How To Identify The Most Important Tasks That Produce The Most value or impactful results
The Eisenhower Matrix can be used to identify the most important tasks that produce the most value or impactful results by considering the order of importance and urgency of the goals, objectives and the associated tasks. Doing this requires categorizing the goals, objectives and tasks into four boxes called quadrants as follows:
- Box 1 tagged “Important and Urgent” are the goals and tasks that have to be executed first and immediately by the direct involvement of the individual because the achievement of the goals and task execution require special skills of the individual and if delayed will have immediate catastrophic or significant consequences.
- Box 2 tagged” Important but Not Urgent” are the goals and tasks that require the personal involvement and skills of the individual and if delayed and executed in a later date will have immediate moderate consequences but will have catastrophic or significant consequences in the longer term if continued delay is prolonged.
- Box 3 tagged “Not Important but Urgent” are the goals and tasks that have to be delegated because they do not require personal involvement and skills of the individual.
- Box 4 tagged “Not Important and Not Urgent” are the goals and tasks that should be dropped, deleted or ignored because they do not add values to the individual or organization. These goals and tasks are generally perceived as mere distractions, time killers, wasters and stealers.
The above propositions by Eisenhower Matrix have been depicted in the diagram below:
