Are you Running the Day or Does the Day Run you?

Dwight Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States. At some point he was also a five-star general in the US Army, the Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe during World War II, President of Columbia University and the first Supreme Commander of NATO.

Clearly, he was an accomplished man. But he’s not only known for his professional achievements.  Dwight Eisenhower is also famous for his supreme time management skills which have doubtlessly played a role in his success. According to history, his are the words:

“Most things which are urgent are not important, and most things which are important are not urgent.”

Accordingly it was Dwight Eisenhower who inspired the Eisenhower Matrix used as a time management tool. According the matrix there are four types of tasks we face daily:

1.    Urgent and important – DO

These are the things we should deal with first every day (i.e. write & send client proposals)

2.    Important but not urgent  - SCHEDULE 

These are the things we should schedule right after (i.e. reply to emails, follow up with clients)

3.    Urgent, but not important  - DELEGATE

These are the things we don’t need to do ourselves so we have time for what really matters (i.e. schedule meetings)

4.    Neither urgent nor important  - ELIMINATE

These are the things we shouldn’t waste any time on during the day (i.e. sorting junk email)

Clearly, you should only be concerned with the first two and schedule time to deal with such tasks every day. The rest you can either delegate or eliminate altogether. What will qualify as either 1 or 2 is strictly individual and depends on the business you are in.

Once this is clear, however, here’s how you can make sure that you stay focused and effective:

Don’t Multitask

People often perceive the ability to multitask as something positive as allegedly it improves productivity. Multitasking is significantly overrated, however, as the reality is very different.

Of course it is possible to do two things at a time such as write drive while on the phone. However, the human brain can only really focus its attention on one task at a time. This means that for multitasking to happen your brain needs to switch back and forth between the tasks and every time there is a switch, it needs time (even if just a few seconds) to refocus and go back to the previous task.

The result? You spend twice the amount of time (if not more) on doing the two things at a time than you would have if you’d done them separately. Besides, the quality of your work is often not the best. Don’t multitask, stay completely focused on the task at hand.  

Have some rules

Many people are addicted to email. According to a study published in the International Journal of Information Management in 2003 the typical person checks their email once every five minutes and on average it takes 64 seconds to resume the previous task after checking their email.

The same applies to checking Social Media to a large extent. Eliminate these distractions by allowing yourself to check these only at a specific time during the day.

With email, for example, you could allocate 30 minutes a couple of times a day for processing your email. Preferably, not first thing in the morning try delay it until ten o’clock, get an important task done before you get distracted by the things other people want you to do. Then once in the afternoon and once before you are finished for the day. Close your email after you process it otherwise you will get distracted while doing your important tasks. Your focus - gone.

With Social Media– you can easily eliminate it during the day and only allow yourself to check your profiles in the evening or in the morning on your commute.

Have a Priority List

Being busy is often misperceived for being productive. But productivity is not about doing a lot of things within a specific time frame but about doing what is really important within that time frame. You can’t do everything and the more you try, the less productive you are.

This being said, it is essential that you prioritise your tasks. Think about urgent & important and non-urgent but important tasks – the things that actually matter. Those are the things that you should aim to complete at all cost every day – starting with what’s urgent and important. Eliminate the rest or do it only if you have time. Then everything falls into place and even if some of the work you intended to do doesn’t get done today, it won’t matter.

Spend 5 minutes at the end of your work day to do up a priority list for the next day. It’s just 5 minutes but it keeps you focused and organised! 

Delegate

Everything that is neither urgent nor important you need to eliminate from your schedule altogether. Things like posting on Social Media during the day, answering certain emails, etc. consume a lot of time, time that is precious and better spent on what really matters. People are often afraid to delegate but if you don’t, you will never be productive. Think about all the things you do every day which are unimportant or not urgent and decide who can take what off your hands. Then delegate, delegate, delegate.

You can set aside a few minutes a day / week to check and make sure that the person in charge does take care of these things for you but that’s all.

Don’t be too busy

Nowadays, busyness seems to be also perceived a sign of importance. The underlying logic is that the busier you are, the more needed you are, hence the more important you are. But in really in 90% of the cases it only means that you can’t or don’t prioritise and you don’t manage your time effectively.

If you are busy all the time, and especially if you try to do a million things at a time (at the moment or over the long run), you end up feeling drained. And it also means that you have less time to relax and do the things you enjoy. Yet those are the things that make you happy and give you energy.

You need some balance in order to give 100% when you are busy with work that matters.

Separate large Projects into Milestones

Oftentimes we procrastinate starting a large (but important) project or a project that we don’t feel like doing. What happens then is, at some point it becomes so urgent that you need to focus all of your attention on it for a while. Consequently, this eats into your on-going work and disrupts your routine.

To avoid this, split such projects into milestones and set aside a little bit of time every  week to work on them. If you can do this you will make steady progress and avoid feeling overwhelmed.

Such projects would qualify as important but not urgent so they should come directly after your important & urgent tasks for the day.

Manage your Energy, not just your Time

People often talk about managing their time but the truth is, it is not just about finding time to do what is important but finding the right time to do it.

You need to think about the tasks that are important and consider when you might be most productive doing them. For example, it may take me 45 minutes to write a proposal in the morning but 2 hours towards the end of the day when I start feeling tired.

The thing is, everyone is different and while some people need a few hours to wake up before they can be focused, others can only do some things in the morning. So think about your energy cycle and set up a specific time during the day that is allocated to these important activities and nothing else.  

If you want to know more about personal productivity and time management, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with me, Ciara Conlon. At Equita we specialise in providing courses on productivity as well as other valuable business skills.