling book, I suggest, everyone, read it, listen to it on Audible. I’ve listened to it, at least three times. Because my one thing should mean one thing. I’m a slow learner, Geoff, so I need to keep listening to the messages, and I know, people can engage with you guys in a lot of different respects, and you can go to their website also and check it out, obviously, The One Thing.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Come and there’s a bunch of things, especially the trainings tab. But it’s funny, Geoff, I was reading your bio, and I know you, after hearing the Jim Rohn quote, I didn’t quite know that the origin is, remember you read that and it says, "The average of the five people you spend the most time with, you are those people." And so, you set out to surround yourself with those high level CEOs and successful entrepreneurs, and within a year, you went from employee to entrepreneur, launching a company with the coauthors of The One Thing. And you’re on a mission to teach people how to live a life of focus. And so, thanks for being with me, I totally appreciate it.

Geoff Woods: The pleasure is mine, Jeremy. And great to see you again.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: There’s a lot of things we’ll talk about, but before we hit record, you talked about, you help the community of people form habits. Talk about what you meant by that.

Geoff Woods: Sure. There’s a quote in The One Thing from FM Alexander, it’s my favorite quote. "People do not decide their futures, they decide their habits, and their habits decide their futures." And I was listening to my partner, Gary, share that the best habit that he formed was the habit of forming habits. His entire life, he has asked really big questions and set huge visions for what he wanted to accomplish, and when he gets clear on what that big goal is that he wants to achieve, he knows that he has to simply become the type of person who behaves in a way that it would put him in alignment with that goal.

Geoff Woods: And so, he just asked the question, "What’s a habit I can form that would make achieving that possible?" And for us, the reason that so many people, when they read or listen to new ideas, that they struggle to put it into action and stay consistent, is they rely on discipline and willpower, when the truth is, they need to leverage those things. And if they can form habits, one at a time over time, I mean, you really can transform who you are as a person.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Tell me something about, I’m curious about your habits, some powerful habits that maybe weren’t so easy from the beginning, but once you learned this stuff, you were able to put these processes in place.

Geoff Woods: Oh dude, I got stories. So one of the things with habits is most people start too big. We have a saying, "Think big, go small and trust the dominos will fall." I remember when I was starting this company with Gary and Jay, one of the things they said to me was, "The fastest way you can ensure you get out of business with us is to not leave The One Thing." They tasked me with becoming the face of the brand and getting out there and making it a global company. And I get, "Okay, well, what’s the one thing I can do that would make living The One Thing easier unnecessary?" And the answer was, I had to start acting in order of priority. "Okay. Well, let’s go smaller." What’s one thing I can do that would make acting in order of priority easier or unnecessary. I’d have to start thinking in order of priority.

Geoff Woods: "Okay. Well, what’s one thing I can do to make that happen?" I can start using, it’s a tool we use called a 411. This is a tool that gives you clarity on your priorities, and in a corporate setting, it becomes the backbone of a one-on-one conversation. And I went, "Okay, well, what’s one thing I can do to start using a 411?" And that lead domino, that two inch little domino that’s at the front of all of them, that if you just flick that everything else falls, I would check my 411, before I checked my email. I would check my priorities before I checked everyone else’s. Because let’s be clear, that’s what’s in most people’s inboxes. And here’s what’s interesting, Jeremy, if we followed most people around with a camera, if we watch them through their days, when they open their computer, what’s the first thing they do?

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Go to your email.

Geoff Woods: Until they go to a-

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: A social media tab, I don’t know.

Geoff Woods: A meeting.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: A meeting. Oh, yeah.

Geoff Woods: And then they realize they got five minutes, so they check email, and then somebody says, [crosstalk 00:06:47]. And before you know it, it’s time to go home and they go, "Oh, I was busy. Did I get anything done?" I know what that feels like, and I know a lot of people are like, "Oh, that’s so true." For me, when I started what we call a 66 day challenge, when you do that one thing every day for 66 days, because that’s how long it takes to roughly form a habit, all I did before I even opened my computer, I checked my 411 before I checked my email.

Geoff Woods: And what was interesting was, if my 411 was blank, if nothing was written on it, I just started filling it out. And if I checked it and it was filled out, that means I was literally staring my priorities in the face. And when I was staring at my priorities, I just started whacking away at those dominoes first. And in a very short period of time, this became a habit. And the best way I can describe it is, I felt like I was seeing the world in color for the first time, when I’d been living my entire life in black and white and never knew it.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: I want to hear about 411. I remember reading the Brian Tracy book, decades ago, Eat That Frog and just do the ugliest biggest thing first. And when you look at your 411, is that a daily thing? Maybe walk through what the 411 is, is that a monthly priority or just the yearly priority? What does a 411 look like?

