The Art of Juggling Priorities, Part 1
Update: You can listen to me discuss this topic on Marketing, Optimized—available now on Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts and Spotify!
When we find ourselves staring down an ever-growing to-do list, do we always tackle it in the right order? Or do we sometimes pick the easy tasks, the ones we’re good at, just to make a dent in the overwhelming list? I’m certainly guilty of that sometimes. That’s why this productivity method—introduced to me by a VP of Marketing in one of my previous roles—is so helpful, even if you don’t have Project Manager in your title.
It’s called the Eisenhower Matrix, or Eisenhower Box, or the urgent-important matrix, all interchangeable. Yes, it’s named after our 34th president, Dwight D. Eisenhower, who it turns out was a very productive man, so it’s no wonder this is still just as relevant in 2021 as it was in the 1950’s. As is this quote (that he attributed to an unnamed former college president):
“What is important is seldom urgent and what is urgent is seldom important.”
Beyond being something we can all deeply relate to on a spiritual level, that quote speaks to the urgency trap we’re all guilty of falling prey to; how important, bigger picture goals are never accomplished urgently; and how what’s urgent and important to one person may be neither to someone else.
Eisenhower Matrix
The Eisenhower Matrix allows you to move out of triage mode by breaking your tasks up into four quadrants:
Urgent, Important (these are tasks you will do immediately, like a report due by End of Day for your boss)
Important, Not Urgent (these are tasks you will schedule to do later, like email follow-ups)
Urgent, Not Important (tasks you will delegate or reschedule whenever possible, like people who are not on your team asking for your help on a project that is urgent for them but not for you)
Not Urgent, Not Important (tasks that you should eliminate whenever possible, like redundant reports or fielding constant one-off questions from co-workers)
Using this matrix really helps you take a good, hard look at the tasks on your to-do list and ask yourself, “Do I actually need to be doing this right now? Or at all?” That question may sound ridiculous. You may be thinking “Of course I do, it’s my job!” Your job, however, is to complete your projects and tasks on time, and you should do whatever you need to do to make that easy on yourself. As an example, replying immediately to a Not Urgent, Not Important email may give us a slight sense of accomplishment for having completed a task, but was that time possibly better spent on the Urgent and Important task(s) on our plate? (The answer is yes.) As another example, is the report you spend hours a week on providing value? Is anyone even looking at it? If not, you can work with your manager to remove it from your list. If so, maybe there’s a way to automate or delegate it. You get the idea!
Urgency Traps
Even if you’ve never heard the term “urgency trap” before, you’re probably already thinking of examples of urgency traps you encounter at work, and maybe even at home. An urgency trap is anything that keeps you in constant “triage” mode. This can include replying immediately to email and Slack alerts even if they aren’t urgent; taking on unnecessary projects simply because we were asked; completing tasks that we’re familiar with and good at over more difficult tasks, regardless of deadlines.
Competing Urgent/Important Priorities
If only we never had more than one Urgent/Important task on our plate at a time. Facing down multiple Urgent/Important tasks can be stressful, and in my next post I’ll break down how to make it easier to get them all done on time without putting your deadlines at risk.