Fast Track Your Productivity

PRIORITISE

Put First Things First. Understanding the importance of priorities and organising your schedule accordingly can radically and swiftly enhance your ability to produce more in less time. Many entrepreneurs are ambitious individuals who in their pursuit of conquering the world, fail to realise that goals are best achieved one at a time.

FOCUS

As an acronym, meaning Follow One Course Until Successful, FOCUS is the driving force behind prioritising your goals and the tasks required to achieve those goals. Prioritising daily tasks are equally as vital to productivity as ranking your weekly, monthly and annual goals. Once a goal has been ordered in terms of its importance and urgency, the goal-setter becomes mentally free to focus on the top priority goals, and then work down the list of tasks and goals according to their rank.

Note though that priorities in different areas of your life can change; and therefore any ranked list of priorities ought to be reviewed periodically, and updated.

RANK IMPORTANCE & URGENCY

Important: – meaning of great significance or value.

Urgency: – meaning pressing importance requiring speedy action.

With this distinction between Importance and Urgency defined, it is useful to note that all goals should be ranked according to both of these factors. The outcome of such ranking is best illustrated in the Time Matrix, created by Steven R. Covey.

1. Important/Urgent 2. Important/Not Urgent
3. Urgent/Not Important 4. Not Urgent/Not Important

As you can see from this matrix, goals and tasks can be categorised in accordance with one of the 4 priority categories.

It stands to reason that category 1 is the highest priority over all (although your aim should be to minimise urgencies by dealing with important matters before they become a pressing urgency). Category 2 follows next (and this is where you should live most often). Finally categories 3 and then 4.

Once a to-do-list/ or goal-list is prioritised, focus becomes comparatively easier. A strong focus brought about by well-defined priorities is one of the most important components in the engine that drives productivity. You are that engine. Likewise, a lack of focus caused by poor prioritisation will always produce relatively low productivity.