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Organize and Prioritize Your Tasks with the Eisenhower Matrix

GeneralEdward Kiledjian

The Eisenhower Matrix, also known as the Urgency-Importance Matrix or Decision Matrix, is a simple and effective organizational tool created by Dwight D. Eisenhower to help prioritize tasks and make decisions quickly. It enables you to focus on the most important activities and avoid wasting time on unnecessary ones.

The idea behind it is to separate things into four categories based on their urgency and importance:

  • Urgent & Important

  • Not Urgent & Important

  • Urgent & Not Important

  • Not Urgent & Not Important

By visually organizing items into these categories, it becomes much easier to determine which ones should be done first, delegated, automated or eliminated. This simple but powerful tool can also improve focus and productivity by helping you identify tasks that require immediate attention and those that can wait.

The Eisenhower Matrix was first created by Dwight D. Eisenhower when he served as president of the United States from 1953 to 1961. He found that it helped him prioritize tasks and make decisions quickly and effectively, a skill he learned during his military career as Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in World War II.

The benefits of using the Eisenhower Matrix are numerous. It helps you focus on what’s important and avoid getting bogged down in irrelevant details or tasks that can be handled later. It also encourages creative problem-solving by breaking tasks into smaller, manageable pieces and allowing you to look at things differently. Finally, it will enable you to prioritize tasks according to their importance, helping you stay organized and productive throughout your day-to-day work life.

Examples

  • Planning Your Day – Use the matrix to plan your day by organizing tasks into urgent and important, not urgent and important, urgent but not important, or not urgent and not important categories. This allows you to focus on the highest-priority items first.

  • Making Decisions – When faced with multiple choices or options, use the matrix to help you decide which is best for you. Assign each option a score based on their urgency and importance ratings, then compare them before making a decision.

  • Prioritizing Projects – When tackling large, complex projects, use the matrix to identify and prioritize tasks. This can help you focus on what needs to be done first and break the project into smaller, manageable pieces.

  • Time Management – Use the matrix to create a schedule that works for you. Focus on the most important tasks first and eliminate distractions to stay productive throughout your day.

  • Goal Setting – Use the matrix to set goals and objectives that are realistic and achievable. Assign each plan an urgency rating, so you know which ones need attention right away and which can wait until later.

Eisenhower Matrix and GTD

The Eisenhower Matrix is also closely related to the popular productivity system Getting Things Done (GTD). This system, created by David Allen, is based on five main steps:

  • Capture – Gather all of your tasks in one place.

  • Clarify – Break each task down into specific actions.

  • Organize – Assign deadlines, prioritize tasks and plan accordingly.

  • Reflect – Take time to reflect on what’s been accomplished so far and adjust plans if needed.

  • Engage – Carry out the required tasks and complete them.

Using these steps along with the Eisenhower Matrix can increase your productivity and get important tasks finished quickly and efficiently.

If you’d like to learn more about the Eisenhower Matrix, Getting Things Done and how to use them in your everyday life, plenty of online resources are available. Start by reading books that discuss these systems, such as “Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity” by David Allen or “The 4 Disciplines of Execution” by Sean Covey and Chris McChesney. Numerous blogs and websites are dedicated to productivity topics and offer helpful advice on using these tools.

By taking the time to understand the Eisenhower Matrix and Getting Things Done, you can increase your efficiency and get more done with less stress. With a bit of practice, you can be well on your way to becoming an expert in organizational skills and time management. Good luck!

Keywords: Eisenhower Matrix, Time Management, Productivity System, GTD, Getting Things Done, David Allen, Prioritizing Tasks, Organize tasks, Reflect on accomplishments, Engage in tasks.

The Hidden Killer of Your Creativity

GeneralEdward Kiledjian
Image by Becky Wetherington used under creative commons license

Image by Becky Wetherington used under creative commons license

Last minute work on school assignments was the norm for most university students. They wait until the last minute then “pull an all-nighter”.

Many feel that this pressure to deliver makes them work better but recent scientific evidence shows that this may actually be completely false.

It seems pressure may actually stifle innovation and creativity. It pushes you down a conventional path.

Some of the most successfully entrepreneurs are people that have learned to deal with pressure. Even when carrying the weight of the world, they are cool, calm and in control.

Be mindful

Any yogi or meditator will extort the virtues of living “in the moment”.

Think about the last time you were waiting in the lobby to be interviewed for a job. In this particular situation, most people feel stressed. They feel fear. They feel eager. Their body reacts to this stress by releasing cortisol. They may sweat a little and even have some nervous ticks.

None of these is ideal for creativity. You are rarely putting your best foot forward in these stressful situations.

But remember that the stress you feel isn’t because of something that is happening then and there (in the moment). It is because you are worried about what you think may happen.

If you are able to be “in the moment”, then you will release the stress and shine like the star you are meant to be.

The research

Professor Teresa Amabile (from Harvard Business School) conducted research into creativity in the workplace and discovered that employees under pressure almost never performed optimally when completing tasks. Funny enough many thought they were optimally creative but measurably they were not.

