A Task List Makes the Difference

Checklists make the difference in controlling your destiny. Inadvertently your calendar will get stepped on and you will have to make adjustments as a professional and it is impossible to remember everything unless you take the steps to write things down. Writing things down and taking notes is part of being a professional who follows through, follows up, meets prescribed deadlines and achieves their written goals. There are many different task lists and ways to prioritize, and I cannot remember how I came up with this method (otherwise I would give credit). I use the 3 P's method - Problems, Projects and Proactive. You may associate these categories with the 4 quadrants of time management which is a great basis for improving your productivity. The first category is Problems, which are in the urgent and important category of the 4 quadrants of time management. Problems are inevitable and you have to deal with them. The next category on my task list is Projects, which are things you are working on that require multiple steps and usually take a few weeks to a few months to complete. Projects are in the not urgent and important category of the 4 quadrants of time management. Last but not least - Proactive is the category on my task list that's associated with planning, building relationships and problems solving. The proactive category is one of the most important things that we need to focus on, but unfortunately most of us spend the least time on (including myself). You must make time to be proactive - otherwise it will never happen. The more you work to be proactive -you will start to see fewer problems and more rewards for making time for what's important, but not urgent. I have shared this with many of my co-workers over the years and I hope this helps you.

I wanted to include a few additional bonus categories that have helped me along my journey The first is Someday-Maybe, which is an ongoing collection of ideas that I have for future projects, improvements. To-do is self-explanatory, and are action items I need to take care of. Follow-up is a category which could be a completed project or task that needs to reviewed on a recurring time table.? Waiting-for is a category that I put things that have been passed off or delegated to others.