How to Prioritize When Everything Feels Important

0:00If you've been feeling stuck in your business and wondering if you're the reason it's not growing faster, I have something for you. I'm hosting a free, no-pitch, live class called Three Money Beliefs That Made Me Millions. And I'm sharing the exact mindset shifts that helped me go from million-dollar years to million-dollar months. This isn't fluff. It is a surprising strategy that changed everything for me, and I want to share it with you. Like I said, no pitch, no fluff, just you and me talking about how we shift our beliefs around money to make you millions. Save your seat now at jasminestar.com forward slash millions.

0:32I can't wait to see you there. By prioritizing your initiatives, it will help increase your productivity. You know what to do and when to do it. And then you're going to get those clear results sooner. Do you have a long list of things to do in your business? Are you not quite sure which one should take a priority? Simply put, do you want more time to get more done in the best and most strategic way? I'm happy you're here. Welcome to the Jasmine Starr Show. My name is Jasmine Starr and I empower seven figure entrepreneurs to scale to eight. And today I want to talk about a common struggle, productivity and prioritization.

1:10Those two double P's. Today I want to talk about both. And for years I have struggled with having way too many things to do. I don't know about you, but do you ever walk out of like a CVS or Duane Reade and you have like 18 feet of a receipt? That's my daily to-do list. And so I started asking myself, what could I do that I would get the strongest and the fastest results? Is there a framework or something that I would be able to do to encourage me to prioritize what I should be doing next in a very long list? So during my last in-person mastermind that I hosted in Newport Beach, as a side note, I host a mastermind for female entrepreneurs who are making seven figures scaling to eight.

1:53and I shared with them my prioritization framework and I did it as a live exercise. So if you're listening to the podcast or watching it, if you want to do this exercise, I would love for you to do it right alongside of us. All you have to do is pause and then unpause whenever you're ready to move forward. So I'm gonna share a video snippet from that event and what we did and I want you to put yourself in the room. So let's get started with that video now. On that note, I want to walk through a few things to get us on the same page about what we can expect. So this is the story of my life. Yesterday, Jade, our COO, who you will meet, we're going to get a breakdown of how we started working together, what I started working with, and then now what she does in the organization.

2:37I picked her up yesterday from the airport, and she was asking about JD, and she's asking about Luna, how things are going. And I said, you know, we might be doing like a co-op homeschool program because homeschooling for us is she's just so much of a boss. Like she has her way of doing things. And we joke in our home, which is going to be a nightmare, I'm sure, the hierarchy in our house is a flat line. Our daughter, her dad, and her mom are all the same. And so I was saying that when JD was trying to go through and trace letters and things of that nature, that there was three lines of letters.

3:11And he said, okay, we're going to do, we're going to outline A, each row. And she progressed slower and slower so that by the third line, her head is on the table. And she says in Spanish, Daddy, grab my hand and trace the letters. And of course, my husband, who the firm advocate that he is, says, okay, of course, I will hold your hand. And that is the story of my life. I can't even judge my daughter because my husband has a daughter that is just like his wife. It's the hold my hand. I can't do this alone. So what you'll see Katie and what you'll see Jade and what you'll see J.D. do is the hold my hand.

3:47I can't do it entirely by myself. Years of therapy of codependency. And you want to know what? I love my team for it. I want us to be able to look at our team and say, hold our hand. I just can't do this. So what would it look like for us to build teams in that way? You'll see a lot of that happening. I've told the team that we are 100 % open books. You can't ask us a question. That would be too much. The reason you came into this room is to get an inside look of how people do it differently. So on that note, welcome. I'm very happy that you are here. And there's this emphasis, or some might say emphasis.

4:24Where do we put it? What a day. What a day. I want us to be very conscious of the stories that we tell ourselves because it's what you make of it. I want you going into your room tonight and choosing, despite it all, because we're going to have highs and lows. This is total normal mastermind experience. the highs and ecstasy of all these ideas. And then we have the low of, I don't have time. My team isn't big enough. Where do I allocate resources? How long will it actually take me to be? Why are other people with less doing more? Okay, normal, totally normal. But I just want us to start by saying, what a day.

