3 ways to prioritize your top priorities
Sometimes it’s easy to prioritize your daily tasks. An average day usually contains at least a few things that can be pushed further down your to-do list. But what happens when you’re swamped and have more than one urgent matter in front of you? Here a few ways you can organize those top priorities and get out from underneath that pile of work.
Consider the value: When looking over tasks, figure out which items have the largest effect on the business. Are certain items impacting customers directly? Are other departments waiting on a task to be completed before they can continue with their own work? Stepping back to look at the bigger picture can give you a better feel for the true importance of the important tasks.
Trick yourself: Let’s say you have 6 tasks on your desk. Try knocking out the shorter ones first. This way, you’ll push a smaller number of tasks off until tomorrow. If you start with the longer tasks, you may find yourself having to focus on a handful of important things again the next day. While this might only be a bit of a mind trick, you’ll appreciate your to-do list going from 6 to 2 as opposed to going from 6 to 4.
Don’t let yourself be interrupted: The most important thing when dealing with a list of important tasks, is to GET. STUFF. DONE. Checking your email every 10 minutes isn’t necessary. Close your door, focus on your priorities, and do work. You can clean out that inbox later.
