BECOME A TIME MANAGEMENT PRO WITH THE EISENHOWER MATRIX
Is your To Do list longer than a Thanksgiving dinner grocery shopping list? Or maybe you’re post-it note system has turned into a swarm and it’s haunting your dreams. Calm down. Grab a blank sheet of paper. The Eisenhower Matrix is coming to the rescue!
The Eisenhower Matrix, also sometimes referred to as Covey’s Time Management Grid, or just the time management grid, is a method or organizing tasks according to two questions: (1) How important is it? and (2) How urgent is it? These two questions, when set as the x- and y-axis on a chart (with high and low values for each) create a 4-square grid that allows you to prioritize your work, delegate tasks, and remove nonessential activities entirely.
Watch this video for a brief overview of how to use the grid:
In case you missed it in the video, here is a visual representation of the Eisenhower matrix, explaining what activities should go in each quadrant:
Quadrant One is urgent and important. These are activities with a looming deadline that can’t be ignored.
Quadrant Two is important but not urgent. These are more activities like planning, development, and quality of life. Cultivating your health and well-being is in this quadrant.
Quadrant Three is urgent but not important. And email in your inbox with the headline, “Huge Labor Day sale ends tomorrow” is urgent but not important.
Quadrant Four is not important and not urgent. Many things in this category are a waste of time, and some things are worth doing, but you should fit them in around more important things.
Now it’s your turn! Print the image below on a piece of paper (or just grab a blank piece of paper and draw lines to divide it into four quadrants.
Write the items from your To Do List in the appropriate quadrants, based on how urgent they are and how important they are. Now start working through the grid, starting with Quadrant One.
Lessons I’ve learned from the Eisenhower Matrix:
Quadrant Two activities (important but not urgent), if left unaddressed for long enough, can become Quadrant One activities (important and urgent). For example, if you ignore your health for long enough, you will be unable to ignore it when you have a heart attack and you’re in the back of an ambulance on your way to the hospital. Another example is your relationships; if you fail to invest in your primary relationships (such as your marriage), the people you spend your life with will quite literally scream their way to the top of your priorities list.
How do I determine whether something is important? I figured out a way. Ask yourself: Am I the only one who can do it? or Do I really enjoy doing this? If the answer to either (or both) of those questions is yes, then there’s a good chance it’s important.
How do I determine whether something is urgent? Also easy… ask one question for this: Does someone really really want it done? If yes, it’s urgent! (The next question is… is that someone you or is that someone a random company running a holiday sale.)
