The Operations Manager at Nymi is a superhero within the company - let’s call him Joe.
Joe is the kind of person who can best be described as “on top of everything”. It seems like no matter what the task is, he’s on top of it. Joe is a model employee, has progressed steadily up the ranks to the senior leadership team, and is a linchpin.
I was reflecting this weekend about Joe, what exactly makes him so useful, and what I can learn from that.
The truth is, there are many factors that make Joe extremely useful, such as: he’s incredibly organized, he has a great working memory, he is easy to get along with, he is willing to do whatever it takes to succeed (bathroom cleaning, delivering packages, organizing calendars, etc.), he communicates extremely well, he knows when to say no and ask for help; I could go on.
But there is one critical factor about Joe I want to focus on: he’s an Ask Once Person.
Joe is the kind of person that you ask to do something once and it gets done. He’s a Message to Garcia person.
It might not get done right away, or in the timeline you were expecting - he’s a busy man after all - but it will get done. If he feels he can’t personally get it done, he’ll find someone else to help.
Sometimes, you might even forget you’ve asked him to do something, and yet somehow, it gets completed.
Joe has a reputation within the company for being reliable regardless of difficulty or complexity, and this has propelled his career from Office Manager to Operations Manager and direct report to the CEO.
Joe is an Ask Once Person, and you should be too.
This means a few things:
Joe has a system for documenting tasks. When I ask Joe to update a spreadsheet or track a package or fix a leaking faucet, Joe has a system for in-taking that information and sorting it within his priority list. He may take a look at his to-do’s and decide he needs to off-board it, or tell you you need to communicate this to someone else, but the critical feature here is he doesn’t miss or forget requests. He writes everything down and prioritizes it immediately. He is also ruthless about clarifying if something is a task or not. He will stop meetings to gain clarity on a passing request in order to ensure that everything is captured. He will also often follow-up a meeting with a record of all the tasks outlined in the meeting, who is responsible, and by when. This is the gold standard of documentation.
-
Joe has a system for prioritizing tasks. This is much more nuanced and difficult to capture in a few lines, but Joe is a master of knowing what is urgent, what is important, and what can wait. I’m still trying to learn how exactly he does this, but I’ve learned a few critical things:
He writes everything down and does not act on requests immediately;
When he does review requests, he evaluates whether he is the best person to accomplish the task;
He always cross-references with the most important items on his list for the day, and gets the biggest things done first;
He has no problem telling you no, and doesn’t feel even the smallest sense of remorse about it (he’s got too much to do!);
He never avoids a task just because it is difficult or uncomfortable
Joe has a system for executing tasks. He is ruthlessly focused on the task at hand, and ignores all other inbound activities, with the exception of documenting future task requests. If he is blocked, he reaches out to other parties to unblock activities. He doesn’t take no for an answer, and is meticulous about follow-ups.
Joe communicates effectively. Joe also has a reputation as a world-class communicator, both in person and asynchronously. When working with Joe, you know you will be notified when something is needed of you or a task is completed. There is no ambiguity and no worrying when it comes to working with Joe, because you know he’ll tell you when it’s done. Joe demonstrates that a finished task is only useful when the entire team knows about it. He sends updates, he identifies blockers, and he only provides information when absolutely necessary.
Ultimately, Joe has built a reputation of being the kind of person you go to when something absolutely needs to get done. That is a reputation he guards and cherishes closely, and lives up to on a daily basis.
So how does one become an Ask Once Person?
Have an inbound task request system. A To-Do list is often insufficient, and I’ve written on how my To-Do list is structured, but ultimately having a system for dealing with requests for time and effort is fundamental to being an Ask Once person. If you’re in a meeting, or away from your computer, how do you ensure that something said in passing gets completed? Perhaps most importantly, just write everything down. Imagine you were away for a day, or missed a critical meeting because of a conflict, you would wish someone had written all these details down for you. Be that person, for everybody else. Worst case: you write down too much, and something turns out to not be important (or a fleeting thought by an executive, I get lots of those). But ultimately having an intake system, one robust and flexible, is 90% of the battle.
Have a ruthless prioritization strategy. I believe that ultimately this comes down to values: do you want to be the person known for getting anything asked of them completed on time? Or do you want to be the person who says yes to everything and delivers, but not necessarily on schedule? Or do you want to be the person who says no to just about everything, but when they do say yes, treats it as life or death? This is all about prioritization. How you prioritize will determine how you survive in the throws of the fast-paced world of corporate culture. Some people use the Eisenhower Matrix to help, and I have found my Daily Highlight To-Do List strategy to be effective here, but ultimately it needs to work for you. Take things on a case-by-case basis, but have overarching principles to guide you.
Have a ruthless execution strategy. All of this is just note-taking unless you get things done. How you do that will depend mostly on you and your role, but suffice to say, an Ask Once person gets thing done, no matter what.
Have a communication strategy. How and when you communicate is often as important as getting the job done. On teams larger than 5 people it can be difficult to know what everyone is working on and how it all comes together into a finished project. Communication is fundamental to success here. If you get everything done ahead of schedule, but know one else knows that, it doesn’t count for much. Have a plan to get the word out, and stick to it. For some pointers on communication, check out this article about the 5 levels of employees.
In closing, here’s a simple checklist as to whether you are an Ask Once person:
You note down any task that is mentioned in discussion or in a meeting
You have a method for inputting task requests into a tracking system
You have a prioritization strategy to handle inputs
You have a set of overarching principles that drive your prioritization strategy
You are ruthlessly effective at getting things done
You have a clear set of protocols used to streamline communication within your team
You have a reputation for being an Ask Once person (ultimately, this is the only thing that matters)
Here’s to having more Joes in the world.