How many times have you said, “There just aren’t enough hours in the day?”

Does your “things to do” list seem to grow beyond your capabilities, leaving you stressed that the critical things in your job and life won’t get accomplished?

If this problem sounds familiar, the Pareto Principle may be just the prescription you need.

Many years ago an amazing discovery was made by an obscure Italian economist named Vilfredo Pareto. It was an enigma that would change forever the lives of those who heeded its wisdom. And this revelation – known the Pareto Principle, the 80/20 rule, or “the vital few and the trivial many” – can help you leverage your time and productivity in ways you’ve probably never imagined.

As an economist, Pareto was interested in the financial situations of different nations and types of governments from a variety of time periods. As he studied these countries, he found an amazing universal principle. In every economy, in every nation, in every time period, under every kind of government, approximately 20% of the people controlled about 80% of the wealth!

But, possibly even more important, as Pareto and later economists dug even deeper, they found a much larger universal truth – that in almost all human activities, a small percentage of factors (“the vital few”) control the vast majority of results.

For example, if you scrutinized a wide range of human endeavors, you would find that, on average:

• 20% of the salespeople generate 80% of the sales
• 20% of the authors sell 80% of the books
• 20% of the criminals commit 80% of the crimes
• 20% of the movies make 80% of the money
• 20% of the music groups sell 80% of the concert seats
• 20% of your customers generate 80% of your revenue
• 20% of your products produce 80% of your profits

And… 20% of Your Daily Activities Are Responsible for 80% of Your Success and Personal Happiness

Okay, before you start sending us emails – it doesn’t always work out to be exactly 80/20. Sometimes it’s 90/10 or 70/30 or even 97/3, where 3% of your activities will give you 97% of the benefits. And sometimes it doesn’t even add up to exactly 100%.

What’s important is the principle that this pattern of lopsided results rules in virtually every field of human activity. So if you understand the concept and master the “vital few” factors, you can reap approximately 80% of your gains in about 20% of your time – rather than wasting energy on the relatively unimportant 80% and only getting 20% in positive results.

Here’s how the highly successful consultant and investor, Richard Koch, describes Pareto’s discovery in his book, The 80/20 Principle: The Secret to Success by Achieving More with Less:

“The 80/20 Principle asserts that a minority of causes, inputs, or effort usually leads to a majority of the results, outputs, or rewards. Taken literally, this means that, for example, 80 percent of what you achieve in your job comes from 20 percent of the time spent. Thus for all practical purposes, four-fifths of the effort – a dominant part of it – is largely irrelevant.”

The bottom-line is that if you drop or delegate anything outside your critical 20% of highly productive activities, clients, products, etc., you will be able to concentrate more creativity and energy to your core 20% ….. and create an explosion of productivity and profitability!

So, set your priorities now. Identify the 20% of your efforts that work – and delete or delegate the 80% that don’t – then stand back and watch your business, and your life, take off.