I’ve shared this before, but I like checking things off lists.
There is something deeply satisfying about seeing progress. A completed project. An empty inbox (for about twelve minutes). A meeting that ends with clear decisions. A trip planned down to the gate number and boarding time.
I enjoy productivity, planning, and working on “what’s next.”
The problem is that productivity and faithfulness are not always the same thing.
One of the greatest leadership temptations I face is confusing what is urgent with what is important. Urgent things demand attention. Important things deserve attention. Those are not always the same. Anyone serving in ministry, higher education, business, or nonprofit leadership understands this tension.
Emails arrive faster than they can be answered. Meetings multiply. Calendars fill. Phones buzz. A decision that felt critical yesterday is replaced by three more waiting before lunch.
Our awesome staff at Manna U know full well what it’s like for me to have too much time in the office. It usually means I’m about to drop some massive strategic grenade that will shift priorities and raise the operations tempo.
The urgent is relentless, and if we are not careful…IF I AM NOT CAREFUL, it quietly becomes our operating system.
I have discovered that urgent work often creates the illusion of progress.
You can answer fifty emails in a day and still neglect the conversation that mattered most. You can solve administrative problems while overlooking the person sitting quietly outside your office. You can spend hours preparing to lead people while spending very little time actually being with them.
Busyness can be remarkably deceptive.
One of the most convicting stories in Scripture is the account of Mary and Martha in Luke 10. Martha was not doing bad things. She was taking responsibility. Anyone leading an organization would probably want someone like Martha on the team.
Yet Jesus gently tells her that she is, “…anxious and troubled about many things.”
The issue was not her work. It was that urgency had crowded out what mattered most.
I understand Martha more than I sometimes care to admit.
As a husband, father, president of a university, teaching pastor, board member, and lifelong learner, there is never a shortage of things demanding my attention.
There is always another email, meeting, proposal, flight to book, or problem to solve.
If I allowed urgency to dictate every decision, I could fill every waking hour and still never finish.
If I wait until life slows down before investing deeply in people, praying without looking at my watch, reading thoughtfully, or spending uninterrupted time with my family, I will be waiting a very long time.
Urgency is not a season.
It is a constant companion.
Which means leaders must learn to manage it rather than surrender to it.
Over the years, I have started asking myself a different question.
Instead of asking, “What has to get done today?”
I try to ask, “What deserves my best attention today?”
Those questions produce different calendars.
Sometimes the answer is a difficult meeting. Sometimes it is writing. Sometimes it is preparing a sermon. Sometimes it is sitting across the table from a student, a colleague, or a friend with my phone turned over and nowhere else to be.
Those moments rarely feel urgent. They often become the moments I remember most.
I have also learned that some of the most important work a leader does is almost invisible.
I’ve talked about this in previous posts, but thinking before speaking, listening before deciding, and praying before reacting are game changers.
None of those things generate much applause. None of them feels especially efficient.
Yet, they shape the kind of leader we become.
Our culture celebrates responsiveness. Scripture consistently emphasizes faithfulness.
Responsive leaders solve today’s problems. Faithful leaders solve today’s problems AND prepare people for tomorrow.
The irony is that many things we consider urgent today will be forgotten within a month.
Meanwhile, the things that truly shape our lives like our character, our relationships, our walk with Christ, the people we invest in, these are usually built slowly, quietly, and over time.
Perhaps the greatest danger of the urgent is not that it keeps us busy.
It is that it slowly convinces us that everything important is happening at the speed of our notifications.
It isn’t.
Some things cannot be rushed.
Wisdom.
Trust.
Character.
Discipleship.
Love.
They all grow at a slower pace.
Perhaps the wisest thing a leader can do is refuse to let the urgent determine what ultimately matters.
Dr. Carlo A. Serrano, President