Geoff Woods: All of the above. Here’s the truth. The world does not need a new way to set goals, it needs a way to have a relationship with them. Jeremy, when you met your wife, what’s her name again?

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Lee.

Geoff Woods: Lee. Some point, early on in that relationship, you set a goal.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: [crosstalk 00:08:30] the first date.

Geoff Woods: First date, you set a goal, and that changed your behavior. You started communicating with her, you started going on more dates, and as things went well, you raised the goal, and that changed your behavior. You moved in together, you eventually got married, you had kids. And like all relationships, when there was tension, did you immediately start changing your behavior so you could grow back together?

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Sure. Yeah.

Geoff Woods: And here’s why I say this, we fundamentally understand how to have a relationship with another person, we were never taught how to have a relationship with our goals. Most people, whether an individual, whether you’re an entrepreneur, whether you’re a leader in an organization, they set their goals for the year, they put them on a pretty piece of paper, but then they go through their day spending their time in email meetings, and answering [inaudible 00:09:16] minutes, rather than investing it in their priorities.

Geoff Woods: And so, what the 411 does, the 411 stands for the relevant truth or information. It also stands for four weeks, one month, one year. When you get clear on what your true priorities are for the year, how can you break them down to the simple priorities you’ve got to knock down this month in order to be on track for the year? And once you have that clarity, you break it down to the very few simple priorities you can accomplish this week, that puts you in alignment with your month, which puts you in alignment with the year. And then you simply know, "Okay, these are the things I have to time block. This is what actually belongs on my calendar." Not all the conference calls, not all the meetings, these are the 20% priorities that generate 80% of your results. And you update it every week. You have a date with your goals.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: So that time, the 411, how can they engage with that? I know, if they go to training… I was reading this this morning, actually, I was on Time Blocking Mastery, which is How Smart and Successful High Achievers Get, open right now, that was reading it, More Done in 66 Days than Most Do in a Lifetime.

Geoff Woods: So, if you go to theonething.com, and unlike the book and the podcast, which is spelled out, theO-N-Ething.com, the websites with the number, one. So theonething.com, on the free stuff page, you can download a 411 template. This is simple folks, there is an Excel version, there’s a Word version. On the training page, we got some courses there. We teach companies how to make this part of their culture, you can find all that there.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: So what’s lately on the 411 for you?

Geoff Woods: For me?

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Yeah.

Geoff Woods: Talent. It’s interesting. So when COVID hit, everybody looked up and realized that the world had fundamentally changed. And I was in a mastermind with Gary Keller, and he was sharing the idea that right now, so many business owners are focusing on surviving. The mistake that they’re making though, is they’re not thinking about what activities can they simultaneously be doing to thrive. Right now, we’ve got to stabilize our business and do the things to survive, but immediately, we’ve got to identify the key, few investments that we can be making strategically that when we come out of this, we will have a lot of momentum, and we can scale. Because every recession that Gary has gone into, he came out with more market share. Going into the past-

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: He has a unique perspective also being real estate 2008, too.

Geoff Woods: Well, so here’s a perfect example. Going into 2008, they were number five. Of all the companies, they came out number one. And the gap between number one and number two was the size of the fifth largest competitor. Because he was really clear, we’ve got to stabilize and survive, but then we’ve got to strategically start making the investments to thrive. And when I look at our business, it’s interesting, people at first, when COVID hit, we were going, "All right, how much of our revenue is at stake? What’s going to happen? How do we just make sure that we can keep the lights on?" Once that happened, it became clear that there was actually more demand for what we do than ever before. And now the greatest investment we can make is the investment in people. Finding a truly exceptional talent that we can bring into our world so that when we come out of this, we are just ready to rock and roll. So when I look at my 411 for the week, this week, it’s very specific activities around recruiting.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: So you talked about surviving. In addition to thriving, what are some of those things that people are doing that they can do both, rather than just worrying about keeping the lights on?

Geoff Woods: Well, first is rightsizing the business for the market at the moment. I mean, getting your expenses in line. What we teach owners to do right now is every single month you look at your expenses, and it’s very simple, "Is this absolutely vital to the business?" If yes, keep it. Next question, "Is this a really strong, nice to have?" Okay. Let’s think about it. "Do we not need this?" Cut immediately. And then there’s the, "What the heck is this?" Cut that too.

