WEBVTT NOTE This file was generated by Descript 00:00:00.133 --> 00:00:05.473 James: Hello, and welcome to another episode, number 21 of Behind the Madness. 00:00:05.503 --> 00:00:10.676 I'm your host, James Roberts, I am the owner and founder here at Method HQ. 00:00:11.084 --> 00:00:14.788 Today we are talking about sharpening the saw 00:00:20.338 --> 00:00:24.298 So I'm here with Jamie and today we're talking about sharpening, the saw. 00:00:24.358 --> 00:00:28.108 Now, Jamie, this is something I know nothing about. 00:00:28.108 --> 00:00:31.311 I hadn't heard of the concept until I read Tilly's blog. 00:00:31.611 --> 00:00:35.044 So if you wouldn't mind fill me in and fill the listeners in. 00:00:35.226 --> 00:00:39.454 Jamie: Sharpening the saw is a concept from a fantastic book, one that I would 00:00:39.454 --> 00:00:43.474 recommend any business owner or anyone really who wants to be successful. 00:00:43.521 --> 00:00:49.438 And it's all about making sure you are as efficient and effective at what you do. 00:00:49.567 --> 00:00:52.694 The book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey 00:00:52.754 --> 00:00:54.644 is a very, very, very good read. 00:00:54.704 --> 00:00:55.713 So do pick it up. 00:00:55.713 --> 00:00:59.506 But sharpening the saw is all about the concepts of making 00:00:59.506 --> 00:01:01.366 sure you are a sharp tool. 00:01:01.366 --> 00:01:01.816 James: I'm sorry. 00:01:01.936 --> 00:01:05.594 Jamie: A sharp tool, yeah, not that kind of tool, James, beneficial one. 00:01:05.683 --> 00:01:09.763 That's the kind of lighthearted stuff we really, really go for it. 00:01:10.183 --> 00:01:13.453 But the best way to talk about this is really go through a story. 00:01:13.483 --> 00:01:17.863 So I want you to imagine there's a guy in the woods and he is cutting 00:01:17.863 --> 00:01:20.243 down a tree with his dull tool. 00:01:20.363 --> 00:01:20.963 James: Okay. 00:01:21.653 --> 00:01:24.983 Jamie: After a few hours, his neighbor gets bored of this and 00:01:24.983 --> 00:01:26.333 he just can't take it anymore. 00:01:26.393 --> 00:01:30.353 So he goes over and he says, why don't you sharpen the saw and this 00:01:30.353 --> 00:01:31.990 neighbor turns around and goes. 00:01:32.410 --> 00:01:33.850 But that will take me time. 00:01:34.850 --> 00:01:37.790 But by taking the time sharpening the saw, will take him less time 00:01:37.790 --> 00:01:39.221 to finish the task he's doing. 00:01:39.341 --> 00:01:43.387 We often in life put things behind what we need to do, we don't 00:01:43.387 --> 00:01:44.947 always prioritize correctly. 00:01:45.457 --> 00:01:49.897 Sometimes, if we want to become more educated, we can't take 15 00:01:49.897 --> 00:01:53.527 minutes a day to read, or we can't take the four times a week to go to 00:01:53.527 --> 00:01:55.147 the gym to look after our bodies. 00:01:55.717 --> 00:01:59.979 And then after a while, these lack of habits build up. 00:02:00.907 --> 00:02:04.147 And then we see the results as a whole and think, oh my God, 00:02:04.147 --> 00:02:05.167 that's happened overnight. 00:02:06.167 --> 00:02:10.487 By sharpening the saw on a regular basis by getting 1% better. 00:02:10.513 --> 00:02:13.107 Then you will see huge, huge results. 00:02:13.437 --> 00:02:16.407 So the real question we have is do you have time sharpen 00:02:16.407 --> 00:02:17.878 the saw, do you make time? 00:02:17.878 --> 00:02:20.940 Because these are the moments that you've really got to ask yourself if 00:02:20.940 --> 00:02:23.910 you want the results and you're going to have to break down those habits. 00:02:24.114 --> 00:02:29.554 Reading 15 minutes a day we can all find, going for a lunch time walk we can all do. 00:02:29.854 --> 00:02:34.264 And these are the moments that make sure that we are a sharp tool, we are better 00:02:34.264 --> 00:02:36.274 business owners, marketing departments. 00:02:36.574 --> 00:02:38.434 We are better at branding our products. 00:02:38.884 --> 00:02:42.067 Could you go out to the weekend and speak to 10 customers? 00:02:42.440 --> 00:02:46.940 Could you jump on the emails in your CRM and say, I'm going to send five of 00:02:46.940 --> 00:02:50.611 these to see who would want to voucher code for sending me some feedback. 00:02:50.944 --> 00:02:54.124 Would that help your offering Would that shape your future products? 00:02:54.124 --> 00:02:54.934 Yes it would. 00:02:55.834 --> 00:02:59.704 But these are the moments that you've got to take by sharpening what you 00:02:59.704 --> 00:03:01.894 do to make sure you do it the best. 00:03:02.614 --> 00:03:04.174 So there's a bit long-winded James. 