Hot on the heels of organizing, we have prioritizing. This is straightforward, but important to consider if you perhaps find yourself spending too much time on the unnecessary, at the expense of the important.
After organizing a bit, perhaps you have a handle on what you might do. Or maybe you have quite a lot of things to do, and it is all a bit overwhelming? This is to be expected. Perhaps you fill find yourself in a perpetual state of “too much to do” given your available time.
We can use prioritization techniques to overcome “decision paralysis” where you find yourself unable to do anything with so many options. (As an aside, this is my usual situation when thinking about dinner plans. What should we eat this week?)
You may find thinking about prioritization unnecessary. After all, it’s obvious. Do the stuff that’s due soon, and maybe the stuff someone is asking you to do. The rest of the time, you get to do what you want to, yay!
No Prioritization Needed!
The first tip comes from Getting Things Done which was first a book, but now is a movement? Anyway, the part I’ll pick out here is the “2 minute rule” which is thus:
- If something will take less than 2 minutes to do, just go do it. Right now. Stop reading, go do it, and then you can come back.
Great, now you’ve done all the easy, quick stuff. Unless you didn’t? Well, go do it. I’ll wait.
If you had 15 “2 minute” things to do, then that maybe took a half-hour, but that suggests you could have benefit from this practice, no? FYI, I’m pretty sure “taking out the compost” falls in this “less than 2 minutes” category.
Okay, maybe sometimes…
Now we’re left with all those things that are going to take a bit. Homework, for example.
Next, consider urgency and importance. For that, let’s introduce the Eisenhower Matrix, which uses categories of urgent or not and important or not.
Urgency is usually self-evident. Homework comes with due dates. How about when somebody asks you to do something? For example: “It’s garbage night! Please collect the trash!” This might seem urgent, based on the reminder. And it is urgent, if you are likely to forget. But if you have a reliable way to remember tasks (see Organization) then it’s not due until just before the garbage truck comes. If you don’t know the urgency of something, it is good idea to ask.
Importance is subjective. If you have a 103% in some class, maybe a homework assignment is not important. At work, I have many things that I could do, but upon consideration, aren’t very important. Some of these I still do. You will also choose to do many “not important” things, for example video games. (Or perhaps these are important for your life satisfaction or something. You get to decide.)
So, this matrix is not a rule, but a guideline. Consider it, and then move on.
Delegation
In the bottom-left of that matrix is urgent stuff, that you have determined is not important. Let’s take “cleaning the bathroom” (or most other chores) as an example. The matrix suggests you should delegate those. You already know this: “Mom, my bathroom needs to be cleaned!” You’re trying to delegate. That is a reasonable thing to do, but recognize also that others can delegate tasks to you. “Garbage Night!”
How do you delegate tasks successfully? Well, you can make a deal, like I’ll do this if you’ll do that. Or you can try to raise the importance for the recipient, such that they prioritize the task. (“Do you like living in filth?“) You can pay them, like all those people who want a clean car, so hire Anacortes Mobile Detailing instead of doing it themselves. Often delegation is appropriate to someone who is better suited. Maybe they have different skills, more time, need the money, etc.
Once you have successfully delegated, it’s no longer on your list. Hooray!
Want more?
In spite of writing all these words, I don’t spend a lot of time prioritizing tasks. I would rather just do them. Or maybe I have practiced enough that prioritization just comes naturally.
Here’s a twitter thread: Advanced time management principles. You might peruse this, and marvel at the thought some folks have put into this topic. My highlight:
- LNO, sorting tasks as “leverage”, “neutral”, and “overhead”. Probably homework is rarely a “leverage” task? Learning something you are interested in, on the other hand, may pay dividends for spending more time.
You can also rate your tasks with priorities, such as critical/important/less important, or 1-5, or ABCDE. Find what works for you. I don’t bother with this.
Enough on prioritization, let’s get on with the doing! Next stop: planning.