Rear my article Monotasking is the new productivity hack

Read my article How to set personal goals, which talks about starting with the end in mind.

Stress Physiology

Epinephrine and norepinephrine are stress hormones produced when you feel stressed. It is the physiological response know as flight or fight. These hormones help you move faster during emergencies.

The other hormone produced during excessive stress is cortisol. Psychology Today called Cortisol The Stress Hormone public enemy No 1

Excess cortisol in your system can lead to a host of health issues including weight gain, osteoporosis, digestive problems, cancer and much more (1, 2, 3.

In addition to wreaking havoc on your body, it can have devastating effects on your mind.

Stress creates free radicals

Cortisol creates a surplus of the neurotransmitter glutamate. Glutamate in turn creates free radicals that attack brain cells (similar to how rust affects metal).

Stress makes you forgetful and emotional

One of the early symptoms of stress is becoming forgetful and emotional.

Studies show that stress causes a reduction in brain electrical activity associated with memories and an increase in activity associated with emotions.

Stress negatively impacts intelligence

I wrote about stress on creativity and stress makes your brain seize up. Think about our primitive ancestors and how they reacted when being chased by a lion. The fight or flight response means your physical characteristics are improved, your reactions are improved but your reasoning and logic suffer. After all you don’t need deep critical thinking when running to save your life.

How can you handle pressure?

First thing first, remember that regardless of how important you think your job is, you aren’t performing brain surgery. Our job is important to us but it isn’t critical to the survival of all humans so chill. Take it easy on yourself.

When feeling stressed about an upcoming situation, ask yourself, “whats the worst that can happen? Then realize that things aren’t actually that bad and relax.

Olympic athletes spend as much time mentally preparing as they do physically. They mentally perform their duties over and over to ensure they are relaxed when they need to perform. It becomes automatic and routine. If you are heading into an interview and you know you will be stressed, prepare and practise.

The second tip is to mentally practice over and over. Make sure you know what the ideal final result looks like and focus on that.

I ran the information security team for a large multinational manufacturer that was regularly attacked. By constantly practising the incident handling processes, our handlers were calmer and more confident when the real thing did happen.

Confidence is the third technique I want to share.

Having confidence in yourself will usually lead to less stress and increased productivity.

When handling an incident, it is easy to get overwhelmed. You are dealing with a skilled adversary out to get you. They are technically strong, well funded and extremely motivated. It is easy to get overwhelmed and freeze up. But I always tell my people to be optimistic. Regardless of how bad it may seem in that moment, I truly believed that things would get better. And my ensuring my team believed in that as well, it makes the process easier to manage and made my people more productive and efficient.

Optimism is the fourth technique.

The secrets of the 80/20 rule you need to know now

GeneralEdward Kiledjian
Image by Jacob Bøtter used under Creative Commons License

Image by Jacob Bøtter used under Creative Commons License

We live in hectic times. For most of us, there will always be more work than hours in a day and we need to find some mechanism to prioritize work and stay sane.

There are hundreds of books on time management (my personal preference is the Getting Things Done methodology by David Allen).

Regardless of your chosen time management framework, there is an important time management principle called the 80/20 principle. This principle applies to work and life. It shows how effort and effort value are not balanced.

Remember student life

Most students know that they spend only the last few days ,before the finals, cramming and getting ready. Most often this yield’s the desired grade and you move on. This means that the little sprint at the end yielded the desired result. You could have studied religious every week for the entire semester and you probably would have achieved the same or very similar level of performance.

Business profits

In most businesses, 20% of the products/services yield 80% of the profits.

The 80/20 rule

The rule is that (roughly) 80% of the desired results will be generated by 20% of the effort.

Typically a small number of decisions/work effort result in the biggest gains for the organization.

The purpose of this framework isn’t to argue an exact split. Most people call it the 80/20 rule but the actual split can be 70/30 or 99/1.

The imbalance is everywhere even in linguistics

Imbalance is everywhere. You deal with it daily without realizing it. Sir Isaac Pitman discovered that 700 of the most common English language words make up 2/3 of every conversation. By extending the definition to include derivatives of those words, the ratio becomes almost 80%.

How it applies to your work

If we assume that this phenomenon is real and then apply it to your work, it means 80% of your time is spent on activities that generate very little return or value.

Think of all the activities you participate in today (or you cause to happen if you are the boss) that steal valuable productivity such as meetings, reports, etc.

My accepting this simple fact as valid, you can start asking yourself which of your calendar bookings are likely a waste of your time (aka they generate the least amount of value).

Large fast food chains try to iron out inefficiencies through carefully analyzed time and motion studies. You can do the same quickly by just thinking about value and trying to optimize your time.

Look at your company profits

List all of your company products/services and rank them by profits generated. You will likely find that 20% of your products/services generate the bulk (maybe 80% or so) of your profits.

By knowing this, you can prioritize these in the short term and ensure your teams are maximizing value by pushing and investing in these lines. It is also a chance to perform some risk assessment and determine what risks exist for these products and how you can react.

