Being able to differentiate the urgent from the important is essential for time management. The urgent / important matrix is a useful tool that will help you identify which tasks need to be addressed first. Urgent tasks, such as picking up dry cleaning or fixing the printer, often take up too much of our time.
- Urgent tasks do not help you meet your goals and can become distractions.
- Important tasks help you meet your goals and the activities that reach the goals.
For the best productivity and time management, give priority to the important tasks. However, you have to identify the important tasks first.