The importance vs urgency matrix

I have again something for you to think about. I am currently reading “The 7 habits of highly effective people” by Stephen Covey. In my opinion a very good book. He presented this matrix of importance vs urgency that I wanted to share with you.

The idea is that one should spend as much time as possible on tasks in the 2. Quadrant (important but not urgent) as these are the things that really matter in improving yourself on all levels (work and private life).

I think we tend to spend a lot of time in Quadrant 1 (urgent and important) for example preparing applications the day before the deadline. I know from experience that this just happens, but we all know it is better to avoid. Spending time in Quadrant 2 will also help you to be better prepared as you are doing things while they are not urgent and so these tasks will never move into Quadrant 1.

Then there is Quadrant 3 (urgent but not important) and the idea is to delegate as many tasks from this quadrant as possible.
Finally, Quadrant 4 (not urgent and not important) is a place that one should totally avoid. And I think this is very hard. These activities tend to be very pleasant, but when we are honest they are just wasting our time.

A way to motivate yourself to improve here is to take some time and think about quadrant 2 activities (maybe one work related and one private to start with). So something that you think is really important to do, but it is not urgent. One should visualise/write down exactly what you would do if you had a lot of time to spend on this activity. Then one should also visualise/write down what the outcome would be and what impact this will have on your life. And then take a week and act accordingly. Spend as much time as possible in quadrant 2. If you eliminate as many Q3 and 4 tasks as possible this will already give you some time that you can spend in Q2 and this in the long run will also eliminate Q1 tasks.

So here is one of my projects: I want to improve on relationship building, mindfulness and stress prevention. So I am for example regularly posting about these things here.