You may even decide to cut down on your less valuable products/services this reducing corporate complexity and overhead. In some cases making you a more nimble and reactive organization. In study after study, we see that the least complex organizations typically perform the best.

A tool when negotiating

When preparing to negotiate, each side will produce a list of desired outcomes. If you prepare your list by keeping the 80/20 rule in mind, you will be able to narrowly focus on what really matters to your organization. This narrower list also gives you more room to manoeuver because you can concede on some of the less important elements.

A tool when targeting customers

By knowing which 20% of customers generate 80% of your profits, you can concentrate your marketing dollars more intelligently. You can also ensure that you provide incredible customer service for these important customers and make them feel special.

The 80/20 rule in life

This rule also applies to your personal life. It means that some personal relationships are more important (more rewarding) than others. A simple way of looking at this is that 20% of your friends generate 80% of friendship value (joy, support, etc.).

When applied to friends, it is less mathematical and more introspectual but is a fantastic exercise. Are you spending your time with the people giving the most back to you?

I recommend everyone plan a couple of days every 6 months to sit and perform some deep introspection. This is a valuable time when you can decide where you want to be in 5/10/20 years. It gives you a chance to take a snapshot of your as-is situation and determine if you are where you thought you would be by now. Now add to this the 80/20 rule. 20% of actions delivery 80% of your life satisfaction. Figure out the “stuff” that is less valuable and try to change it. If work is not contributing to your overall life satisfaction then make a plan to change it. If your relationship with your partner isn’t contributing to your overall life satisfaction then make a remediation plan (counselling, honest discussions, or in extreme cases separation).

Remember that 80% of your life satisfaction comes from 20% of your activities. Try to waste less time with the other 80% of your time by replacing it with better more rewarding “things”.

The 80/20 rule in time management

Many executives I have worked with typically run after the work that is the loudest or seems the most urgent. In Getting Things Done, you learn to capture all open loops (commitments of work not yet completed) and then use this list to prioritize your work for the upcoming days, weeks and months.

If you apply 80/20 thinking to GTD, you will highlight the activities that actually generate the most “bang for your buck” and push everything else down the list.

Conclusion

This is a very simple concept to understand but much harder to implement. It is powerful because of its simplicity and it has proven to work over and over. Trust in its power and use it.

Daydreaming - the untold secret to success

HealthEdward Kiledjian

When  I was in elementary school, teacher actively discouraged daydreaming. They refereed to it as a "lack of attention" and a "waste of time". As we got older, we kept these negative beliefs about daydreaming which may adversely impact our intelligence and overall mental well-being.

Thinkers from the past have often defined daydreaming as a gateway to unconscious processing. It is a way to engage your subconscious mind (or other than conscious mind) to tackle all kinds of problem through improved creativity. T.S. Eliot called it  "idea incubation" while Lewis Caroll called it "mental mastication".

Then in the 50's, Jerome L Singer, a Yale psychologist,  put daydreaming through the scientific ringer and published his findings in 1975 in a book entitled "The Inner World of Daydreaming". Singer defined 3 categories of daydreaming:

  1. Positive Constructive Daydreaming - this is a positive constraint free model in which you experience playful, vivid imagery that encourages creative thought
  2. Guilty Dysphoric Daydreaming - This is a type veterans with PTSD sometimes experience which is driven by ambition, anguish and pain. It allows the dreamer to experience heroism, pain or relive a past trauma.
  3. Poor Attentional Control Daydreaming - Typically this is driven by distraction when people have difficulty concentrating. Sometime this is caused by Attention Deficit Disorder or identified as such.

Rebecca McMillan and Scott Kaufman wrote a paper entitled "Ode to Positive Constructive Daydreaming" (link) which talks about the benefits of the first style of daydreaming. They explain how it is not only beneficial but essential to making people happy, creative and empowered.

An interesting excerpt from the paper says

"Future planning which is increased by a period of self-reflection and attenuated by an unhappy mood; creativity, especially creative incubation and problem solving; attentional cycling which allows individuals to rotate through different information streams to advance personally meaningful and external goals; and dishabituation which enhances learning by providing short breaks from external tasks, thereby achieving distributed rather than massed practice"

They continue in the same thought direction

"These mental activities are, in fact, central to the task of meaning making, of developing and maintaining an understanding of oneself in the world"

Another study published in Psychological Science (link) from researcher from the University of Wisconsin and the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Science posits that daydreaming (or sometime called mind wandering) " correlates with higher degrees of what is referred to as working memory". This is the type of memory with the ability to retain and recall information when actively distracted.

Daydreaming isn't free because it requires time and it requires that you give yourself permission to daydream (which isn't as easy as it sounds). You have to be able to daydream without feeling guilty for wasting time. Once you are able to daydream freely, you will start seeing huge benefits. It may be as simple as a mental vacation during a stressful day, daydreaming about an upcoming presentation you have (aka mental preparation), to dynamically work through complicated unrelated information or a freestyle session which bolsters memory and creativity.

"Encourage your kids to daydream. Encourage your employees to take time out of their day to daydream. Encourage yourself to daydream." -Edward N Kiledjian