Setting Priorities Means Ditching Stuff, Not Ordering It

No matter how organised you think you are, there’s stuff you’re simply never going to get around to. Dumping those options from your future to-do list can make all the difference. Tech author Thomas A Limoncelli , author of the book Time Management for System Administrators, put it well during his keynote at Linux.conf.au earlier this week:

As geeks we often think priorities are the order we’re going to do things in, but really priorities set lists of things that we’re not going to do as well.

Not that this doesn’t mean you should ditch long-term goals — there’s nothing wrong with forward planning in that sense — but there’s no point in beating yourself up over stuff that simply won’t happen on your watch. Better to acknowledge that it won’t happen (and pass the baton elsewhere if it’s a work task) and focus on a realistic list.