Eisenhower prioritization of work

Urgent things are usually not the most important,

and the important ones are not the most urgent.

Dwight Eisenhower.

The rhythm of life that exists today can hardly be called calm and measured. Most of us set ourselves grandiose tasks every day, plan to redo a bunch of things, and when unresolved issues have to be carried over to the next day, and they grow like a snowball, there is an emergency, a hard time trouble.

Constantly being in a state of “don’t know what to grab onto” is hardly appropriate when we are talking about personal effectiveness. The resulting emotional stress blocks productivity, leads to rapid fatigue and apathy. Therefore, in order not to become a victim of stress or, even worse, chronic fatigue syndrome, let's deal with time management or time management.

Time management (time management) - science that allows you to achieve your goals in this crazy high-speed world

Time management is the act or process of exercising conscious control over the amount of time spent on specific activities in order to specifically increase efficiency and productivity.

There are a number of skills, tools and techniques that can be used to help manage time. specific tasks, projects and goals. This set includes wide range activities, namely: planning, allocation, goal setting, delegation, time analysis, monitoring, organization, listing and prioritization.

One of the time management tools of time management is the so-called eisenhower matrix, allowing you to properly prioritize your business. The authorship belongs to the 34th President of the United States Dwight David Eisenhower.

Eisenhower had a lively and inquisitive mind. He was interested in history, sports, mathematics, he was attracted by the arrangement of things and the motives of people's behavior. He directed his considerable energy to making the known work better, and not in any other way. And internally, Dwight was more focused on self-improvement, rather than remaking himself.

So, what is the essence of the method?

Let's start with the fact that one of the most important skills proper planning work, increase personal productivity, save time and other resources is the ability to classify cases according to their degree of urgency and importance.

According to the rule proposed by Dwight Eisenhower, priorities are set according to such criteria as as the urgency and importance of the matter .

• A important and urgent . This category should include the most important cases that require immediate implementation.
• B Important but not urgent . This includes important things that can wait.
• C Urgent but not important . AT this category includes not very important things, which, however, need to be done urgently.
• D Not urgent and not important . This group includes issues that may not be addressed at all, since they will not bring any return.

A common mistake many people fail to plan is precisely the lack of ability to prioritize the tasks that need to be solved.

People tend to do, first of all, what they like, and then experience periods of time troubles that drive a person into stress and lead to a burnout syndrome.

Importance of the case is determined by how the result of its implementation affects your work.

Urgency- how quickly you need to do this job.

A Important and urgent. If most of the cases and tasks fell into this sector, then stresses and crises are your usual schedule. The hope that things from quadrant 1 will be completed and then a new, more meaningful and more measured life will begin is a huge delusion.

As practice shows, often this situation is a consequence of:

• irrational planning: we are busy with work all day, but for some reason we start doing things “from the end”, postponing everything important “for later”;
• lack of self-discipline, inability to force oneself to do things that really matter;
• laziness;
• in general, poor organization of the work of the department, department, unit in which planning is not carried out, and the situation of emergency work is considered “normal”.

Most likely, priorities are set incorrectly, or responsibilities are not delegated (there is no trust in the team). In this state of affairs, you will always be busy important issues today. The point of the system is to keep cases out of that category. To do this, it is enough to start the implementation of important, but not urgent matters in advance.

• An unplanned visit to the dentist, caused, as always, by a sudden toothache.
• Writing an article, preparing a report, the deadline for which is about to come. Of course, you knew about the article a week ago, about the report - even earlier, but somehow your hands didn’t reach ...
• Urgent call.
• Chronic fatigue, which was the result of the lack of a daily routine, good sleep and rest, overload, etc.

You need to learn how to delegate responsibilities, find and “educate” yourself an assistant who will replace you if necessary. Prepare a list of duties that your subordinates and colleagues can perform for you. Review your priority list. Move the "center of gravity" of your activity to quadrant 2.

B Important, but not urgent. This category of cases can be called very important, since it is to her successful people spend the most time and effort. Starting an important task on time means not only relieving yourself of stress, but also enjoying a difficult, but interesting task. After all, you have time to think about the matter, and then slowly, without fuss, begin its implementation. By the way, this approach eliminates errors or, according to at least, minimizes their probability. But even if they arise, you have time to fix everything.

If you do not start the implementation of these cases on time, over time they will move into category "A". And then you have to spin, spin, sigh, complain about life and hate your job.