5:04I have a clear idea of how to get to where I want to go. So I want us to get started right. And I want us to do something different because I've spoken to each one of you one-on-one. And let me tell you the number one common theme that we don't have is blank space. Once I get this done, then I'll do that. And then other things happen and we don't have the space for it. So what I'm gonna invite you to do, I understand the temptation to be like, wait, wait, wait, I flew all the way to Newport Beach to journal for 10 minutes. Oh, yes, you did. Hey, you want the white space and place to dream? That's what we're going to do.

5:42And we're going to do it in small pockets. I'm going to ease you on into this. For some of you who are coming in from cohort one, the joke was like, oh, Jasmine's a little bit woo. I was like, no, no. We've tapered down the woo. It is my job to intersperse versions of differences of the things that you're here to do so that you don't go home the same way. So you ask unconsciously for what you're going to get. So for 10 minutes, you're going to open your journals, or if you prefer to type, you do you. But what we're going to do, and I'm going to use an exercise that I used in a mastermind that I hated and then ended up being the biggest breakthrough for me.

6:25I want us to understand that here we are at the top of August. So if you look from January to July, that's seven months. And what we're going to do here is we're just going to list everything you've done in the last seven months. Now, I will tell you, I'm going to predict your future. You're going to list your launches. You're going to list your debuts. You're going to list your press. You're going to list your team hires. You're going to list the team fires of the person who just, oh, every time you just looked at them or they spoke, made your skin crawl. And you're going to list all those things.

6:54And then you're going to run out at about minute four. And we're going to keep you going another six minutes because this is where the deep work goes. It was taking on a project and completing it. It was having that hard conversation. It was how you rallied after a launch that didn't go as well. So for 10 minutes, we're just going to write down all the things in the last seven months that you've accomplished. And then I'm going to come back up and we're going to work through starting there. So we'll get some music going and we'll give you a two minute heads up. All right, ladies. There's plenty of time later.

7:31We have a break later this afternoon. if you guys would like to go back to that. I am going to ask you, and we're all leading up into like a very clear objective. Everything is leading us to an end result. And I've been told by the results of many of our print assessments, you women wanna know where we're going. So we are going to a very clear destination and it is a destination for us to, thank you, Katie, for us to have a very clear outcome and a prioritization of the things that we're going to do. because right now you're coming into the mastermind with a lot of things to do. And you're gonna lead the mastermind and there's a very good chance you're gonna add to that list.

8:09So what we're going to have a focus outcome would be a priority list of things that you can achieve when you're done. So until the end of the year, there's five months. We're here at the top of August. What I would like you to do is what must, now I know there's want, but let's hone our focus. What must get done by end of year? For you to hit your goal, what must be true. And then I want you to list them. And in this, for this exercise, because the next step, I'll get to that, but I think it might be nice to bullet point so visually we can go back and address it. So what needs to get done by the end of the year?

8:45Just start listing. Let's go crazy. Let your mind go. Let's be free. But I want us to be very strategic. So here again, we'll take about eight or 10 minutes. I'll gauge by the pacing of the crew. Here again, here again, we have a break later today. you can add to this if you would like. So now what we're looking at is first and foremost, proof of what you can do in seven months. And then what you're looking at is a desire to do something for the next five. So I want you to carefully assess them. And then we're going to remove any stories we have attached to what's too much, what's not enough. We're just looking at the possibilities.

9:23And so now that we have what we've done and we have what we want to do, what I would like for us to do is for us to do something with what we call tech issues. There it is. Okay. One domino. I will often refer to this on the team. Sometimes they'll say, what's the one lever? Or sometimes what's the one domino? What is the one thing in a system of operations that get us the greatest amount of impact? What one thing must we do in order to achieve the big end of year goal? So now what you're looking at is a list of what needs to be done over the five months and what things would alleviate the greatest amount of stress.

