Being a creative practitioner and small business owner, there’s often a lot of things to do and many things due at the same time. You become skilled at spinning plates, juggling many balls in the air, balancing various roles at the same time – however, oftentimes your work day ends and you’re left feeling like you’ve barely made a dent in your workload at all.
Time management is an important skill to master and can become overlooked when you’re in a small team with competing priorities. When you feel like you’re beginning your weeks wondering “Where do I start?” or feeling like you’re drowning in work, it can be difficult to persevere.
In this article, I’ll show you a helpful tool that you can use to prioritise your projects and tasks as a creative entrepreneur and small business owner when you’ve got multiple things on the go.
The Eisenhower Matrix
I have two kinds of problems: the urgent and the important. The urgent are not important, and the important are never urgent. – Eisenhower, quoting Dr J. Roscoe Miller
In his dual term as 34th president of the United States from 1953 to 1961, Dwight D. Eisenhower achieved an extraordinary number of feats – he obtained a truce with South Korea, managed the Cold War with Russia by proposing communication and surveillance measures in both countries, created NASA, sponsored the first civil rights bill, balanced the budget three times during several periods of war and crisis, and led the construction of the Interstate Highway System in America, among other things.
“Ike’s” tenure influenced many writers and thinkers in the generations that preceded him, including the best-selling author Stephen Covey, who repurposed Eisenhower’s methods into a productivity tool in his book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (this book is a must have on your bookshelf). The tool is called the Eisenhower Matrix, however is also known by many names including the Eisenhower Box, the Eisenhower Method, The Urgent-Important Matrix, or as it’s dubbed by Covey, The Time Management Matrix. Covey writes:
…the two factors that define an activity are urgent and important. Urgent means it requires immediate action. Importance, on the other hand, has to do with results. (Covey, p. 150-151).
When to use the Eisenhower Matrix
Try using this matrix if you:
Find you’re overwhelmed with how much is on your plate
Have difficulty delegating your work to others
Are constantly running around and fixing problems
Are always busy but don’t feel like your work is having a useful impact
The Eisenhower Matrix is an effective tool for short-term and long-term planning to increase your productivity and output. All of your daily tasks and large projects can fall into one of the four quadrants depending on their level of importance and urgency:
Quadrant One: Urgent & Important tasks (do immediately)
Quadrant Two: Not Urgent & Important tasks (schedule for later)
Quadrant Three: Urgent & Not Important tasks (delegate)
Quadrant Four: Not Urgent & Not Important (delete)
So how do all the quadrants work, and what kinds of tasks go into each?
Quadrant 1: Do
This quadrant is aptly named do as it contains all the tasks that are important for your job that need to be done first – today or tomorrow at the very latest. It also contains your urgent tasks, some things that usually come up at the last minute that are both urgent and important.
An example of this type of task could be to review a video that’s set for release the next day, and requires an internal quality check first. Another example is sending off an invoice to a client to ensure you’re getting paid in a timely manner. Or perhaps an urgent HR matter, if you're a manager in your business.
Quadrant 2: Schedule
The second quadrant is all the tasks that are still important, but not as urgent as those that fit into the first quadrant. These are all the tasks that you can schedule and pop into your calendar.
For example, an idea for a blog post could be scheduled for release in a few weeks to give you a chance to research your idea, write up the content, and plan when it’s released. Another example is holding regular weekly or fortnightly one-on-one meetings with your core team members to build relationships with them, receive updates on their projects, and assist them in professional development activities. By scheduling these meetings, you're not interrupting workflows with impromptu office visits or last minute meetings.
People who have a good grasp of their time management typically leave fewer tasks to the last minute and like to plan regular and recurring activities in their weekly schedule to help them a) stay on top of the workload and b) create a routine. In doing so, they’re managing most of their workload within the second quadrant, helping to reduce their stress and minimising urgent tasks in the process.
Quadrant 3: Delegate
The third quadrant is reserved for tasks that you can delegate to other people on your team. These are less important than the first quadrant, but require more immediate attention than those in the second quadrant. As a result, try delegating these tasks out to someone else.
Using a project management software like Asana or Monday helps you track the progress of your delegated tasks, and manage communications in a concise and timely manner.
For example, you might need to create some social media posts to promote a project you’ve just completed. You have the notes from your production team with photos and designs to use in your posts, and you can foresee you’ve got a busy week ahead with your quadrant one tasks. Or maybe you need help stocktaking your products after a big distribution of merchandise sales. Find a team member, send them an email (or delegate them a task in your project management software) outlining what you need from them, when you need it completed by, and when you want updates on the progress.
Quadrant 4: Delete
The final quadrant is reserved for non-urgent and unimportant tasks that you could simply delete. This quadrant will help you remove the distracting items and bad habits that zap all your energy and focus.
For example, less time can be given to surfing the web, spending too much time on your phone, social media, and excess gaming, so you can focus your critical attention on the important tasks in the first and second quadrants. Ali Abdaal has an interesting habit that he's developed over the years: he doesn't watch any TV when he's alone and considers it a social activity that he only enjoys with others.
Consider what things you may be able to delete or limit in your day-to-day that might be inhibiting your productivity.
Conclusion
In this article, we talked about using the Eisenhower Matrix as a tool for prioritising your tasks and helping you become more productive.
When we discussed urgent tasks, we referred to tasks that you feel you need to react to: social media notifications, emails, phone calls, meeting requests. When we discussed important tasks, we referred to tasks that contribute to meeting your long-term plans or end goals.
The next time you sit down to write your to-do list or plan out your week, use the Eisenhower Matrix to help you quickly identify the activities you need to focus on immediately, the ones you can schedule and plan for, those you can delegate, and the things you can ignore completely.
For more advice on prioritising your tasks, listen to our podcast episodes on overwhelm and the Eisenhower Matrix below.
Overwhelm
The Eisenhower Matrix
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