Method

Six principles. None of them is original; such merit as they have lies in keeping to them every day, including the days when it would be easier not to. I keep them in writing, which is the first way of not forgetting them.

Time and attention

Time can be measured; attention cannot, and it is the scarcer of the two. Guarding both means filtering before forwarding, summarising before attaching, and calling a meeting only when an email will not do. Whatever reaches the desk of the person deciding should have earned its place there. The rest can wait, and generally does so without complaint.

Five separate words

An idea is a possibility. A proposal is an idea with a cost and an owner. A decision is a proposal accepted by someone entitled to accept it; an action is what follows, with a date attached; a result is what can be observed afterwards. Muddling them is the quickest route to believing a thing finished before it has started.

Facts and assumptions

‘They have not replied’ is a fact. ‘They are not interested’ is an assumption, and should be written down as one, together with whatever it would take to check it. Assumptions are no sin; they become one when they go about dressed as facts. A well-placed ‘perhaps’ spares everyone a good many wrong certainties.

Memory that can be found

An archive is judged not by how much it holds but by how quickly it hands back what is needed: accumulating is easy, finding is the work. Everything gets a name that says what it is, a date and a single place to live. A file called ‘final’, followed by ‘final_2’, is an archive that has stopped telling the truth.

Closing things properly

Delivered is not the same as done, and a draft is not a message sent. A matter is closed when the person meant to receive it has received it, when what was supposed to happen has happened, and when someone has written as much down. Until then it is open, however tidy it may look. ‘Nearly done’ is a polite way of saying ‘open’.

Dissent, then execution

If I disagree, I say so beforehand, once, with my reason and the consequence I expect. Repeating it would not make it more right, merely longer. If the decision stands, I carry it out as though it had been mine. Dissent is there to improve the decision, not to be proved right afterwards.