The two things I do to get to V1 fast
Make big projects into shippable moments.
👋 Hi, it’s Greg and Taylor. Welcome to our newsletter on everything you wish your CEO told you about how to get ahead.
Two weeks ago, we wrote about the 5 traits of a high-output generalist, people who quickly drive any project forward. But of the five skills we included, I think the last one (getting to V1 fast) is the most difficult.
Knowledge workers have never felt more overwhelmed or inundated – according to Microsoft’s most recent Work Trend Index report, 68% of workers say they struggle with the pace and volume of work.
And for most, this manifests in less time to work on high-impact projects – 88% of knowledge workers say that time-sensitive projects and large initiatives have fallen through the cracks due to the amount of work on their plate.
Yet businesses need employees that can tackle these high-impact projects, even in the day-to-day chaos. It’s why we value high-output generalists so much – especially those that can get to V1 fast. So this week, I’m sharing the two tactics I use to prioritize my many incoming requests and get to V1 fast.
– Taylor
Step 1: Prioritize incoming projects and requests
Throughout the day, almost subconsciously, all of us are fielding a slew of incoming projects, tasks, and requests. To manage the incoming flood, I bucket these requests into one of four categories based on their impact and effort.
High impact, low effort – No Brainers. These are rare, and if I get a task like this, it’s a no-brainer to complete it that day or within the week.
Low impact, low effort – Quick Wins. These are common, and include tasks like answering a colleague’s question, tracking down a piece of data, approving email copy, reviewing a deck, or signing off on a decision. They usually require a fast turnaround time and come with a sense of urgency.
High impact, high effort – Big Projects. These are also common, and they’re where it’s harder to get to V1 fast. Examples include updating the product roadmap, building a board meeting presentation, or writing a strategy memo. Typically, they require more time and brainpower.
Unknown impact, high effort – Big Bets. You shouldn’t be getting low impact, high effort requests – if you are, you should push back on them. But requests that require high effort, and have unknown impact are more common. We wrote about how to handle these requests last month.
Quick wins and big projects account for probably 80% of my inbound requests, and they’re where high-output generalists stand out. Because most people excel at one of these two. They’re either great at knocking out tactical to-dos, but can never find time to make progress on bigger projects, or they’re great at setting strategy, but fail to quickly outline and execute the operational plan.
High-output generalists do both at the same time – they execute on quick wins AND make progress on big projects throughout the day and week. I do this by breaking big projects into small shippable milestones, and finding small (30 min) chunks in the day to complete these shippable milestones alongside the quick wins.
Step 2: Break big projects into shippable milestones
Between meetings and knocking out quick wins, most managers have only one or two hours left in the day for high impact, high effort work (the big projects). And this time is rarely available as a one or two hour block.
Instead, it’s three random 30 minute chunks of free time spaced throughout the day. So high-output generalists get really good at breaking down big projects into pieces that are shippable within a half hour.
Here’s an example. Every quarter, I create our board meeting deck. It’s a daunting project that usually requires zooming out on the business, synthesizing our progress, and identifying the discussions we want to have with the board.
It likely requires 4-5 hours of heads-down work, but I never have 4-5 hours of uninterrupted working time. So I break the board deck into shippable milestones that I can execute over the course of two weeks:
Outline (30 min): 20 min call with Greg to brainstorm what we want to cover + 10 minutes right after call to outline the deck while the information is fresh
Shell deck (30 min): Create the “shell” of the deck in Google slides, including placeholder slides and complete “lower hanging fruit” slides that are in every deck (agenda, quarterly wins/losses, financial slides, housekeeping)
V1 draft (two 45 min sessions): Fill in the meat of the deck, including cleaning up my notes in the shell deck and building net-new slides
V2 draft (30 min): Next version of the deck with edits based on Greg’s comments
V3 draft (40 min): Next version of the deck with edits based on Greg’s comments
Working this way has a few benefits.
First, if I waited for an uninterrupted 3-hour block of time to work on this, I’d only ever complete impactful work on the weekend. This allows me to make progress during a “normal” business day.
Second, each of these blocks of work is shippable – meaning I can send something to Greg to get his feedback. I’m not sending him finished work, so I have to set expectations. I’ll use phrases that make clear the status of the work and where I want feedback. For example:
“Here’s an initial outline for the board meeting – can you comment on anything that I’m missing or you think looks directionally off? I’ll start work on the deck Monday.”
“Here’s a very early shell deck for the board meeting, with placeholders to demonstrate what I’m planning to include on each slide. Can you comment on anything you’d change by EOD Thursday?”
This helps me get feedback faster and prevent wasted work.
Third, working this way not only makes it easier for me to fit this work into my schedule. It also helps me move faster, and make Greg (my boss) feel like we’re making progress on the work. These five hours are completed over the course of 2 weeks.
So if I waited until I had time to complete all these steps before sharing work, I’d get to V1 (granted, a more complete V1) in 2 weeks. This way, I get to a (slightly less complete) V1 in a few days.
Our advice
As managers, there’s nothing more valuable than an employee that can take a big picture idea shared via a short slack message or during a 1:1 and quickly (within 24-48 hours) turn around some progress on that idea. These are the people that move a conversation or idea from theory to plan.
It’s so valuable because most people get overwhelmed by these asks and punt them to when they have a dedicated “focus sprint” or block of 2-3 hours to build this type of plan. But as you get more senior, you don’t have nearly as much of this uninterrupted time. And adding them to your weekend list works once in a while for emergencies, but isn’t a sustainable habit.
So this ability to identify big projects, break them into small shippable moments, and make incremental progress quickly is crucial.
If it doesn’t come naturally to you, give yourself time constraints. Choose a project, break it up, and see how much you can accomplish in 30 minutes. Look at what you just completed – is it shippable? Does it move the conversation or project forward? Does it build on your previous work?
If yes, then do it again – you’re getting the hang of it.
Have a great week,
Greg & Taylor