Executive summary
If you have 50 priorities, you actually have none. Strategic prioritization is a capacity decision: every organization has a fixed number of hours from its people, and every priority competes for them. Leadership teams that count those hours, rank what matters and stop the rest get more done with the same people.
- More than half of chief strategy officers say they are managing too many priorities with too little time.1
- Only a third of senior managers can correctly identify their company's top three priorities.2
- Only 41% of CEOs keep an evergreen stop list to prune low-value initiatives.3
Focused leadership teams make three moves:
- Count: they compare the hours their priorities need with the hours their people actually have.
- Rank: they set three to five priorities in order and make the full list visible.
- Stop: they stop something for every new priority, and their calendars match the list.
A priority list is a budget of people's time
I have a mathematical view of capacity. It comes from years in consulting, where my time was measured in 15-minute increments, and I still think that way with leadership teams. If your workforce has a limited number of hours, where are the best bets to place them for the best return on that time and money?
Seen that way, a priority list is a budget. Adding a priority without taking one away is like approving spending without checking the bank balance. The hours come from somewhere, usually from the priorities that matter most, because those are the hardest and slowest to show progress.
That is why long priority lists produce slow results everywhere. Teams spread across ten initiatives make a little progress on all ten and finish none of them on time.
Priority lists grow because adding is easy and stopping is personal
Every priority has a sponsor who believes in it. Saying no means saying no to a colleague, often in front of the CEO. Deloitte's 2026 survey found only 35% of chief strategy officers co-lead or own decisions on their organization's top priorities.1 If the strategy function can't hold the line, it is hard for anyone to.
The result is confusion two levels down. Research by Donald Sull and Rebecca Homkes across more than 400 firms found only a third of senior managers could correctly name their company's top three priorities.2 AI has added a new category on top: more than 80% of CEOs in Bain's survey are using AI for cost and productivity,3 which in many organizations means a wave of pilots on top of everything already underway.
Strategic prioritization breaks down in six places
Two breakdowns are about counting, two about ranking and two about stopping.
01. Nobody counts the hours. Plans list projects, not the people and time they need. Total demand is never compared with the capacity available after running the business, which takes most of people's time.
02. The same people carry everything. The most trusted leaders and specialists end up on every critical initiative, and they become the bottleneck that slows everything.
03. Everything is a top priority. The list has no order, so every team decides for itself what comes first.
04. Nobody sees the whole list. Each function adds its own initiatives. No one looks at them together, so the total keeps growing unseen.
05. Priorities are added, never removed. New initiatives arrive each quarter. Old ones linger with no decision to stop.
06. Calendars don't match the list. Leaders say one thing is the priority and spend their meetings on something else. Teams follow the calendar.
Three moves turn a long list into results
Count. Estimate how many hours your people have for change work after running the business. It is almost always less than leaders assume. Cost each priority in hours, including the people who are hardest to replace, and add them up. If demand exceeds capacity, and it usually does, the list has to shrink. This fixes breakdowns 01 and 02.
Rank. Decide which three to five priorities matter most to the strategy this year and put them in order. Publish one list across all functions. When two priorities compete for the same people, the ranking decides. This fixes 03 and 04.
Stop. Keep a stop list. Every time something new is added, something else is stopped, paused or shrunk, and the stop list is published as clearly as the priority list. Then align leaders' calendars to the ranking. This fixes 05 and 06.
The prioritization test
Six questions, one for each breakdown.
- Do you know how many hours your people have for change work after running the business?
- How many critical initiatives are your most trusted people carrying?
- Can every member of your leadership team name the same top three priorities, in the same order?
- Is there one list of active initiatives across all functions, and does anyone know the total?
- When did your leadership team last stop an initiative on purpose?
- Does your leadership calendar reflect your stated priorities?
What focused leadership teams do in practice
1. They run a capacity check before planning. Available hours for change work are estimated first, and the plan is built to fit.
2. They limit how much scarce people carry. A short list of critical people is identified, and their assignments are capped and tracked.
3. They publish a ranked list with a trade-off rule. Everyone knows the order, and the rule for what wins when priorities collide.
4. They keep one portfolio view. All active initiatives across functions sit in one place, reviewed by the leadership team together.
5. They publish a stop list. What has been stopped, and why, is shared as clearly as what has started, so teams can let go without guilt.
6. They audit their calendars against the list. Leaders check where their meeting time actually went and move it to the top priorities.
Bring Create More Time to your event
Create More Time is my keynote on capacity, focus and flow at work. It shows leaders and teams where their time actually goes, how to prioritize by capacity and how to protect focus for the work that matters, starting with their own calendars.
I deliver it as a 45- to 90-minute keynote, in person or virtual, tailored to your organization and audience, with a custom tip sheet your attendees can use the next day. It works for leadership offsites, annual planning sessions, kickoffs and conferences.
Conclusion: focus is a decision
Strategic prioritization comes down to deciding what you won't do. Leadership teams that make that choice in the open, keep a stop list and plan by capacity get more done with the same people.
The list you publish tells people what you hope for. The hours you fund tell them what you mean.
Read next: The True Cost of Meetings
Frequently Asked Questions
What is strategic prioritization?
Strategic prioritization is choosing the few initiatives that matter most to the strategy and deciding what to stop so they get the time and people they need. It works best as a capacity decision, because every priority competes for a fixed number of hours.
How many priorities should a leadership team have?
Few enough that everyone can name them in order. For most organizations that means three to five ranked priorities a year. As Suzanne puts it, if you have 50 priorities, you actually have none.
What is a stop list?
A stop list is a published list of initiatives a leadership team has decided to stop, pause or shrink to make room for its priorities. Bain found only 41% of CEOs keep one, even though it is one of the simplest ways to protect focus.
How do you prioritize by capacity?
Estimate the hours your people have for change after running the business, cost each priority in hours including scarce people, compare demand with capacity, rank the priorities and stop or pause enough work to fit.
Why do priority lists keep growing?
Adding is easy and stopping is personal, because every initiative has a sponsor. Lists also grow when no one sees the full set across functions, and when new AI pilots are added on top of existing work.
Who is Create More Time for?
Leadership teams, managers and staff who feel stretched across too much work. It suits offsites, annual planning, kickoffs and conferences, and each talk is tailored.
About Suzanne Knight
Suzanne Knight, MBA, MA, is a keynote speaker and the CEO of mBolden, a Toronto-based management consulting firm (mbolden.co). She has led transformation in the Ontario government, at Deloitte for nearly eight years, as Director of Organizational Effectiveness at Philip Morris International in Canada, and as VP, Transformation Services at Walmart Canada.
She has advised more than 80 organizations in 14 countries, including Fortune 500 companies and governments, and has spoken on more than 65 stages in 18 months. Her TEDx talk is The myth of doing it all. Her keynotes are The Next Big Thing, Never Waste a Good Crisis, The Trust Advantage and Create More Time.
Sources and references
- Deloitte. (2026, February 12). 2026 Chief Strategy Officer Survey. Source ↗
- London Business School. (2015, December 7). Two-thirds of senior managers can't name their firm's top priorities (Sull and Homkes; 11,000 executives and managers in 400+ firms). Source ↗
- Bain & Company. (2026, June 1). The 2026 CEO Agenda: Where Ambition Outpaces Execution (survey of 100 CEOs). Source ↗