Geoff Woods: So how do we rightsize the business so that we can at least keep the lights on? But then from the things we do, in terms of thriving, I mean, one of them is training your people. One of the biggest mistakes that we are seeing leaders make right now is they’re severing their budgets for training, and they’re severing their investments and accountability relationships. This is the time when you should be training your people, this is the time when you should have a coach who’s helping you think bigger and pushing you past your current comfort zone. That’s how you take market share when most people are shrinking.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: You work with some of the biggest organizations in the US and world with training. Obviously, people can engage with the book, theonething.com, the podcast, and different online trainings, but you also do a lot of corporate trainings. So when you go into these big organizations, where do you start? Right now, I know a really hot topic, obviously is logistics. I know you’ve worked with a lot of logistics companies, maybe use that as an example.

Geoff Woods: So we work with a Fortune 50 company in the logistics space. And I think, like a lot of organizations, they’re asking the question, "How do we do more with less? How can we continue to compete and remain relevant?" And when we really peel the onion back, and I don’t care if you’re in logistics, or regardless, the challenges are the same. One, Are we really clear? Do we have clarity up and down the chain? What is the one thing for the organization? And for that to happen, what are the priorities? I am not talking about 20 pages long of priorities, which, by the way, I saw a business plan inside this company that was 20 pages long, and we helped them get it down to one side of one page. We were able to streamline them from 20 pages of priorities, down to six priorities, six dominos, that in order of priority, that if you just knocked those down, everything else would fall.

Geoff Woods: So, there’s a lack of clarity on what the one thing is, what the priorities are, what to do when priorities change. What do I do, Jeremy, if my one thing is this priority and your one thing is another priority, and we have to work together, but my one thing isn’t your one thing when we have interdependencies?

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: [crosstalk 00:00:15:56], how do you decide?

Geoff Woods: Well, there’s a way to make that decision. And how does it go down the chain so that every single person understands the piece of the overall plan that they are responsible for to the point that they understand these are the three to five things that absolutely no ifs, no ands, no buts, this belongs on my calendar this week, and until these things are done, everything else is a distraction? And then, how do we create a common language so that this can actually become part of our culture? And what we consistently find, everything that we’re talking about, by the way, is surprisingly simple, because that’s what the one thing is, it’s the surprisingly simple truth-

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Nothing so easy, but simple.

Geoff Woods: Not easy, it is simple. But we consistently hear people in a relatively short period of time say, "I am more clear and focused than I’ve ever been." And they start getting a lot more done in a lot less time because they stop treating everything like it matters equally, and they identify the thing that matters most, and they do that first.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: You’re creating almost a decision making tree for them. It’s like a core values, but with priorities. So if you know that, then you can eliminate things or add things based on that.

Geoff Woods: Can I share a personal story about this, my first time with this?

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Yeah.

Geoff Woods: So early on, when we were starting the company, I had to cast a vision for it. And the way that we cast a vision is we create a GPS. It’s a one page business plan. That’s what I was referring to. I created our GPS, and I walked into the boardroom with Gary and Jay, and I handed each of them a copy. It was a single sheet of paper, it had a goal at the top and it had three priorities. That was it. And we started talking about them. Gary and Jay asked a bunch of questions about number one. I answered them, said, "Are we good?" Then they went, "Yeah." And so I went and started talking about number two, because it was the next on the list.

Geoff Woods: And pretty quickly, Jeremy, Gary went back and started asking more questions about one. And I remember thinking, "Oh, he must have just forgotten." So I answered the questions. I asked him if we were good. He said, "Yeah." I finished my number two and then started talking about number three. And then he started asking more questions about number one. You ever seen Meet the Parents?

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Yes.

Geoff Woods: You know the circle of trust?

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Yes.

Geoff Woods: In that moment, I felt like I was not in the circle of trust. It seemed that they’re just giggling in the corner, and I’m going "Why does Gary keep going back to number one?" So I did the best I could, I answered the questions and I said, "Are we good?" He said, "Yeah." And I went back to number three and he just stopped me. And he asked a series of questions that shifted the way I view time. He said, "Geoff, do you need to do number three in order to do number two?" I said, "No." He said, "Do you need to do number two in order to do number one?" I said, "No." He said, "Then do me a favor, draw a line between one and two." Anyway, and I drew a line across the paper and he said, "Actually even better, rip the page in half." Jeremy, I kid you not, he waited while I took my business plan and ripped it in half. And then he said, "Don’t even think about number two or number three until you’ve earned the right to, by mastering number one."