10:03So let's pause here for a second. I'm going to ask two people to write what they think might be or share what might be their domino. Does anybody just want to, and we don't need to do the mics because it's just probably one thing and I'll repeat it back for audio. Yes, Heli. Great. Great. So Hallie in the next five months would just happen. She's going to promote somebody to marketing director. Now, the challenge, the invitation I have for you is that person is there. What is a domino that when you look at all the things that you want to do for the next five months, what needs to get done first?

10:42That very first domino to push a series of things to happen now that we have a marketing director that might be isolated. She might need to hire. she might need to have operationalized her business. I'm saying hypothetically. She might need to operationalize her business. And she also probably thinks that she probably needs an operations director or a COO, maybe, hypothetically. So what is the point of saying, I need to operationalize the business without actually having somebody to take it or work alongside her? So the domino in this situation would not be, I need to operationalize the business.

11:12That's one thing that we have to do. What's the domino? She's gonna have to hire the person to come alongside her and or do it. Does that make sense? Let's try it one more. Talk to me, Heidi.

11:27Okay, no problem. Let's envision a series of 25 dominoes. And each domino represents something that needs to get done before the end of the year, right? So we need to probably finalize your live event for the tea party, right? There's gonna be tea party things related. There's going to be a launch related. We're going to have a churn initiative and we're going to get that evergreen funnel going. Right. There's a lot of things that you want to do before the end of the year. But there's going to be one thing that when you look at the list of 25 that says this has to be done first. What is the point of executing on the Tea Party live event that doesn't actually happen until next June?

12:08Well, what we really need to do is, well, we need to address churn. And that was part of the 25. but what is our idea? How are we going to really address churn? And if we went back to the edge assessment that you and I had, one of the things that we wanted to do was to get an evergreen funnel going. And you're like, I'm not sure this evergreen funnel is working. And then we dove into the numbers and I'm like, this thing actually might have some feet. So we have the party, we have churn, we have an evergreen. I don't want you to prioritize the party because it feels fun or it's a lot of stress.

12:38There was one thing that will actually push that domino and get the other things so that by the time you go to your live event and you're pitching the membership, you feel really good because your churn is on point. And how are we knowing our churn is on point? Well, we're going to get an evergreen funnel going. Then we're going to look at what's happening with the churn from that evergreen funnel so that when you pitch it next year at the live event, you feel really good about the time and investment. So what is the priority thing at that front end that we, that first domino that we need to push that would have ramifications for everything else in the business.

13:14The dumbass deal. You're what? The dumbass deal. Let's go. Hold on. Let's get a mic for the dumbass deal. You know, like last time we were here, Heidi said she needed to have, Jade, can you get her the mic? Last time we were here, she had just bought a farm in Nashville, a lavender farm. She's going to have her events there. And she said that I'm saving money for a cow, but just not any cow. It's a very special cow. And she's going to call her cash cow. So Heidi has these Heidi-isms. So we have her cash cow that's on the horizon, marching to us if just like baby hairs away from that. And now we have the dumbass deal.

13:48Explain to us the dumbass deal. So I was writing down all of my things and I need to make sure. So like basically the dumbass deal is I'm a dumbass for offering it and you'd be a dumbass not to take it. Okay. So I need Honey the Highlander to be a dumbass deal. I need my upsell for Honey the Highlander to be a dumbass deal. I need PPHQ to be a dumbass deal. I need my upsell on PPHQ to be a dumbass deal. Dumbass deal, great. So this is actually what we're gonna be working into. So is the domino the dumbass deal? So let's ask ourselves, this is how we know if the dumbass deal is the domino. If we get the dumbass deal to work and off its feet and you look at the rest of the 24 dominoes or however list you're on, maybe your list is only seven, whatever.

14:34But if we get the dumbass deal going, does it impact everything after that? Or does something else need to go in front of the dumbass deal for the dumbass deal to really be executed? Does this make sense? Are we following along? Okay, great. So when we work through that, and this is where we workshop questions. This is where we really get it going because we have a hard time seeing the soda label from the inside of the bottle or in this crew. We have a hard time seeing like the sparkling water or green juice label from the inside of the bottle. So I know that dumbass deal is going to be real good and it's real important.

