Check the Wall Before You Climb Faster

Last updated: 2026-09-03

Every Tuesday at 4 PM, I review upcoming tasks. 1.5 hours. If something doesn’t align with my top goals, I eliminate it.

I keep this ritual because low-impact work still costs payroll. My time. My energy. Skip a week of it and it’s easy to spend the rest of the week on work that never should have made the list.

Does this sound familiar to you?

You’re getting faster. You’re tightening how you work. You’re doing more things right. And the work that actually matters still isn’t moving.

You can climb a ladder as fast as you want. If it’s leaning against the wrong wall, you’re just getting to the wrong place faster.

That’s a classic Stephen Covey concept, and it still holds. Before you optimize your workflow, verify the wall.

Efficiency is doing things right. Effectiveness is doing the right things.

You can be highly efficient at painting a wall green. Clean process. No wasted motion. If the goal was blue, you wasted all that effort. Effectiveness is the prerequisite for efficiency. Without it, you’re spinning your wheels faster.

Are you living in alignment with the wall you meant to climb? Look at this week’s tasks and ask which ones are green paint on a blue wall. Direction first. Then speed. Get those backwards and the better you get at the work, the faster you arrive somewhere you didn’t want to go.

Never optimize a task you haven’t done at least twice

You can’t improve a process you don’t understand.

First, do it. Second, do it again. Third, systematize it or automate it.

Most people jump to step three because building the system feels like the productive move. Then they find out they over-engineered a one-off. You don’t know the work yet. You haven’t even done it twice. So there’s nothing real to improve.

Leave the one-offs alone. Identify one recurring task you’ve already done three or more times. Create a checklist for it. That’s enough. Don’t start by automating. Start by seeing the work on paper.

If you can’t teach it, you don’t know it

Could someone else do this from what you’ve written down?

If you can’t document a process clearly enough for someone else to do it, you don’t know it well enough. The act of teaching or documenting a task often reveals inefficiencies. It also simplifies the process, because you finally have to name each step instead of carrying them in your head.

Brooks hit this while training someone on newsletter assembly. Teaching the work is what surfaced the waste and made the process simpler. The documentation did the heavy lifting. That’s why writing a process down isn’t an HR requirement. It’s a productivity tool.

Write down your current workflow for one recurring task as if you’re teaching a new hire. Don’t polish it. Write the real version. The fuzzy steps will show up as soon as you try to hand them to somebody else. Do that before you systematize. If you can’t teach the task, you’re not ready for step three yet.

Put your work on an elimination diet

A listener suggested this, and it goes the opposite direction of the usual advice. I know. The usual move is to add more.

Instead of adding tasks to your list, clear the deck. Then require each task to earn its way back on. Only do something if it directly contributes to your current goals. If it doesn’t, eliminate it.

Try the elimination diet for 3 days. Three days. Every item has to earn its spot. “I’ve always done this” is not a contribution. Direct progress on a current goal is.

How much of your list would survive that?

You’ll feel the pull to put things back. Let them argue. A lot of low-impact work stays alive because it never had to apply for the job.

If you want a sharper cut, audit your current tasks against your top 3 goals. Same test. If a task doesn’t serve those three, it doesn’t get a default yes.

Groom the backlog every week

Block 1.5 hours this week for Personal Backlog Grooming. Review upcoming tasks. Eliminate the ones that don’t align with your top goals.

This is how you stop paying yourself to focus on the wrong things. Low-impact work still costs payroll. Your time. Your energy. It just doesn’t show up as a line item, so it’s easy to keep doing.

I do this Tuesday at 4 PM. Pick a time. Treat it like a real appointment.

While you’re in that block, audit the week with three questions:

1. Am I making progress on my goals? If no, I’m ineffective.
2. Am I creating more free time and less stress? If no, I’m inefficient.
3. Is there a recurring annoyance I can fix?

Add those three questions to your weekly review template. The first one tells you whether you were on the right wall. The second tells you whether the way you’re working is actually giving you back time and lowering stress. The third hands you one recurring snag you can fix instead of tripping on it again next week.

What wall are you currently climbing?

If you can’t answer that cleanly, don’t optimize anything new this week. Block 1.5 hours for Personal Backlog Grooming, and cut until the remaining work can sit next to your top goals without flinching.

That’s the move. Check the wall first.