Geoff Woods: And this is when it hit me, my entire career without realizing it, I had unconsciously formed the habit of treating everything like it matter equally. I saw all the stuff that was on my plate, and I told myself that I had to get it all done. And so, I just moved each of them forward just a little bit. And a perfect visual of this is, imagine a freeway. I mean, Jeremy, imagine every time you drive downtown Chicago, imagine just the traffic jam. You’ve got thousands of cars-

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: I don’t have to imagine it, but I live it. Go on.

Geoff Woods: Gridlocked, going down. And imagine if we were all flying above with a helicopter, and in the middle of that sea of cars, we saw a yellow car, a single yellow car. What most people do is they try to move every car forward just a little bit, versus asking the question, "How do we create a lane so that the sea of cars parts, so that one car that truly matters most can zoom through?" That’s what we need to be doing in our organizations, it’s what we need to be doing as leaders, and it’s what we need to be doing in our personal lives.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Geoff, good thing, that one thing that you came up with the priority was good. Because if you rip the other two off… Biggest mistakes, you go into a lot of organizations and you have to cut through a lot of clutter to get from 20 pages to one page, or whatever it is. What are some of the big mistakes they’re making with their thinking or the organization?

Geoff Woods: The biggest mistakes, they start too big. They start too big. I mean, I said it earlier, think big, go small, trust the dominos will fall. And here’s what I mean. In 2009, there was a group out of the Netherlands that broke the world record for domino falls, 4.5 million. And we know, the best way to knock down a whole bunch of dominos is to line them up and knock the first one down. And here’s what happened, when that leader effortlessly flicked their finger, 94,000 joules of energy was unleashed. That’s as much as it would take me to drop into 545 pushups. So really think about it, for everybody who’s listening, actually take your index finger, put it against your thumb, and actually imagine you’re flicking a domino, and think about how much effort that would take. And now, think about how much effort you would have to exert to do 545 pushups. That one effortless action created that much.

Geoff Woods: Editing team, cut, I forgot the question you asked. Here’s why we share this with you. If we said, "Go unleash 94,000 joules of energy," How do you do it? The path to getting everything you want is to get one thing at a time. It means we have to think big about being the type of person that could make such a big impact, but go small, understand that it really comes down to, if I can just effortlessly knock that first one down, that will knock the next one, that will knock the next one.

Geoff Woods: And in a corporate world, or even in your personal life, it’s narrowing the scope. People stop because they worry about if they’re going to live it perfectly. And perfection doesn’t matter, it actually just gets in the way of what’s possible. It’s all about celebrating progress along the way. So when we go and it’s about, "I know you’ve got 20 pages of stuff and can we really identify what number one is, and prove that we can start to move the ball on that first." And then we earn the right to move the ball in the second, and then we earn the right to have the ball in the third. And you make that part of a culture, they’ll start achieving a whole lot more in a way less time.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: I want to talk about, Geoff, time blocking. As I look through and have listened to The One Thing, and you have different resources on your site, time blocking, because I’m thinking, okay, well you check the 411 before email. How do you know how much time you leave before you do that? And then that goes into the whole question of, well, how do you time block your day?

Geoff Woods: So this was cool. We were working with some people in our community and we help people form a habit of using a 411 among other things. And it was amazing because people, every weeks, would update their 411, they would have clarity on their priorities. And week after week, we’d check in and say, "How’s it going?" "Oh, I had clarity, but I didn’t get them done." We were scratching our heads, Jeremy, going like, "What the heck is going on?" And when we really dove in, what we figured out is, they were getting clarity there on their priority, but they weren’t time blocking it.

Geoff Woods: Time blocking is the act of scheduling time with yourself for the things that matter most. And we’re not talking about everything, we’re talking about the 20% priorities, your time off. So you’re always refreshed. Having time on a daily basis for you to do your one thing, whether you actually have a one thing, or as a leader, most of us have lots of other things, just time blocked for whatever is the highest priority that day. And time block to plan. And to really understand that these are the 20% big rocks that I need to place in the middle of the stream so that when the water hits it, it literally goes around.

Geoff Woods: The way most people plan their weeks as they open their digital calendar, see all the stuff that’s there, and then they just fill in the white space. But that’s treating everything like it matters equally, that’s a lie. The opportunity is to teach people, how do we start by getting clarity on what the priorities are, make sure those big rocks are time blocked, and make everything else flow around it.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: You remember a favorite example or story, whether it was a corporate training yourself, or someone from the community that this was a big aha. What did they actually time block in their schedule? What was a big priority for them? Or nothing’s moving these three blocks of time, or whatever it is?