00:03:04.504 --> 00:03:07.174 But it is one of those things that's really, really important. 00:03:07.294 --> 00:03:11.279 James: Yeah, and I think it's brilliant and I do like the term I was reading 00:03:11.279 --> 00:03:16.049 a book, which those who know me know that that is a feat in itself. 00:03:16.131 --> 00:03:19.041 It was actually, all about sleep I can't remember the author. 00:03:19.041 --> 00:03:21.171 but I will make sure I get it down in the show notes. 00:03:21.321 --> 00:03:22.671 Try and read a book on how you sleep. 00:03:22.851 --> 00:03:24.651 Oh, you know, we should all be fairly good at it. 00:03:24.651 --> 00:03:29.314 We do it quite often, but it was around naps, it was around basically 00:03:29.314 --> 00:03:34.834 making us better human beings through the right kind of sleep or the right. 00:03:34.913 --> 00:03:35.783 It wasn't called sleep. 00:03:35.783 --> 00:03:36.863 It was called rest. 00:03:36.953 --> 00:03:37.433 There we go. 00:03:38.423 --> 00:03:39.333 So it was all about rest. 00:03:39.333 --> 00:03:39.990 Jamie: He fell asleep. 00:03:40.050 --> 00:03:42.462 James: And I fell asleep and it was all sleep related. 00:03:42.462 --> 00:03:43.722 It was all napping related. 00:03:43.722 --> 00:03:46.182 It was all basically about recharging your batteries, but it comes back 00:03:46.182 --> 00:03:49.439 to this, it comes back to certain times, Winston Churchill for 00:03:49.439 --> 00:03:51.509 example, was a very, very big napper. 00:03:51.645 --> 00:03:57.215 He's running the country at a pivotal time and he would make time for sleep 00:03:57.245 --> 00:04:01.415 because he knew the decisions that he would have to make needed his 00:04:01.415 --> 00:04:03.245 full capacity to be able to do that. 00:04:03.245 --> 00:04:07.205 So he would schedule out time to actually to rest, recharge to go again. 00:04:07.505 --> 00:04:11.045 And I think it's, you know, a similar concept to this. 00:04:11.315 --> 00:04:15.355 In the fact that, you know, you have to schedule time in to improve 00:04:15.355 --> 00:04:18.355 yourself and be that what it is, you know, it could just be sharpening 00:04:18.355 --> 00:04:20.035 the saw so you can go again quicker. 00:04:20.035 --> 00:04:24.535 It could be you know, making a plan of action before just diving 00:04:24.535 --> 00:04:26.485 in and doing what you need to do. 00:04:26.497 --> 00:04:32.039 All of these things, even down to scheduling your team and yes, it's going 00:04:32.039 --> 00:04:35.759 to take time to do it rather than just let them sort it out amongst themselves but 00:04:35.939 --> 00:04:39.629 they're going to be much better optimized and, and work at a much better rate. 00:04:39.659 --> 00:04:42.119 If you do, just take that time to start off with. 00:04:42.569 --> 00:04:43.649 So, yeah. 00:04:43.649 --> 00:04:44.429 I liked the concept. 00:04:44.429 --> 00:04:48.445 It's right up there with with my kind of productivity and optimization that 00:04:48.445 --> 00:04:49.915 I like to do within a lot of companies. 00:04:49.915 --> 00:04:50.305 Anyway. 00:04:50.340 --> 00:04:52.566 So yeah, I think it's a really really good concept. 00:04:52.866 --> 00:04:57.623 And as you said, everybody, can find time, find 15 minutes to, as you said 00:04:57.623 --> 00:05:00.713 to read, or even if you're not very good reader, like me find time to to 00:05:00.773 --> 00:05:02.823 put a podcast on or an audio book. 00:05:02.869 --> 00:05:04.969 But time for yourself. 00:05:05.389 --> 00:05:10.347 To make you better to learn, you know, we mentioned in the last podcast around 00:05:10.347 --> 00:05:15.327 us and rebranding our website and the reasons we did it were around our 00:05:15.327 --> 00:05:19.977 customers and trying to improve or enrich the content that we're offering to them. 00:05:20.090 --> 00:05:25.670 And we could have not done that we could have quite happily carried on as we were, 00:05:25.730 --> 00:05:29.226 we could have kind of forgotten about them if you like, and carried on regardless. 00:05:29.556 --> 00:05:34.264 But we took a step back, we stopped, we had a chat about it and realised 00:05:34.284 --> 00:05:35.784 that it was the right thing to do. 00:05:35.844 --> 00:05:38.724 And we schedule time in to do that. 00:05:38.724 --> 00:05:39.871 Now, the time slipped you. 00:05:39.911 --> 00:05:43.941 You know I think we're on our third deadline for our own website, but it 00:05:43.941 --> 00:05:50.011 was there, it was worked on constantly and we finally did release the website. 