27. Everything Can't Be Priority One

At Work with The Ready

We talk a lot about doing less to get more—but in practice, most organizations end up doing the opposite. When priorities pile up, and nothing gets removed or finished, the result is a familiar kind of chaos: too many projects, too little focus, and an endless loop of adding more in hopes of getting unstuck.

This week, Rodney Evans and Sam Spurlin unpack one of the most common organizational dynamics they see: the “more-is-more” trap of priority overload. They dig into why deprioritizing anything at work feels so psychologically and politically fraught, how identity and sunk costs keep teams clinging to low-impact efforts, and ways for leadership teams to prioritize at a org wide level, not just assemble a laundry list of everyone’s pet projects.

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Mentioned references:

• "60% of Americans"
• Depthfinding
• John Cutler's prioritization article
• WSJF (weighted-shortest-job-first)
• GTD: Brave New Work Ep. 39 with David Allen

00:00 Intro + Check-In: What’s a molehill you’re willing to defend until the end?

03:52 The Pattern: We prioritize everything and nothing gets done

06:01 John Cutler’s 4 Jobs of Prioritization

10:08 Why it’s so hard to stop doing lower value things

18:35 Difference altitudes of priorities

22:23 Where leaders mess up prioritization

25:11 Continuous steering version of priorities

33:05 Idea 1: Use a variant of WSJF for your own variables

37:21 Idea 2: Shift from saying “no” to “not right now”

39:27 Idea 3: Visualize your work to “see” deprioritization

41:26 Idea 4: Openly talk about conflicting priorities

44:00 Wrap up: Share the show with your coworkers!

Sound engineering and design by Taylor Marvin of ⁠⁠⁠Coupe Studios⁠⁠⁠.