Categories: Business, Productivity

Vilfredo Pareto was a French economist who was born in the mid-19th century. He noticed that the majority of the land in Italy was owned by a minority of the population. It was very roughly 80% of the land, to 20% of the population.

This idea was expanded by the Business Guru Joseph Juran, who labelled it the “Pareto Principle,” also known as the “80-20 Rule,” or “The Law of the Vital Few.” It covers a whole range of topics, and highlights an inherent imbalance in nature.

Very simply, in most things, 80% of consequences stem from 20% of the causes.

The numbers are not usually exactly 80-20, but the idea that the majority of consequences stem from a minority of actions seems to stand up in a whole range of fields.

For example:

• 80% of a company’s sales come from 20% of their product range
• 80% of sales come from 20% of the customers
• 80% of what you produce at work is created in 20% of the time you spend there
• 80% of the time it takes you to read your e-mail is spent reading 20% of the messages you receive
• 80% of money made by football clubs in a league is earned by 20% of the clubs playing.

Knowing that a majority of your time is spent on things that produce a minority of your outcomes, you can begin to decide where you should focus your energies – and what tasks should be eliminated.

A practical example is needed. When I started putting websites online, I used to add my e-mail address at the bottom of the pages. Occasionally, people would send me comments and questions. One night, I received an e-mail from someone commenting on an article I wrote. Her e-mail was just a few words disagreeing with something I had said, but it took me over an hour to write the response. A few days later, I realised what a waste of time this had been. What did I get back for all this time apart from wanting to prove I was right? That little e-mail address at the bottom of my page was taking up a lot of my time.

The result was that I removed my address from most of my sites, and don’t add it to any new ones any more. By making a tiny change to my site, I saved myself countless hours in something that was pretty unproductive.

Use the 80-20 rule to identify which actions are productive. Be aware of what is actually getting the results, and cut out the rest. Use the time to focus on what is working.