Why “setting priorities” is more than a grammatical mistake…

Why “setting priorities” is more than a grammatical mistake…

We all know it: “Everything here is a top priority!” Or: “Alongside A, B and C, we also have ‘double-A priorities’!” Statements delivered with an undertone of desperation that I repeatedly hear in my consulting work.

Many of us, myself included, used the quiet period around New Year to reflect on the past year and plan the next: what will I set out to do? Which goals and priorities matter for the new year?

But that is exactly where the dilemma begins: when we talk about priorities in the plural, we get tangled up—and not just linguistically.

The word “priority” entered English around 1400 and was always singular: the one thing that comes first. The plural did not appear until around 1900, in everyday usage! As if we could trick reality and somehow set ourselves several “first-ranking” matters as goals.

Indeed, the word “Priorität” officially exists only in the singular to this day. That surprised me too! You will find confirmation in the Duden dictionary.

I still consider setting goals for 2024 important for maintaining direction in everyday life. More crucial, though, is asking: what will I stop doing? What will I remove? This applies not only to personal development but to working life and strategic realignment too: what do we no longer want to do?

In his classic “Führen, Leisten, Leben”, Fredmund Malik calls this exercise at the beginning of the year “systematic waste removal”. Speaking of waste: alongside the number of goals, their quality matters too—but that is another subject.

Before overloading our priorities list again, let us focus on what counts and start small: what is the ONE priority for this week?

With that in mind: Happy New Year!