Case examples for quadrant B:

• Writing articles, abstracts, reports on science, reports on the activities of the department, and other planned work;
• timely payment of car insurance, for utilities etc.;
• regular visits to the doctor - in order to prevent and prevent diseases.

C Urgent but not important. This category includes forced tasks that you have to do, even if they do not bring you closer to your goal. This includes temporarily performing the duties of another employee who went on vacation or sick leave, fixing problems that suddenly arose (for example, water from a washing machine flooded neighbors). Such things only distract from work and do not allow to concentrate on the main thing. Alas, no one is immune from their appearance.

Typically, people who engage in activities listed in Quadrant 3 feel that they are in Quadrant 1. Their activities seem to them not only to be truly urgent, but extremely important. For some reason, you out of all your official duties selected only the unimportant ones. Moreover, you yourself have determined what is the main thing for you, and what is vanity of vanities.

Just move the "center of gravity" of your affairs to quadrant 2, the implementation of urgent, but not vital tasks from quadrant 3, you simply must delegate. To do this, you must immediately revise the list of priorities, schedules for completing tasks, and master all time-saving techniques. It is these methods that will help you get a solid supply of time that you will spend on really important activities that will lead you to your intended goal.

D Not urgent and not important. The affairs of this group do not bring a person any practical use. These include:

• aimless shopping "just to look", although in reality you do not need anything - you just want to improve your mood;
• aimless reading of Internet pages is entertaining, but absolutely useless;
• freezing in ICQ, Skype and other messengers;
• computer games;
• long telephone conversations;
• watching TV show, entertainment programs, music channel; aimless channel switching when you watch everything a little bit;
• reading jokes, funny stories and etc.

The affairs of this category do not bring any benefit to a person, but they are very pleasant. The main recommendation of time management experts is to devote as little time as possible to these tasks or use them for short breaks between important tasks. Unfortunately, many people start their work or day off with these activities, irrationally wasting their morning energy.

Prioritization: how to do it right

1. Divide all your tasks and responsibilities into the above groups A, B, C and D. In this way you will separate the "necessary" from the "useless".

2. Remember: “important” is fundamentally different from “urgent”. “Important” brings your goal closer, but it is not necessarily “urgent”. “Urgent” on the other hand requires your immediate attention.

3. Pay attention to the so-called "priority rule": "important" comes before "urgent". It is not necessary to do everything that requires haste. Try not to submit to the dictatorship of the urgent anymore, because it lurks the following danger: we begin to get distracted by what is urgent, but absolutely unimportant and not mandatory.

4. To plan your time intelligently this advice will be very useful: always start with the task number 1 in group A, and not with the one that is number 3 or 4, no matter how attractive and interesting they may be. If by the end of the working day you did not manage to cope with all the tasks and cases from group A, then continue working with them the next day. Do not do other tasks until you are done with the first ones.

5. Every day, work on some task from group B that requires a lot of time. Along with your daily activities, you should also think about your "strategic" important tasks and goals. Only in this way will you be able to secure tomorrow's success today.

We need to understand once and for all that we will never have enough time for everything that we would like to do, and for what others want from us. It is necessary to use our time only for things that are really important for us, which can bring us closer to our goal. And time can only be won if you learn to say “no” and refuse to do unnecessary things.

In addition, in order to be more productive in your activities and not live in between stresses and crises, you must be able to delegate responsibilities and not waste time solving other people's problems.

In this way, perfect schedule for the day should contain mostly to-dos and tasks that fall into quadrant 2 (important/non-urgent) of the Eisenhower matrix.

This principle is named after General Eisenhower, who later became President of the United States of America. They say that the experienced manager Eisenhower actively used him in his work. He divided all cases, tasks and questions into four subspecies, guided by the following matrix.

It's believed that important and urgent You need to do things yourself, and immediately. But the whole art of time management is aimed precisely at not bringing things to this stage.

Further, for most people, all other urgent matters come to the fore. Which are not always important. How can you tell if something is important or not? Very simple. We consider important all the cases, the implementation of which is directly necessary. to achieve our goals"BUT". Thus, if a given case is not necessary to achieve one of our three "A" goals, it is not important.

Thus, many people first of all spend time on any urgent matters, but almost all of them have nothing to do with achieving goals "A". At the same time, the achievement of goals "A" is being pushed back and pushed back. After all important but not urgent can always wait!

Finally, significant time is spent on tasks that are neither important nor urgent. But they are the easiest to deal with. We cannot force ourselves to do something useful - and we surrender to routine processes. We disassemble many times a day email. We go to the same sites. Gathering information that we don't really need. Having busy ourselves with something unimportant, we get a good reason to put aside more important, but also more difficult things.

