Productivity Tip #1 – Eisenhower Matrix

Have you ever felt like there is never enough time in the day to do all the things you want to do.

One technique that I’ve found particularly helpful, from a time management and prioritisation perspective, has been to bucket anything someone is asking me to do into one of the four categories in the Eisenhower Matrix.

This video does a great job explaining the technique in just two minutes.

Dwight D. Eisenhower, 34th president of the USA, made this method famous with the quote “I have two kinds of problems, the urgent and the important. The urgent are not important, and the important are never urgent.” The president attributed the technique to a former college president.

The Eisenhower matrix has the four quadrants below, it uses two axis. Urgent and Important.

Hopefully the quadrants are relatively self-explanatory, so I’m going to focus on how I make use of this matrix, and I would love to hear how other people have used this or other techniques to make themselves more productive in the comments below.

I maintain two of these matrices. I keep one for work and one for my private life. I find this really helpful to switch between work priorities and life priorities.

In practical terms my work list is nothing more than a notepad file with the headings of the different quadrants, and a small list under each heading. Nothing more complicated than that. However the hardest bit, that requires a bit of self-discipline when you start using this technique; is to write a task someone gives you into your list rather than just cracking on with whatever you’ve been asked to do.

I find just writing down the different things people have asked me to do, really helps to alleviate stress, as I’m no longer having to keep a mental track record of everything.

But writing things down first can be really tricky, as starting the task straight away can be really, really tempting. However, if you take a minute, take a step back; breathe and think about the bigger picture, it will really help to prioritise and manage your time effectively.

Do

In practice I’ve found trying to keep the “DO” list small is more realistic. In reality you won’t have 10 things going in parallel, that you are “doing”. I try to keep this list to around 5 items. They can be small in size like schedule meeting with a client, or larger items, like review a design of a system feature. They will be things that have a clear end goal/state. It can be really satisfying to see how many of these items you complete in a day.

At home a typical item that will go straight into this bucket could be change the baby’s smelly nappy, but only if I can’t delegate it away to my lovely wife!

Schedule

My schedule list tends to be twice as long as my “DO” list, and you’ll often find items that never get scheduled will move to your “ELIMINATE” list. To avoid these tasks becoming stale, I find it helpful to note down a target end date for the item, so I know how much time I have to figure out when to slot the item in. Scheduling time to write any blog posts, or design documents is a great example of things that are important to me, but are often not very urgent.

Delegate

One of the first things I had to learn as I moved into a leadership role, was learning how to delegate. It’s very tempting to do everything yourself, because no one can do it as well as you! Don’t let perfect be the enemy of the good. You don’t have the time to do everything yourself.

You’ll find you do some of this naturally at home with your family or partner. Who is responsible for the washing up, cleaning, grocery shopping? All the house hold chores are either things you are scheduling or delegating.

Eliminate

As I mentioned above there will be times when tasks move from one quadrant to another. Tasks that fall into this bucket are my favourite, as it means I don’t have to spend any more mental effort thinking or doing that task.

However another way to think about this quadrant is to improve your own productivity. How much time do you spend that isn’t focused on one of your goals? I loved playing video games, and I still find them fun to play with friends, but the time I spend playing them has significantly reduced over the years. Especially when playing alone, as I realised it wasn’t that important for me to complete the latest grand theft auto game.

Summary

I won’t claim that I’ve never incorrectly categorised a task. It does happen, so forgive yourself and just try to learn from it. There is always the temptation to do the simple or fun stuff first, and sometimes when you need a break that might be just what you need before you get back to the urgent and important list.

Time to relax and re-charge your batteries can be just as important as your “Do” list at work or home. Finding the balance is the key; and something that I continue to search for every day.