Have you ever felt that you’re being surrounded by many half-done or unfinished tasks? You can’t figure out how to prioritize them, and you don’t know what should be done first when every task seems to be important all the same. In this article, we’ll present you the Eisenhower Matrix that can change your life forever.
What is the Eisenhower Matrix?
According to Asana, it is a method that helps you organize your works by classifying them between urgency and importance. Hence, you’ll know what work really matters, and should be done as your first priority.
The difference between ‘Importance’ and ‘Urgent’
This is the very first thing for you to know in order to separate your task individually.
Important tasks: It’s concerned about your long-term goal, and it’ll not show the result immediately. Many people tend to neglect this task because they think it’s not an urgent task, but if you pull off this task long enough, it’ll eventually become urgent.
Urgent tasks: They require your attention immediately and they need to be finished in time.
The matrix can be divided into 4 quadrants in terms of what you should do in each day
- The first quadrant is called ‘Do’ — your work with deadlines is very important. You cannot postpone or make it your last priority because it needs to be done urgently. Remember to not be procrastinating. We suggest you do it now!
- The second quadrant is called ‘Decide’ — your work that is also important, but not as urgent as the first quadrant. Thus, it’s not necessary to do it right now, and you can decide to do it later or schedule the time and date that suits you. For example, your daily routine may include physical activities and fitness, so you can choose how much time to do these activities each day either 30 minutes or 1 hour per day.
- The third quadrant is called ‘Delegate’ — your work that is urgent, but it may not be important to you. You have to think about changing the time or handing it over to others. For instance, an online meeting can be hosted by someone else, so you can assign this duty to your coworker to take responsibility for it.
- The last quadrant is called ‘Eliminate’ — it’s a non-trivial task that can waste your time, and decrease your productivity such as playing games, watching movies, scrolling through social media, etc. We recommend you to consider it as a leisure activity that should be your last priority since it may not help you to achieve your goals.
Use the Eisenhower Matrix to implement your perfect time management as follows:
- Choose color codes to quadrants
Try to choose the color which is related to your lifestyle, favorite color, and easy to remember. This can help you understand the importance of the event. Plus, when you have things you need to do next, you can get a quick glance and be ready to do it. Therefore, allocating colors can make you an effective decision on what you should prioritize before.
- Classify your list to do two parts: personal and professional
Make sure you don’t confuse assignments, so you should categorize matrices between your personal and professional tasks. This is essential to manage your time because you will know what is suitable for you from separating two tasks.
- Set the number of items per quadrant
It may be over-complicated if you put more than 6 or 7 on the matrix. The reason why is using the Eisenhower Matrix for managing your time will be lost. It means you are out of control of your time and you cannot deal with what you need to do.
Now you have the ideas to divide your tasks up to how important or urgent they are. By applying this matrix in your life, you’ll become more organized and finish your tasks successfully. If you still can’t figure out which tasks are important for you, the Get Unstuck Method could help you with that.
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