How to improve the efficiency of using your time, guided by the Eisenhower principle?

First, plan your time according to the importance and importance of the tasks, and not according to their share in the total number of tasks!

For example, consider how the time of managers is distributed. The most important tasks (category "A") account for approximately 15% total all the tasks and affairs that the leader is busy with. Self-importance of these tasks (in terms of contribution to the achievement of the goal) is, however, approximately 65% .

But this is if we talk about the tasks necessary to solve production issues! At the same time, the achievement of one’s own goals “A” can be completely penalized - both during working and non-working hours.

Obviously, the most profitable thing is to make the most of your time to achieve goals "A" - both work and personal. If you sort out important but non-urgent things in advance, devoting a lot of time and effort to them, most of them will not have time to become important and urgent. From the rest of the cases you need get rid. Urgent, but unimportant things - to delegate to someone (as far as possible). Non-urgent and unimportant - just don't do it (as far as possible). Don't waste your time and energy on them. And if you really spend, then at a minimum. And as little as possible. By the way, that's why I don't go through e-mail more than once or twice a month.

It is extremely important to learn refuse from most cases. Especially from those that have nothing to do with the goals of "A" either for you personally or for your work. The fewer cases and assignments you take on, the more time you can devote to truly important tasks. No wonder they say that the main word in time management is the word "NO".

In general, the ideal of time management approximates to:

☼ spend maximum time on “A” cases, and only on them;

☼ in the breaks between cases "A" spend a lot of time on quality rest;

☼ Enough time to spend on sleep, that is, get enough sleep.

It is unlikely that you will be able to completely exclude unimportant things from the schedule. On the other hand, purposeful(according to Alan Lacaine) people should devote at least 5 hours a week to their "A" activities. Can you imagine what will happen if you spend a third, or even half, of all the time that you devote to business on business “A”? At the same time in every possible way limiting the time spent on unimportant things? And devoting significant time to quality rest and sleep?

Ultimately, this is what a flexible approach to time management is aimed at, which is based on Lyubishchev's time management system, based on developing a sense of time with the help of timekeeping. This system we will discuss further!

But before that, let's consider how a manager and especially a business owner can optimize their time for managing a business.

The word “priority” itself contains the Latin prefix “prio”, which means “before, before”. Prioritization is when you decide on a daily basis what needs to be done first in order to achieve your goals.

The Eisenhower principle will help you start your tasks and work in order according to your priorities. And to do this, first of all ask yourself: are these matters important or urgent?

According to the Pareto principle, 20% of our tasks will be important in all respects. It's funny, but most of them are also urgent. Doing important things brings you closer to the intended goal. Urgent matters, on the other hand, switch your attention to themselves, without exerting great influence to your target. The most important tasks and tasks leading to success and achievement of goals should in no case be pushed back under the pressure of unimportant but urgent matters.

However, unfortunately, we all tend to start with minor, unimportant things, so to speak, "exchange for small things." The printed forms lying on the desktop seem much more attractive to us than the important project we have been putting off for several days now. Therefore, first of all, pay attention to those tasks that can most affect your success. Priorities will help you with this.

To attain best results you have to spend most time for really important things and tasks.

A little test: important or urgent?

Check correct option(only one).

1. You decide to work towards your “yearly” goal. However, all this is still "shelved".

Important or ____ urgent?

Important or ____ urgent?

3. You decide that you will visit the dentist once a year. A year has already passed, and you still have not been to dentistry.

Important or ____ urgent?

Right answers:

question 1 - important; question 2 - urgently; question 3 is important.

The Eisenhower principle allows you to combine only two criteria - important and urgent, thus, four classes of priorities are obtained. For successful planning you need to analyze and classify all the tasks before you. And then you will build a hierarchical list, thanks to which you will know what, when and how to do it.

Eisenhower Hierarchical List

A-Priority: These are things that need to be done today because they are urgent and necessary.

B-priority: important things that don't have to be done today. Just give yourself time regularly to do things B and find a place for them in your schedule. Completing the tasks in this group will ensure success and bring you closer to your intended goal.

Very often, B cases are simply shelved because they are not urgent. Nevertheless, their timely implementation will avoid many problems.

Task Example B. You need to prepare a report for a board meeting, it is quite possible that it will even get you a promotion. You have a whole month in reserve, however, if you frantically write a report in the last two days before the meeting, this can lead you to a crisis.

