There’s an old saying attributed to Mark Twain that serves as great motivation to knock out your difficult tasks: “Eat a live frog first thing every morning, and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.” Twenty years ago, that advice meant to stop procrastination—do the most uncomfortable thing in your day early, and the rest of the day will be easier. In today’s world, where we are constantly bombarded by emails, tweets and phone calls, it also means working smarter and minimizing distractions.

Bill Dillon, managing partner of Dillon Law Group and a 25-year veteran of the U.S. Department of Justice, says “eating the frog” has helped grow the Atlanta white-collar defense firm he founded in 2012 after retiring as a prosecutor.