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The hidden cost of too many priorities and the one fix that actually works.
THE JUDGMENT CALL By Lisa Goldenthal, CEO Revenue Architect Issue 9 | June 11, 2026
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I once asked a CEO what his company’s number one priority was for the quarter.
He gave me seven answers.
Seven.
I said pick one.
He could not.
That was not a strategy problem.
That was a judgment problem.
And it was quietly destroying his execution.
THE UNCOMFORTABLE MATH
Harvard Business Review found that companies with three or fewer strategic priorities grow revenue 70 percent faster than those juggling five or more.
Not because they work harder.
Because they stop fragmenting every person in the building across initiatives that compete with each other for the same energy, attention, and budget.
Here is what nobody says out loud in the executive team meeting.
When everything is a priority nothing gets the full weight of the organization behind it.
A team 20 percent committed to seven things will always lose to a team 100 percent committed to one.
Every time.
And here is the part that nobody in the AI conversation is talking about.
AI does not fix fragmented strategy.
It executes fragmented strategy faster.
Which means you get to the wrong destination more efficiently than ever before.
Congratulations.
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THE STORY
A CEO running a four hundred million dollar division came to me after his board approved eleven strategic initiatives for the year.
Eleven.
I asked him one question.
If you could only accomplish one thing this year that would make every other thing easier or unnecessary what would it be.
He went quiet.
Then he answered.
I said why is that not your only priority right now.
He said because the board approved eleven.
I said the board approved eleven hopes. You need one commitment.
By year end his team had accomplished the one thing. And because that one thing was done three of the eleven became irrelevant and four others became significantly easier.
They did not work harder.
They worked with intention.
That is a completely different animal.
FOUR WAYS TOO MANY PRIORITIES KILL EXECUTION
One. Decision fatigue multiplies. Fifty extra micro decisions per day per leader. Quality drops. Speed drops. Momentum disappears.
Two. Your best people get fragmented first. High performers cannot do deep work when they are context switching every two hours. You do not lose them to resignation first. You lose them to fragmentation first.
Three. Accountability becomes impossible. When everything is a priority nothing can be held responsible for falling behind. There is always another fire.
Four. AI makes it worse. See above.
Source: giphy.com
THE ONE QUESTION THAT FIXES EVERYTHING
Write this on the board before your next executive meeting.
What is the single outcome that if we achieved it over the next 90 days would make every other priority easier or unnecessary.
Then stop talking.
One outcome. One commitment. Everything else moves to after.
Clarity scales.
Complexity does not.
YOUR 90 DAY CLARITY AUDIT
One. List every active priority your team is currently pursuing.
Two. Circle the one that if achieved makes the most others easier or unnecessary.
Three. Ask honestly. Is that priority getting the majority of your best energy right now.
Four. If the answer is no you have found your problem.
Five. Name it. Communicate it. Align every team around it. Deprioritize everything else for 90 days.
The answer is almost always obvious.
The courage to act on it is what separates leaders who execute from leaders who plan.
Clarity scales. The most important leadership work you will ever do is the work you do on yourself.
Lisa Goldenthal CEO Revenue Architect | Top 15 Executive Coach Creator of the BOSS Method Host, WholeCEO With Lisa G highperformanceexecutivecoachi
DM me MAP and I will show you exactly where your priority gap is living and what it is costing you every week you leave it there.