Geoff Woods: Well, I mean, I can share just a personal example for me. Going into this year, our business had been growing so much and more was on my plate than ever before. And at the same time, I’ve had a very interesting identity shift in the last 12 months. I’ve shifted from being a businessman with a family, to being a family man with a business. There’s a clear difference. And when I look at more demands on me than ever before, but saying, "No, no, no, I’m a family man with a business," I knew I needed a new model for my time. And so, I took my planner, which is a paper planner. I still use a digital calendar, but a digital calendar is for convenience, a paper planner is for vision. Because you need a bigger view of time. And so we actually created one around The One Thing, it’s called The One Thing Planner, shocker.

Geoff Woods: And I sat down, and I’m looking at my monthly view and I said, "Okay, if I’m a family man with a business, then when am I going to take my time off, so that I’m the type of person that just works in between vacations and not the other way around? Can I place those boulders in the stream? Okay, well, what’s the one thing I can do for my family?" And it really came down to dates, dates with my wife and dates with my kids. And I figured out how many times a month would I want to go on a date with my wife and have dates with my kids. And I placed those boulders in the stream.

Geoff Woods: And then asked, "Well, what’s my one thing for my role?" It’s prospecting. "So what days am I going to be lead-generating? What days am I pouring into my team? When’s my planning time?" When I placed those boulders in the stream, literally Jeremy, I can hold it up for you right now, this is the current month. But you can see the big boulders in the stream. Then when I opened up my digital calendar, because I now had vision, I now had a model for my time, and I placed them in the digital calendar, as I moved throughout the month, when people started saying, "Hey, can you meet at this time?" The answer was actually really simple, "Sorry, I have a commitment." "Well, can you meet at this time?" "Sorry, I’m booked then too. Here’s when I am available." And it actually required that I started to say no to things. I had to start saying no to a lot of other stuff, but it was easier to do because I was clear on what I needed to be saying yes to.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: A lot of people, Geoff, thanks for sharing that, by the way, are bad at saying no. What are some ways that, as a site we want to be nice and make sure we commentate, what are some good ways that you’ve found of saying no?

Geoff Woods: First, we have to understand the reason we struggle to say no, is because we are not clear on what we should be saying yes to. Steve Jobs is a perfect example of this. In 1997, when he came back as CEO, for a two year period, from 97 to 99, he took Apple from 350 active projects down to 10. He said no to 340 things they had already said yes to. Not to imagine the additional new shiny objects that popped up, they narrowed their focus as a company down to 10 major things. And Apple went on to become one of the most valuable companies in the world.

Geoff Woods: When we get really clear on the things that matter most, all of a sudden, everything else just doesn’t matter as much. And from a tactical way, how do you say no? You actually don’t even have to say no. So this is where inside an organization, when we help them create a GPS, that’s the business plan, or a 411, the tool for you to have a relationship with your goals. When a boss comes in and says, "Hey, I need your help with this thing," You actually don’t say no, what you say is, "Awesome. Help me out here real quick. Here’s my 411 for this week. These are my priorities, I want to make sure I’m following your vision. What number would you give this? Is it the new number one? Is that the new number two? Is it the new number three?" You’re just literally holding your priorities up and saying, "Where does this fall?"

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: It becomes objective instead of [inaudible 00:29:30].

Geoff Woods: It’s objective. And at a senior leader level, I mean, this is what happens inside the fortune 500, when you’re talking about massive business plans and lots of interdependencies, lots of things changing constantly. When something new comes up, I’ve literally seen leaders who have said, "Hey, here’s my GPS for this year. These are our four top priorities, we’re adding a fifth. Let’s make sure you and I are in lock step moving forward. If I make this the new number one, here’s what the impact is going to be for the others. Are we okay with that?" It’s just a matter of giving people clarity, because he or she who is most clear actually has the power.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: What I love about that, Geoff, thank you for walking through that, is that it gives power to the staff of the company to possibly senior leaders as well. They could be like, "Listen, I can do what you’re saying." Because oftentimes the staff are like, "Oh you told me…" There may be a visionary leader is throwing in different directions that it gives power to the staff to say, "Cool, I’m happy to do that. But here’s the three things you told me, do you want me to supersede what I’m already doing?" And they may then go, "No."