15:09But what needs to happen in front of it so that the dumbass deal is set up? And it might not be the thing you're being called to. And it might not be the sexier fun thing. But the domino is going to set everything else in a list of priorities. And so that's what we're going to do right about now. I just, we're going to not journal or anything. I just want you to look at what you might think would be the domino. And if you're like, I'm not quite sure, okay, just put a little star against two or three that you think will be dominoes. And then I'm gonna walk you through a framework that we use internally to help us keep the main thing, the main thing, even when it's not fun and even when it's not sexy and even when we don't want to do it.

15:50We understand that one domino topples all of them. It's our job as CEOs to prioritize what is that thing. Cool, great. So as you're kind of just going through your list and you're getting those things ready, I want to walk us through a prioritization framework. Will this be the end-all, be-all for you to walk home and know how to prioritize? Probably not. Will I get you started on a path that's sturdier than where you currently are? Yes. So I want us to have a very clear conversation around what is urgent versus what is important. The urgent is constantly getting your attention. The urgent needs to be supposedly handled right there and then.

16:34The urgent is a wonderful distraction. Sometimes it's really fun. Sometimes it's very stressful. Sometimes it's agonizing. But that's the urgent. The important things. The important things are often overlooked for the urgent things. Because the important, nobody's really on your arse for the important. No one's really demanding the important. Because our job as operators and as CEOs and as visionaries is we know what's important. We know where we need to go, but the team sometimes has a hard time understanding, seeing, or even getting behind because it feels like, oh, everything's on fire. Everything's on fire.

17:08So what I want us to do as we're assessing the domino is understand that urgent keeps us stuck. I want us to understand that urgent keeps you in the business and not on the business. One of the biggest breakthroughs that I had when I was masterminding is how I believed that I had to address what was urgent because it would keep me from what was important. And then I quickly realized that when I focused more on what was important, the urgent stuff figured itself out. It was just like, sorry, it's going to get a delayed response. Sorry, I can't solve your problem right now. I'm sorry that we don't have the SOP that's needed.

17:51I'm going to get back to you. the next day. It's just understanding we have to prioritize the important. So if we had to ask ourselves a real question, because all we need to do is have a lot of clarity and reality here. How much in a given work week, let's just say hypothetically, 40 hours, we know many of us work more, some of us work less. This is not a right or wrong. Percentage-wise, how much are you working on important versus urgent? Write it in your notes, just an assessment, what comes up for you naturally. And I'm seeing business partners look at each other and give looks across the room that is just like, it's the Gettysburg address of looks of, oh my God, oh my God.

18:32Oh, this has been interesting. This is a new experience. If you guys might be open and y 'all, I'm gonna be real with you so that you are real with yourself and that you are real with this other people because we don't get rooms like this very often. I've said it before and I do, I'm going to say it a thousand times over. only 4 % of business owners in America in a given year will cross seven figures. 4 % of business owners will cross seven figures. 0.7 % is female. And so we have to be so thankful that this room exists. We have to be thankful that we're in this room. But I'm imploring you to please use this room for conversations that you likely, 99.3 % will not have with other people in your daily life.

19:19So let's have a little bit of a fun exercise, if I may, with Meg and Katie. Katie, what's your percentage? And we're going to cross compare. And Katie, keep it real. Keep it real. This is fun. This is fun. This is fun. that we're screwed. Okay. Here we go. Okay, so Meg, what is the percentage of I spend my time as co-founder and co-visionaries of this organization are you spending on... I don't need that. No, we're recording. We're recording. We're recording. Yes, yes, yes. That's why. I'm so sorry. I should have done that for a little bit of housekeeping. We're recording everything so you can watch.

