What is "better work"?

"Better Work" Series: (1 of 5)

I’ve spent 20 years leading, coaching, building, and problem-solving—first as a pastor, then as a gymnastics coach, marketing director, small business owner, and non-profit executive. Every chapter taught me something for the next. Across those roles, I’ve seen every flavor of work: bad work, toxic work, okay work, good work, and great work.

At this point in my career, I don’t want to be part of, support, or create anything less than better work.

Over the past year, I’ve taken a hard look at my experiences and assessed what separates thriving organizations from the ones that are constantly spinning their wheels or creating toxic work environments. The difference isn’t talent, luck, or even hard work. It comes down to three essential elements—and if these are missing, no amount of effort or money will save you from burnout, inefficiency, uncertainty and frustration.

First, what do I mean by "better work"... 

Work that prioritizes the well-being of everyone involved in the work as much as high-performing results. 

I honestly believe you don't get one idea without the other, but my experience tells me this needs to be stated explicitly.   

I also believe there are 3 elements that must we must proactively lead to get us to this deffiniton of better work...

1. Clarity – Documenting exactly where you're going and how you’re getting there.
2. Calendar – Making sure time is spent the right way on what actually matters.
3. Conversations – Thinking out loud with the right people to keep you accountable strengthen your leadership.

Let’s break it down...

1. Clarity: Define and Document the Game You’re Actually Playing

If you don’t define the rules, you can’t expect to play at the highest level. The best businesses (and leaders) create clarity by aligning and documenting their vision, objectives, structure and processes in a ruthlessly aligned and clear document.

Without documented clarity, work turns into a never-ending game of telephone—everyone’s guessing what needs to be done, how to do it, and who’s responsible. Instructions get lost in Slack threads, decisions change based on who’s in the room, and progress stalls while everyone waits for someone else to figure it out. The result? Frustration, wasted effort, and a team that spends more time fixing miscommunication than actually moving forward. Nobody’s sure what success actually looks like

“Great companies don’t just focus on what to do. They also focus on what to stop doing.” —Jim Collins, Good to Great

What the research says:

• Organizations with clearly defined goals and performance tracking are 40% more likely to hit revenue targets (McKinsey & Co.).
• Leaders who document and communicate their vision increase team alignment by 35% (Gallup).

What should we document? High level, you must articulate and document:

• Your long-term vision and objectives—what are you actually building toward?
• A performance score that aligns daily activity with those objectives.
• A structure that supports your objectives and responsibilities (instead of roles just existing for the sake of it).
• Process standard and workflow charts that produce the score - eliminating guesswork and wasted effort.
• Explicit expectations on what acceptable performance and culture looks like.

When you get these right, and on paper, people stop operating on assumptions. Decisions become faster and smarter. And work starts to feel like it’s actually leading somewhere instead of just filling the day.

Bottom line, you can not keep people (including yourself) accountable for unwritten expectations. 

Make it clear, and write it down.

2. Calendar: Use Time Like It Matters (Because It Does)

The calendar isn’t just where you dump appointments—it’s where priorities live or die. If your calendar doesn’t reflect your strategy, your strategy is more like a bedtime story. Day to day you have a list of things that keep you busy, and “busy” is an illusion of progress. 

Without a smart calendar, meetings feel like bad therapy sessions, awkward “doing this because we should” moments, and hostage situations for people that actually want to work. No real problem solving gets done. Important decisions pile up and get pushed off. A high-performance calendar keeps you out of the weeds and focused on what actually moves the needle.

"The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.” —Stephen Covey, 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

What the research says:

• Leaders spend 72% of their time on unplanned, reactive work (Harvard Business Review).
• Structured planning improves execution by 25% and reduces wasted effort by 18% (Deloitte).

When Michelangelo was commissioned to paint the Sistine Chapel, it wasn’t just an artistic challenge—it was a logistical nightmare. The scope was massive, the timeline unrealistic, and he wasn’t even a painter by trade.

His solution? Meticulous planning. Instead of tackling the whole ceiling at once, he broke it into sections, planned daily progress in chalk, and adjusted as needed—turning what should have been a decade-long project into a four-year masterpiece.

Even raw talent and vision aren’t enough. Success depends on structured execution—breaking big goals into focused, manageable steps, just like a well-planned calendar does.

A structured calendar keeps your focus sharp. Here’s how:

• Annual Planning – Set high-level objectives. What do aspire to accomplish this year?
• 90 Day Planning – Break it the aspiration down into clear and targeted milestones.
• 30 Day Performance Reviews – Enhance and adapt the 90-day roadmap with real time results and current realities.
• Weekly Pop Up – Lock in tactical focus to avoid the “I’m busy but doing nothing” trap.

We often don’t struggle with work ethic. We struggle with direction and are certain that what I'm doing is the right thing to do. We can mistake urgent for important, and before we know it, we spend another week buried in the wrong work.

The right calendar fixes that. 

We can harness time, or it can harness us. No middle ground on that one. 

3. Conversations: Think Out Loud and Get Accountable 

The worst thinking happens alone in our heads. The best thinking happens out loud, with the right people.

If you don’t have strategic conversations built into your leadership routine, you’re missing out on one of the biggest accelerators of good decision-making and leadership growth. 

“The ability to rethink and unlearn is more important than the ability to think and learn.” — Adam Grant, Think Again

What the research says:

• Leaders with a trusted advisor or peer accountability system make decisions 25% faster and with 40% more confidence (Gallup).
• Companies that encourage open dialogue and strategic conversations have 30% higher innovation rates (McKinsey & Co.).

When Bill Gates first met Warren Buffett in 1991, he wasn’t looking for a mentor. In fact, he thought their conversation would be a waste of time. But that meeting turned into one of the most valuable relationships of his career.

Buffett didn’t tell Gates how to code or run Microsoft—he helped him think better as a leader.

If we are not allowing our assumptions to be challenged, thrashed around, and refined with someone else, we’re leaving better decisions on the table.

The takeaway… Have the right conversations with the right people proactively lined up—mentors, peers, and advisors who challenge your thinking, behavior, and push you to level up.

Conclusion: Hope is Not a Strategy

Better work isn’t about working harder—it’s about proactively implementing and operating inside a framework and system that helps lead us toward our objectives. It’s about replacing the cycle of frustration with a system that actually works. We’re human after all, we’ve got to deploy solutions to extract the best of us and guard against the gaps. 

“Strategy without process is little more than a wish list.” —Robert Filek

• Clarity (on paper) ensures you and your team know what success looks like.
• Calendars (not list) protect your time from the tyranny of the urgent and drives the important.
• Conversations (out loud) refine your thinking and keep you accountable.

In the next posts, I’ll go deeper into each of these three areas.

We work hard. Let’s be confident our effort is making a difference. 

Next ---> Step 1: Documented Clarity