There are those that sit down with a lit of task items for the day and just start working through them. Other folks find their day works better by working a couple todo line items at a time, shifting when progress on one is slowing. Still others stare at their long list of things to get done for the day and stall at which to do first and how to get started… usually loosing out to the coffee machine for another cup of coffee while they start to feel overwhelmed.
Eisenhower, the President, had a way of dividing up his tasks into four groups. The ones that needed to get done now, the ones that should be put off for a future time (maybe needing other things to get done first or other individual’s time), there are tasks best left to delegate to others and finally there are tasks that really don’t need to be done by you at all. Take a quick look over your task list for today with those four groups in mind.
Now, the trick is to move all tasks into one of the four groups. Then, divide the Do First group into smaller bites, say 8 as a max. Work the smaller list of Do First todo items and see the list shrink. Everyone feels better when they can dive right in, getting things done, especially when items start getting knocked off the list as ‘done’!
You can start doing the process with a pad of paper, or… to make it easier to take anywhere with your, there is an app for that. Simply called ‘Eisenhower‘, the iPhone app lets you divide down your work to what you can actually get done, removing the clutter or tasks best left for later or not done and all. For a bigger view, there is a free Web site version too, but I’m pretty mobile so having the Eisenhower app in my pocket makes more sense. Though, the Web site does sync to the iPhone via the Cloud so there isn’t a need to use only one or the other.
For those important, must concentrate tasks, Eisenhower offers a 30 minute countdown timer so there is no need to keep an eye on the clock to watch for progress. Tasks in the future can be added to the iPhone’s calendar and Delegating is made easier via the built in email task option,