For anyone who has to compile numerous documents, the task of B is certainly to acquire the skill of the ten-finger typing method. Even if it takes thirty hours of your time - it's okay, in the future, being able to type quickly, you can save a lot of time, Moreover The sooner you start learning, the better.

Of similar importance is the so-called customer survey conducted to improve the product, which will significantly increase customer satisfaction.

AT privacy Task B can be called a regular preventive examination by a doctor, which will identify special threats to your body and prevent serious diseases and, as a result, the subsequent long weeks of disability.

C-priority: skills, mastering, which we think urgent matter, but is not important. These include: the ability to remain calm, to delegate their duties (so to speak, “the ability to send delegations”) or to say “no”. With this, you will buy time to solve important tasks from group B.

D-Priority: This includes cases that are neither important nor urgent. You can safely put them in a drawer or, if it comes to deadlines or some tasks, refuse them or simply delegate it to someone else. Consciously block yourself for a while from doing things D that allow you to relax and have fun on the days of the most stress.

Prioritization: Do It Right

1. Divide all your tasks and responsibilities into the above groups A, B, C and D. In this way you will separate the "necessary" from the "useless".

2. Remember: “important” is fundamentally different from “urgent”. “Important” brings your goal closer, but it is not necessarily “urgent”. “Urgent” on the other hand requires your immediate attention.

3. Pay attention to the so-called "priority rule": "important" comes before "urgent". It is not necessary to do everything that requires haste. Try not to submit to the dictatorship of the urgent anymore, because it lurks the following danger: we begin to get distracted by what is urgent, but absolutely unimportant and not mandatory.

4. For the reasonable planning of your time, this advice will be very useful: always start work with the task number 1 in group A, and not with the one at number 3 or 4, no matter how attractive and interesting they may be. If by the end of the working day you did not manage to cope with all the tasks and cases from group A, then continue working with them the next day. Do not do other tasks until you are done with the first ones.

5. Every day, work on some task from group B that requires a lot of time. Along with your daily activities, you should also think about your "strategic" important tasks and goals. Only in this way will you be able to secure tomorrow's success today.

Recognize once and for all that you will never have enough time for all the things you would like to do and all the things that others want from you. Make sure to use your time only for things that are really important to you and that can advance your goal. And you can only win time if you learn to say “no” and refuse to do unnecessary things.

Quiz: Are You Prioritizing Right?

Now you can analyze your ability to prioritize. Please note: only tasks that are really important to you can be included in priority groups A and B!

1. What percentage of your total time do you spend in each of the four squares A, B, C, D? (see picture)

2. To which group would you classify the things that you will do tomorrow?

1.____________________=_________ - priority

2,____________________=_________ - priority

3.____________________=_________ - priority

4.____________________=_________ - priority

3. Now write down what or whom you would like to spend more time on than usual, and what you would like to reduce time on.

I would shorten (a): __________________________

Instead of this: __________________________

Eisenhower principle

According to this principle, priorities are established according to criteria such as urgency and importance of the case. Depending on these criteria, four groups of cases are distinguished:

Urgent and important matters. They should be taken care of right away.

Urgent but not very important (less important) things. Here the leader should not be hasty. If the task, despite the urgency, is not so important, then it should in any case be delegated, since no special qualities are required for its implementation.

Important but not urgent matters. They do not need to be done immediately, they can wait. Problems with such cases begin when they become urgent. And since this is inevitable, we can recommend the following: it is best to either postpone important, but not urgent matters, or entrust all or part of them to your subordinates. By the way, by doing this you will not only save time, but also help to increase the motivation of your employees.

Non-urgent (less urgent) and unimportant (less important) tasks. These things can not be done at all without any Damage. Take courage and use the wastebasket for these cases.

And now we will talk about the second very important aspect of planning, namely the planning of working time.

It is hardly necessary to convince anyone of the importance of such a conversation. “Where did my time go?” say many busy executives. Unfortunately, for our management team, not having time and working as much (longer) as possible has become a kind of symbol of status, official position, and even a source of pride. But the point here, of course, is not an overload of work, but a simple inability to plan one's own time. A researcher in the field of management A. Mackenzie, as a result of numerous surveys of top management personnel, concluded that out of a hundred managers, only one (1%) has enough time to solve all cases. Ten (i.e. 10%) need 10% more, forty (40%) need 25% more, and the rest lack even 50% extra time. And this, of course, does not indicate the number of cases and the workload of managers, but the mass inability to rationally use their time. It is no coincidence that therefore in modern management there is a section called "Time Management". Let's get to know psychological aspects time management. Let's start with quotes:

“He who allows his time to slip away, let go of his life, he who holds his time in his hands, holds his life in his hands” (A. Leiken).

