Brian Tracy presents the 80/20 (Pareto) rule and applies it to goal setting and productivity. He defines the rule (vital few vs trivial many), recounts Pareto's 1895 observation about wealth distribution in Italy, and gives practical steps: write 10 goals, identify the 1–2 most important (top 20%), work on those first, and resist clearing small, low-value tasks. He also cites a study claiming 85% of rich people focus on one big goal while only 3% of poor people do, and closes with a call-to-action to download his 14-step goal-setting guide.
Questions this video answers
1895
10 goals
If you could accomplish only one goal in the next 24 hours, which would have the greatest positive impact on your life?
85% of rich people have one big goal; 3% of poor people have one big goal.
Chapters
Ask for the job you want, ask for the salary you want. Ask for the responsibilities you want. Hello, I'm Brian Tracyn. Today I'm going to talk to you about one of the most helpful concepts of time and life management. It's called the 8020 rule. Now, the 8020 rule is also called the Pareto principle, named after its founder, the Italian economist vilfredo Pareto. In 1895, he noticed that people in society seemed to divide naturally into what he called the vital few, or the top 20% in terms of money, property and influence, and the trivial many, or the bottom 80%. Later, he discovered that virtually all economic activity was was subject to this same principle. In that 80% of the wealth of Italy during that time was controlled by 20% of the population. We can take Pareto's 80:20 rule and apply it to almost any situation. In particular, we can apply it to goal setting and productivity. According to this principle, 20% of your activities will account for 80% of your results. That means if you have a list of 10 items to accomplish, two of those items will turn out to be worth more than the other eight items put together. The sad fact is that most people procrastinate on the top 10 or 20% of items that are the most valuable and important, the vital few that account for all your success. And instead they busy themselves with the least important 80%, the trivial many that contribute very little or nothing to their success. So here's what you should do in order to Effectively apply the 8020 rule to goal setting and to your overall productivity. First, take a piece of paper and write down 10 goals. Then ask yourself if you could only accomplish one of the goals on that list today within 24 hours, which one goal would have the greatest positive impact on your life? I ask this question of my clients all over the world. What is your most important goal in life right now, which you need to know, by the way, if you want to be successful, then pick the second most important goal. What you'll find is that after you complete this exercise, you will have determined the most important 20% of your goals that will help you more than anything else you do. Second, you should work at those goals that you have chosen all the time. You often see people who appear to be busy all day long, but seem to accomplish very little. This is almost always because they are busy working on tasks that are of low value or no value, while they are procrastinating on the one or two activities that can make a real difference to their companies and to their careers. The most valuable tasks you can do each day are often the hardest and most complex, but the payoff and rewards for completing them can be tremendous. They can actually change your whole future. Before you begin work, always ask yourself, is this task in the top 20% of my activities or is it in the bottom 80%? The rule for this is resist the temptation to clear up small things first. That's the greatest killer. We become so involved in little things and little things multiply. They just become more and more and at the end of the day you're exhausted and and you've accomplished nothing. If you choose to start your day working on low value tasks, you'll soon develop the habit of always starting and working on low value tasks. You'll be like the horse that pulls the wheel around in a circle all day. Never makes any progress Finally, I want to tell you about a study that's just been done about the attitudes of rich people versus poor people with regard to goal setting. What they found is that 85% of rich people have one big goal that they work on all the time. Only 3% of poor people have a big goal and they don't work on it very much. So if you want to be wealthy, do what wealthy people do. Pick one big goal and work on it all the time. And if you do, it will change your life. Before we wrap up, I'd like to leave you with a thought to share with your friends and followers. When your goals are clear, you will come up with exactly the right answer to achieve your goals at exactly the right time. Those are my strategies for applying the 8020 rule to goal setting. If you haven't seen my other videos about goal setting and increasing your productivity, take a look now. I'd love to hear from you. So my question today is do you use the 8020 rule for goal setting and time management? And if you do, what changes have you noticed in your life? Leave a comment below and I'll be sure to follow up with you. Thanks for watching. And remember, if you want to change your future, take action. And take action now. To learn more about goal setting, download my 14 step goal setting guide by clicking the link on the screen or in the description below. To help you get on track with your goals.
