I think most people have heard of the 80/20 rule, also known as the Pareto Principle … basically that 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes.
In business it is often that case that 80% of revenues come from 20% of the clients. It can also be suggested that 80% of your problems come from 20% of your clients.
Jim Rohn would suggest, “Spend 80% of your time with the 20% that produce the most.”
In a perfect world you might be able to use that data to fire 20% of your clients, replace them with “better clients” and hence your business would improve. In reality life is never that simple.
This IS however a very handy way to look at your efforts at work because very often an 80% solution is perfectly adequate, and if it can be achieved with 20% of the effort then that is often a good choice.
Don’t get me wrong … if you are a surgeon then 80% success rate of your operations is not an acceptable targetI Equally if you are a pilot them 80% of your landings being good is not acceptable! However, if you are developing an IT project then just maybe a solution that meets 80% of the needs, but is developed at 20% of the cost would be a great answer! If you are producing internal reports do they need to be “pretty” or do they need to be functional? If they are readable and professional is that OK … or do they need to be in colour, formatted to the “nth” degree and publisher quality? (Often not!)
This is where business common sense comes into play …
Ask yourself some basic questions:
- Does the 80/20 rule apply to my situation?
- Will the extra effort it will take to improve my result “here” be better spent elsewhere?
- Will the extra effort it will take to improve my result be time well spent?
- Am I aiming for perfection at the expense of practicality?
- Will my client be happy with the result I am providing? (Note it can be an internal client, or an external client).
“The 80/20 rule should serve as a daily reminder to focus 80 percent of your time and energy on the 20 percent of your work that is really important” F. John Reh.
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Kevin Dee is founder of Eagle (a Professional Staffing Company)
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