“Time is the most limited capital, and if you can’t manage it, you won’t be able to manage anything else” (P. Drucker).

“The ability to manage time, along with the right leadership and the technique of influencing people, is a factor that pre-1 determines your success or failure” (3. Sievert).

“The most important thing in your life is ultimately your time” (A. Leiken).

What is time management? Firstly, from finding and eliminating the "sinkers" of the manager's time and, secondly, from the ability to plan the working day. First, let's look at the most common "sinkers" or "traps" of time! Try to eliminate at least five of them in your work and this will be an excellent result.

time traps

Fuzzy goal setting.

Lack of priority in goals.

Trying to do too much at once.

Absence full view about upcoming challenges and ways to solve them.

Poor work planning.

Personal disorganization ("littered" desk).

Excessive waste of time on correspondence, paperwork.

Poor documentation.

Lack of motivation.

Searches for records, notes, addresses, phone numbers.

Shortcomings in cooperation and division of labor.

Department-breaking phone calls.

Unscheduled visitors.

Inability to say no.

Incomplete late information.

Lack of self-discipline.

Failure to complete the task.

Non-working environment (extraneous noise).

Protracted meetings.

Insufficient preparation for conversations and discussions.

Lack of feedback.

Chatter on private topics.

Excessive communication.

Business records beyond measure.

Delay Syndrome.

Desire to know all the facts.

The duration of the wait (for example, a business meeting).

Haste, impatience.

Too rare delegation of affairs.

Lack of control and self-control.

We now turn to an analysis of the principles of effective planning of the working day. Managers are aware of the following pattern: work is spent as much time as it is available, that is, any work is performed during the time allotted for it.

The principles and rules for planning the working day, which I will bring to your attention, are, of course, not binding. Many of them may seem frivolous to you. However, they are psychologically justified and have proven themselves in various life situations. It is not necessary to use all principles. Try to apply each of them, find your style - it will be the best for you.

So, the organization of working time must comply with the basic principle: "The work must obey me, and not vice versa." The twenty-five rules for planning a working day can be divided into three groups:

¨ rules for the beginning of the day;

¨ mid-day rules;

¨ end-of-day rules.

In this article, we will look at what time management is, what its main methods are, and describe in detail an example of the Eisenhower matrix. This matrix is the most common way to allocate time in all spheres of human life.

Eisenhower matrix - time management method

Time management- the ability of a person to correctly allocate his time for the implementation of specific tasks. There are time management methods great amount. One of the most popular and common ways to implement time management is the Eisenhower method.

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Dwight David Eisenhower is a famous political and military figure, David was born on October 14, 1890 in Denison (Texas, America). Everyone knows him as the 34th President of America, who stood out for his organizational and mental faculties. This allowed him to achieve great success in life, to become an example for many public people. David believed that the presence and performance of valuable deeds defines a person as a person, contributes to development in all areas and undertakings.

“Since I stopped being president, I have been able to win golf much less often”

Dwight David Eisenhower

As president, David was immersed in a huge number of cases, plans, tasks. He thought about how to clearly and correctly allocate his precious time in order to do everything. Considering all your plans for certain period, he created a table where he marked his cases according to their significance and urgency. Later, his method gained particular popularity and became known as the Eisenhower matrix. It looks like this.

A quadrant Important urgent matters

In quadrant Important non-urgent

C quadrant unimportant urgent

D quadrant unimportant non-urgent

The essence of the Eisenhower window is to prioritize activities. A person must divide all his plans by significance and urgency, relate to certain category. Now let's take a closer look at the main sectors or quadrants of the matrix. An example of the Eisenhower matrix will be considered a little further in our article.

Quadrant A

This includes important urgent matters that cannot be postponed, as this can lead to negative consequences. In an ideal arrangement, correct distribution time, this box must be empty. A person must perform on time important tasks so they don't become urgent.

Quadrant B

There are important non-urgent matters here. With the timely implementation of the plans of this sector, a person accumulates a huge number of valuable urgent cases. The gradual implementation of plans in order of importance helps to put things in order on time, without psychological and physical exhaustion of the body.

Quadrant C

Unimportant urgent matters that are not significant in this moment but they need to be done right now. Perhaps their fulfillment is valuable for someone, but for you they are ordinary without any value.