00:05:50.131 --> 00:05:53.311 And I think that's where you can always find time. 00:05:53.371 --> 00:05:56.881 You know, your timescales might, might shift slightly, but we 00:05:56.881 --> 00:05:59.597 realised that we needed to take that time to focus on ourselves. 00:05:59.851 --> 00:06:03.691 Jamie: It's a really interesting one, James, because something I heard recently 00:06:03.691 --> 00:06:07.891 that came on the back of the pandemic and obviously during that, I think we 00:06:07.891 --> 00:06:09.241 can all agree, we had a lot of time. 00:06:09.548 --> 00:06:12.008 A lot of people had more time than they probably ever had in 00:06:12.038 --> 00:06:14.048 their adult lives suddenly appear. 00:06:14.431 --> 00:06:17.468 And I heard something recently that said that thing that you've been 00:06:17.468 --> 00:06:21.742 wanting to do, it's not a case of time, it's a case of discipline. 00:06:21.792 --> 00:06:25.692 Because whether you wanted to learn a language or learn the guitar. 00:06:26.082 --> 00:06:30.522 Whatever it was, we have had the time, so if you haven't done it, then it's 00:06:30.552 --> 00:06:32.532 case a discipline rather than time. 00:06:32.875 --> 00:06:39.025 Finding the time is one thing, making the time is another, using tactics, 00:06:39.025 --> 00:06:41.485 like your calendar to time block. 00:06:41.665 --> 00:06:45.505 If you know, you want to lose weight, or you know you want to be more productive 00:06:45.505 --> 00:06:50.478 at work, block out 15 minutes in the day to read, block out the time in your diary. 00:06:50.838 --> 00:06:55.188 When something goes in a diary, we are programmed in to not want to cancel it. 00:06:55.518 --> 00:06:59.508 You don't often cancel a dentist Although I think we all wish we probably could. 00:07:00.018 --> 00:07:00.978 Sorry, dentists. 00:07:01.079 --> 00:07:03.449 But when it's in the diary, people can't book over it. 00:07:04.019 --> 00:07:05.909 You're making a commitment to yourself. 00:07:06.419 --> 00:07:09.449 If you booked in to read with a client. 00:07:09.899 --> 00:07:11.009 You wouldn't cancel it. 00:07:11.339 --> 00:07:12.599 So why would you do it to yourself? 00:07:12.629 --> 00:07:14.729 You are shortchanging or self by doing that. 00:07:14.849 --> 00:07:17.519 James: I think look at those goals as well in the same token, you know, 00:07:17.669 --> 00:07:21.269 you how to eat an elephant you know, you do it bit by bit and, and I think 00:07:21.299 --> 00:07:22.271 it's exactly the same thing here. 00:07:22.397 --> 00:07:23.237 Jamie: Frowned upon that 00:07:23.720 --> 00:07:23.960 James: It is. 00:07:24.470 --> 00:07:24.890 It is. 00:07:25.040 --> 00:07:25.350 Oops. 00:07:25.421 --> 00:07:27.561 Same way as it didn't use to be able to get my taxis as well. 00:07:27.581 --> 00:07:30.381 How did you use to get, But anyway, that's another, another side. 00:07:37.023 --> 00:07:38.973 And that finishes off another podcast. 00:07:39.244 --> 00:07:44.074 So In summary, by sharpening the saw, you can keep yourself mentally refreshed. 00:07:44.134 --> 00:07:47.274 You're better prepared to deal with unprecedented curveballs 00:07:47.274 --> 00:07:48.384 that life can throw at you. 00:07:48.804 --> 00:07:50.814 And the same obviously applies for your business. 00:07:51.324 --> 00:07:55.104 So by constantly ensuring that this saw remained sharp, your 00:07:55.104 --> 00:07:56.634 business will grow and renew. 00:07:57.794 --> 00:08:01.184 If you've enjoyed this podcast, please do share it with people who 00:08:01.184 --> 00:08:02.924 you think might find interest in it. 00:08:03.314 --> 00:08:04.514 Over the next few weeks. 00:08:04.514 --> 00:08:07.304 We've also got some great guests that we're going to get it involved. 00:08:07.724 --> 00:08:11.439 And make sure you do follow along and also give us some feedback. 00:08:11.439 --> 00:08:13.023 Obviously over iTunes is great. 00:08:13.023 --> 00:08:15.126 It does help us kind of go up through the ranks. 00:08:15.156 --> 00:08:18.366 So the more feedback you can give us the more comments positive. 00:08:18.366 --> 00:08:21.396 Obviously we don't want the negative ones, email them to Paul. 00:08:21.513 --> 00:08:24.963 All of those positive comments that you can kind of put on iTunes will 00:08:24.963 --> 00:08:27.933 really help us reach more listeners, which is kind of what we want to do. 00:08:29.015 --> 00:08:32.285 So until next time, keep that saw sharp.