I am embarrassed to say that it took me 10 years to learn one of the most fundamental pillars of leadership: It is all about outcomes — and not activities. This business truth is simple and obvious, yet, extraordinarily powerful. Unfortunately, it remains strangely elusive for most people.

I can hear you now, “Of course I knew that,” or “Not me … I’m all about the mission.” Well, in my experience, I have found that most people tend to confuse activity with outcomes — a breathtakingly expensive mistake. In a world of infinite choices, choosing which activities will occupy your day is likely to be your single greatest driver of effectiveness. Beyond picking the right objectives to pursue, you need to focus on the results, not just the means to that end. Some people choose wisely and focus on high-impact activities that truly move the needle. Others, however, work the same number of hours without making clear progress toward meaningful achievements or measurable results. Focusing on what really matters is a difficult to achieve skill in our attention deficit disorder world. Successful leaders invest the time to clearly identify, prioritize, and communicate key goals, while measuring success by real progress against those desired outcomes. By focusing on the end results, creative leaders can identify the shortcuts and often achieve those goals with less work.

As we talk about outcomes vs. activity, it is important to nail down the semantics. Outcomes, in this context, means a certain, generally measurable, end result — and one that matters a great deal. Activities, however, are a set of tactics that are used to achieve that outcome. Productivity might then be defined as the value of a certain outcome divided by the cost of the activities used to achieve it — simply put, the return on your investment (ROI).

If this is a bit confusing, that is good. Understanding this confusion is the first step to seeing how easily things can go terribly awry. Because many of us in uniform are so accomplishment driven, we tend to look at both activities and outcomes as accomplishments. While they both could be achievements, results should almost always be valued well ahead of tactics. A long day at the office often creates the illusion that we are creating value and driving the ball downfield. Ticking off tasks on your to-do list fills you with a sense of accomplishments but did you achieve the end goal? Many of the activities create some benefit, but is it making a tangible difference for the organization? Is it the most effective use of your time? Often, the answer is no and, unfortunately, few people are aware of it.

I remember my first squadron tour with the “Proud Pegasus” of Patrol Squadron Eleven (VP-11) in the early 1990s. We were a great squadron — superb camaraderie, Battle E and golden wrench winners, the “go to” VP squadron in Brunswick, Maine. Most of the 60 officers in the squadron were always crunching on some problem, with long hours in the plane and even longer hours in our ground jobs. Fast-forward 10 years; I am a reserve lieutenant commander with VP-65. This reserve squadron had the same number of planes, same training and maintenance requirements, yet, surprisingly, were able to keep the squadron functioning well with only eight full-time officers — even I knew that something remarkable was going on.

When forced to make difficult tradeoffs in an exceptionally constrained environment, good leaders focus only on those things that matter. The pressurization of VP-65 leadership forced them to choose only those activities that drove key outcomes: available airplanes, trained reservists, and accomplished missions. As I reflect over both those experiences, I realize that I had confused being busy — lots of activity — with accomplishing something of value.

Defending yourself against the myopia of task saturation requires a bit of planning. Defining key outcomes is the first step to getting back on the road to productivity and effectiveness. Are the results that we hope to achieve measurable and meaningful? Can we assign dates to deliveries? What are the key measures of success and an appropriate sampling rate? For companies, it is likely to be revenue and profit margin; for a squadron perhaps readiness and safety. Successful practitioners focus on the goal despite the forest of tasks, distractions, and nice-to-do activities.

Once leaders begin to assess their team against key measures, they are often surprised to see how quickly they can create a results-driven culture. In that kind of enlightened organization, it’s about ownership, trust, accountability — and not about hours worked.

Mr. Michel is founder of Military.com, a company focused on connecting service members, veterans, and their families to the benefits earned while in the service. He is a former naval officer.

This article originally appeared in Proceedings magazine