Quadrant D

Eisenhower referred to this sector unimportant non-urgent tasks that need to be done, but they are not super-important or urgent. Their implementation brings a person, of course, satisfaction, but failure to fulfill them does not threaten with negative consequences.

We will consider these sectors in more detail, describing the example of the Eisenhower matrix.

Goals of the Eisenhower Method

The Eisenhower method has several main goals.

1. Development of human self-organization. Having seen everything planned for a few days, a person becomes active, connects all his resources to achieve a result, thereby organizing himself without anyone's help.
2. Qualitative distribution of tasks Everyday life. Having compiled such a matrix, everyone will be able to see significant things in a specific period of time, will try to complete them so that there is no rush job.
3. Successful Planning Skills. A table with clearly defined plans helps to allocate a certain amount of time for each task, to calculate this time correctly.

By compiling an example of the Eisenhower matrix, we can analyze the goals of this planning technique in more depth.

Features of highlighting significant tasks with examples

As we have already found out, the Eisenhower matrix consists of four main components, which include our cases in terms of importance and urgency at the moment. Now, with the help of examples, we can figure out what cases can be urgent, and how to determine this ourselves. An example of the Eisenhower matrix will help you fully understand the significant and urgent tasks in everyday life.

Quadrant A (important urgent matters)

As we mentioned, this sector should ideally be empty, a person should have time to do valuable things on time so that they do not become urgent. For example, we can classify an unscheduled operation or an urgent meeting at work as "sector A". Important things need to be done on time, because when they become urgent and valuable, there can be sudden obstacles to doing them ( sharp deterioration health, various force majeure circumstances). Let's take an exam situation. This is important, but not urgent. If a person postpones preparation until the last day, turning it into an urgent task, then he simply physically does not have time to do everything, his body will become exhausted physically and psychologically.

Quadrant B (important non-urgent matters)

The affairs of this sector can wait, but their failure will lead to negative consequences. Particularly valuable cases are allocated for this in order to complete them on time. This includes issues related to own health, personal development. For example, if you go to the doctor for a consultation on time, the need for surgery will not arise. Another example, if you learn English on time, you will be able to get a new well-paid position in a short time.

Quadrant S (unimportant urgent matters)

This sector combines tasks that need to be completed at a particular point in time, but they are not of particular importance to you. To determine the importance of plans for yourself, ask yourself the question: “What will happen if I don’t do this task?”. If in the end the case bad influence on you, it means it's really important. Sample Tasks this sector there may be an insignificant conversation with a colleague or friend, participation in a poll. These things only distract you from important things. For example, if you are busy with a valuable project at work, you may be distracted by some other instructions from your superiors, a call from a friend just to chat. It is imperative to postpone these tasks, focusing on more important things so that it does not become urgent.

Quadrant D (non-important non-urgent tasks)

These plans can be carried out in free time when there are no important tasks assigned. They bring a sense of satisfaction with themselves, the work done. For example, you decide to clean up your library, put things in your closet. This also includes computer games, hanging in in social networks. These things help you calm down, but you should not put them in the first place, thereby ignoring significant tasks.

Let's try to figure out, using an example, how to determine important urgent tasks using the Eisenhower matrix. Consider the example of the Eisenhower matrix.

Let's say you have the following tasks for the first time:

• fix the stool so that it does not stagger;
• see a dentist with toothache;
• preparation for tomorrow's working draft;
• a call from a colleague with a request to send a report;
• unscheduled meeting with the boss;
• spend time on social networks;

Now let's try to structure the named tasks according to their importance and urgency. We create our own example of the Eisenhower matrix.

Quadrant A (important urgent) :

• preparation for a working project;
• unscheduled meeting with the boss.

Quadrant B (important non-urgent) :

• visiting a dentist with a toothache;
• skill acquisition of English language for advanced training.

Quadrant C (minor urgent) :

• a call from a colleague with a request to send a report.

Quadrant D (non-important non-urgent):

• fix the stool so that it does not stagger;
• spend time on social media.

Thus, having comprehended the value of your upcoming affairs, you can easily deal with the distribution of priorities at this point in time. Do not be too lazy to take the time to work on yourself, to rethink your plans and undertakings, this will help you do more than you think.

“One hour of working on yourself will teach you more than one day of explanations”

Jean Jacques Rousseau

It is worth noting that the technique of time allocation described by us is designed for short-term goals that need to be achieved in the near future. It helps to structure the affairs of everyday life, it is very useful in all spheres of work and life. This technique can be used by both presidents and schoolchildren, since it is understandable to everyone and easy to use.