Geoff Woods: And here’s what’s interesting, I remember we were working with, it was Cox, and somebody challenged in the room and just said, "Okay, I get it. This all sounds really good. But if I get an email from the CEO, I’ve got to reply." And I just played coach and said, "What do you think about that?" And the most senior person in the room stood up and said, "Look, if the CEO emails you, or if I email you, do we expect a response? Yes. But do you think we are literally sitting at our desk, pressing send, receive, send, receive, send, receive, send, receive, waiting for your email? No, I’m just moving it off of my plate and onto yours." But Jeremy, for some reason, we have taught ourselves that we’ve got to respond.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: It becomes urgent.

Geoff Woods: It must be urgent. But when we reply quickly, when we say yes to people, we are training people that we are responsive to the channel of email. We are training people that when you have a question, you come to me because I’m going to solve your problem. Instead of, Jay did this with me in my first 90 days, any time I had a question, he would say, "I have an answer. And my job is to teach you to think, what do you think?" Most of the time people are coming because they’re too lazy to figure it out for themselves. And if you just pushed back a little bit, it’s amazing, they figure it out.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: You know what the funny thing is, Geoff, there’s some email, I forgot what is the link, you could send some of the, ask a question, and it’s literally a video of someone, I don’t know if you’ve seen it, showing them going to Google and typing it in.

Geoff Woods: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I remember one of our coaches used to, when he would go into a time block, he’d close his door and he found that the number one thing that would distract him at a time block doing his one thing was people knocking on the door. And so what he did is he put a sheet of paper on the door that said, write your name, write your question, write three possible solutions.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: I thought it was going to be write your name, write your question, now Google it.

Geoff Woods: Write your name, write your question, write three possible solutions.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: In The One Thing too, you mentioned when the time blocking, you also have some trainings and some information around couples goal setting.

Geoff Woods: Yeah.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: So you want to talk about that for a second?

Geoff Woods: Oh, my gosh. So this was a huge aha. And this came from my partner, Jay and his wife, Wendy, probably now 14 or 15 years ago. They realized, we have these proven models for setting goals in a business and ensuring clarity and alignment, but we don’t do it with the most important relationship, the relationship with our significant other. Every year we set goals, but we don’t succeed alone, we succeed with others.

Geoff Woods: And so he and Wendy, for well over a decade, every year, rented a hotel, got out of their normal environment and they actually set their goals together. And we eventually created a couples goal setting retreat that we facilitate, where couples can actually go through a process that we facilitate, where they actually set goals together. And some of the biggest questions that we get are, "What if my plus one is not a goal setter?" Welcome to the majority of the world, most aren’t. And "What do I do if my goals aren’t their goals?" And the answer to that is it’s not about that. It’s actually not about your goals being the same. If so, then Melinda Gates would have gone and started a computer company, but that didn’t happen. Or a software company. It’s about understanding what’s important to each other and how you can support one another. And so it’s expanded, it’s been huge. And now it’s expanded to, there’s a couples retreat, then there’s a retreat for individuals and teams. That way you are aligned with the people that matter most.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: I love that. Because when you talk about the time blocking, you go to the big rocks, which are your family. And so what makes sense, you could apply the same things, and we spend our majority of time sometimes working to our personal life, which is our support system.

Geoff Woods: The thing that we want you to get from this, no one succeeds alone. So don’t try to, whether it’s setting goals with a significant other, or when we help leaders in organizations, when they want to create their business plan, they don’t do it themselves. And that’s a huge mistake. They go up to the ivory tower and create their business plan and cast down the vision, "This is where we’re going," But nobody feels like they have any ownership in it. Versus we spend it on its head, we facilitate the process, where you bring your people in and you ask questions and they tell you where they think you should be going. And it’s not a democracy, you still say, "This is where we’re going," But they make you a lot smarter in the process and now they’ve bought in.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: So first of all, Geoff, thank you. Thanks for creating clarity, which can be really confusing on priorities in habit forming. Everyone should check out The One Thing. That’s, the with the number one, thing.com, and check out the book, check out the podcast. Where else should they check out? I know you have corporate trainings and you have [crosstalk 00:36:06] trainings.

Geoff Woods: If you want to actually put this into practice, the training page has the online stuff we do, it has what we do from a corporate standpoint, the couples retreat that we facilitate, all that’s there. It’s one link that has everything.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz: Check it out. Geoff, as always, it’s a pleasure. Thank you.

Geoff Woods: Thanks, Jeremy.

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