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Focus on Two Priorities, One Month at a Time
Posted by Kevin Purdy at 1:30 AM on February 2, 2008
The Web Worker Daily blog pulls a snippet from one of the latest business-advice tomes, Susan L. Reid's Discovering Your Inner Samurai, one that speaks to a way of choosing from all your possible actions (Answer email? Do research? Crank widgets?) when you don't have a logical next step. Reid's suggestion:
Two priorities; one-month commitment. That's all. Of course, if you can, you might narrow that priority down to one. Most of us, though, unless we are in an extreme situation, will have two.That doesn't, of course, mean skipping everything else for one month, but dividing your year into 12 chances to hone in on something that could use a little more attention than it usually gets—like keeping a workspace clean, in my case. How do you go about giving tasks priority and choosing what gets done next? Share your own samurai code in the comments.
Tags: getting things done | planning | priorities | productivity | task management | top
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Deprong Mori
Posted 4:38 AM 2/2/08
One easy way for me to determine priorities is to walk into my boss's office, say "I have A, B, C, D, and E on my todo list. Do you want me to jump on one of these or is there something else that needs immediate attention?"
Same thing when I come back from vacation. I ask my boss before I tackle e-mail and voicemail, then I'll look for messages related to the prioritized task.
I know I'm doing the most important thing. My boss knows I'm doing the most important thing. No miscommunication.
Deprong Mori
Dr_Smoke
Posted 5:38 AM 2/2/08
In the context of the "you have a free hour" criterion of the "Web Worker Daily" post, GTD devotees know that David Allen recommends the "Four-Criteria Model" for choosing actions in the moment:
1. Context.
2. Time available.
3. Energy available.
4. Priority.
However, IMO the topic of priority-such as setting priorities-is addressed inadequately in GTD.
This is where a system like Quadrant II Organizing, discussed in Steven Covey's book First Things First (FTF) proves more effective than GTD in setting priorities and making choices based on such. By applying Covey's ideas to your Next Actions, you know which are Quadrant I (urgent, important) and Quadrant II (important, not urgent, but deliver long-term value), making the priority choice more straightforward.
GTD provides a great approach for processing "stuff" via the Workflow, but FTF provides the framework for setting priorities that lead to long-term, positive results in one's life. GTD's "Six Level Model" and it's bottom-up approach to review is, IMO, more complex than Covey's top-down approach of first understanding one's roles and goals. I suspect many GTDers have not gone beyond the Runway or 10,000 Foot levels in their long-range planning.
Neither GTD nor FTF is perfect, but I've personally found that blending the best of both methods can lead to significant short- and long-term results.
Dr_Smoke
computermom
Posted 6:39 AM 2/2/08
Dr. Smoke - that was the best explanation I've read to date about the two methods.
GTD unclutters your mind from the mundane details since it guides you into having a "trusted" system for storing all the stuff that has to get done. I had to implement those ideas in order to have the time and energy to find out what my QII objectives were - let alone carve out the time to actually start working to achieve them!
I just never saw that until I read your comment - thanks for sharing!
computermom