19:55Anybody can watch us back at a later point in time. So what is the percentage of urgent versus important that you would say, what's your guess? together or me personally, individually in the company? Like the two of us together working on it or me separately? You. 50%. 50 % urgent and 50 % important. Katie, we have a mic for you. If you were asking me from the last month, 75 % is urgent and 25 % important. Great. Our goal by just doing this exercise and priority is for us to focus on the domino, even if it doesn't feel urgent. Even if you're sitting here and saying, Jasmine, we got other things that are important.

20:34I understand, but urgency in business will always be there. It will always exist. So this is a first time accepting urgent will be there and choosing important. So I want us to focus on earning the results and not just getting them or expecting them. It's one thing of putting it on a list. I need to get this done. I look forward to getting this done, but we actually have to change our behavior to get an entirely different outcome. Many of you have been in business for over four or five years. And so what got you here and what got you into this room will not get you to the next level. So what does that mean?

21:13Ruthless elimination. Ruthless. And some people on your team will say, I don't know if I like the person who came back from Newport Beach. If they look at you and they say, you've changed, then you could say, thank you. I'm not supposed to be the same person. Ruthless elimination of things that are distractions. I want us to learn how to say no to our team members, to new projects, to anything that's going to get in the way of the domino. We have to please, I'm begging and imploring you, trust the domino. Trust that the answer is inside of you. And if this domino keeps on coming up, we have to say, I've never at once ever focused on something that wasn't on fire, that wasn't sexy or glamorous.

21:58It didn't really call me to it, but I actually believe this thing will have an impact on everything I want to do from now into the end of the year. Lastly, we're going to reprioritize our time so that the domino, because we've already went through the framework, is important. So we're going to reprioritize even though we can say, I have a launch coming up and I need to do this. I get that. But you will stay on that launch treadmill if we haven't reprioritized where we're going in the business. We are going to sprint in place if we have not reprioritized where we're going in business. And I want us, lastly, to focus on results to push through the pain.

22:37Oftentimes, things come at a cost. And when we focus on the urgent with our team, our team feels seen and they feel very supported. Because they're like, oh, I asked for this. And Alex got a fee. I asked for this. and Green did it. I asked for this and I got this feedback when I needed it, right when I needed it back. And so their urgency is not our priority. So when we are focusing on the results, what do I want as an outcome of the domino? Despite how uncomfortable I am, I choose this. And so I know that we're starting the day and everyone's like, whoa, she came out with a bazooka. I did, I did.

23:14Because there's no more playing around anymore. We are at a time in the education space, in the digital space, we're at a time where businesses are really turning upside down. And I will tell you that for probably four or five months, I felt really nervous. I felt very scared. I felt very uncertain with the nature of the types of businesses that we were building. And then what happened to me was nothing about my knowledge or the reality changed except that all business owners are on the same starting line. Every business owner is looking at AI and saying WTF. Every single one of us. I see people who are doing nine and 10 figure businesses and they're making these offers for like a thousand dollar consulting call where I put you into a customer service line and then I run it through my AI end and that's my offer.

24:05I was like, interesting. We're all on the starting line. So if we're all on the starting line, Ladies, hear me quickly and very clearly. We can win. We can win and we can win. The playing field is a lot more level now than it has ever been. And so what I want you to do is to focus on the domino. I want you to say it's important. I want you to push away the urgent because you see a vision of where you can be when for the first time in a very long time, the playing field is shaky and yet very standardized. What I would like to do now is spend a couple minutes on Q &A. And even if you don't have a question, but you have a feeling that needs to be out of you, please understand that we're here for that totally and completely.

24:52Any questions, any breakdowns, any confusion? If you are feeling confused or not sure about the domino, I'm gonna walk us through a domino framework real quick, but let's get the clarity. If you are feeling confused, somebody else in the room is too. Yes, Helly. Okay, so my domino maybe changed a little bit because yes, Fiona's instrumental. I think doing everything, my marketing director, They're doing everything that needs to happen this year. And it's already starting to happen with her in place and my COO back from maternity leave. But we are implementing Hallie AI. So now you're saying this, I'm going, that might be the catalyst.