I was reminded the other day from a colleague about how we need to really focus nowadays to achieve great things. Combine that focus with the ability to make bold decisions and work hard and you cant go wrong

Have you noticed how distractible we all our in our daily lives? Our phone buzzes or lights up and we immediately take notice regardless of what else we are doing. And it isn’t just your phone as there are so many other distractions that cause us to switch attention away from what we are doing. This impacts us all at an individual level and we see this manifest itself in the organizations where we work.

When it comes to managing a Portfolio of Projects this behavior means we are constantly having to rebalance where we focus on and has the very real danger that the Portfolio becomes too big to really achieve anything. What I mean by that is that we have our lists of projects that are approved and we are working on and monitoring progress. Then the newest idea comes in and we say yes to that and so add that to the growing project list without stopping or delaying other projects because they are believed to be equally important. Before we know it we have a large list of projects inching along due to resource constraints and we are not able to get the right focus because there is just too many things to review.

There is this constant theme that the business landscape is constantly in flux and we have to change rapidly to keep up with it and this is very true. But we also have to ensure that we don’t loose FOCUS on what is important and what will drive the organization forward. Having a view of the Portfolio of Projects will at least ensure that the scope of work and driving forces behind it are front and center and as leaders we can ensure we don’t get distracted as often as we do.