The Pareto Principle states that the world is unbalanced but predictably unbalanced. You only need a few things out of many, but those few things matter a lot. This is perfectly explained by Richard Koch on how you can apply it in your own life.
Transcript: And if we really get this principle of progress, it will make it easier for us to expand our personal horizons and reach for a better future.
We can always multiply the value of what we do. To show how that really is only one principle of progress running through our whole historical evolution as a species, and if we really get this principle of progress, it will make it easier for us to expand our personal horizons and reach for a better future. The history of civilization, I suggest, is actually the history of achieving more from less. This is what's behind the success of humankind collectively, behind the success of businesses and corporations, and behind the success of teams and individuals. It's also the route to making every one of us in this room more productive, more useful, more prosperous and even happier. Well, visualize it, do you think that Warren Buffett is busy frantically crunching numbers at his desk? Do you think that's what Rupert Murdoch spends his time doing? Do you imagine that Jim Clark does that rather than thinking about the boats that he's going to sell? What's the value that Bill Gates added to the world, a function of the hours that he put in? Or what about Ronald Reagan, who famously said, “it's true, hard work, never killed anyone, but I figure, why take the chance?” Or John F. Kennedy or Winston Churchill or Albert Einstein or Isaac Newton? What all these people do or did was spend time creatively on the few essentials and little or no time on the mass of trivia that engulfs all of us most of the time. Most life, especially most business life is trivia. Don't work to deal with the trivia, work to avoid the trivia. Save yourself for one or two things each week that are really important in terms of getting results. Spend time deciding what those things are, then work out how to deal them, then spend time considering and reconsidering and preparing and then go and get what you want. Because, ladies and gentlemen, few things really matter, but they matter a tremendous amount. These things that really matter are often difficult to find, but once you find the few things that really matter, they give you tremendous power, the power that gives you more from less, the power of the 80-20 principle. It lies in one phrase, which is finding the vital few in the trivial many. If we take time on the top activities from a 20 percent up to the 100 percent, we can actually quadruple our value and that's without using better methods, which again can produce another 16 times increase. Even if we allow trivial tasks to still take up a day a week, we can get up to 360 percent of our previous level, more than tripling the value we add, but to make this happen we need to stop our low value uses of time, delegate or outsource them. Never do anything that are more junior colleague can do nearly as well. First, have done with averages, divide the world always into these two boxes, visualize two boxes, this large box that delivers very little and small box that does deliver a great deal and find the powerful forces and methods that you can ride to success, in other words, be selective. Don't think what most people think, don't do what most people do. Only do the things that work incredibly well, there are always things that work incredibly well. The 80-20 principle shows that, all we have to do is to find them, be much more selective. Secondly, experiment, keep looking for ideas and approaches and ways of acting that are many times better than those today, they are always there. Not just a little bit better, but hugely better. Third, never forget this, that there is always a way to multiply effectiveness at your desk, not to do things a little bit better, but to do them 2, 3, 10, 20, 100 times better. The 80-20 principle promises that it's always possible, all we have to do is to tap into the really powerful forces which there are around us and within us, within our minds.
By: The Outcome Title: You Only Need 20% to Achieve Your Dreams | The Pareto Principle Sourced From: www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kMukbxrr6U