Coveys Time Management Matrix

Stephen Covey, author of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People andFirst Things First popularized the concept of a Time Management Matrix for prioritizing.

Urgent

Not Urgent

I
(MANAGE)
y y y y y

II
(FOCUS)
y y y y y y Preparation/planning Prevention Values clarification Exercise Relationship-building True recreation/relaxation

Crisis Medical emergencies Pressing problems Deadline-driven projects Last-minute preparations for scheduled activities

Quadrant of Necessity

Quadrant of Quality & Personal Leadership

III
(AVOID)
y y y y y

IV
(AVOID)
y y y y y y

Interruptions, some calls Some mail & reports Some meetings Many pressing matters Many popular activities

Trivia, busywork
Junk mail
Some phone messages/email

Time wasters Escape activities Viewing mindless TV shows Quadrant of Waste

Quadrant of Deception

In Quadrant 1 (top left) we have important, urgent items items thatneed to be dealt with immediately. In Quadrant 2 (top right) we have important, but not urgent items items that are important but do not require your immediate attention, and need to be planned for. This quadrant is highlighted because Covey emphasizes this is the quadrant that we should focus on for long term achievement of goals

In Quadrant 3 (bottom left) we have urgent, but unimportant items - items which should be minimized or eliminated. These are the time sucks, the poor planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part variety of tasks.

In Quadrant 4 (bottom right) we have unimportant and also not urgent items items that dont have to be done anytime soon, perhaps add little to no value and also should be minimized or eliminated. These are often trivial time wasters.

Quadrant 4 Not Urgent and Not Important

Clearly, not urgent, not important and an obvious time waster. Other time wasters include:
   

Mindless web browsing Too much television/channel surfing for the sake of channel surfing Reading lots of random RSS feeds (no matter how fast you may read them) Junk and low value email

Quadrant 3 Urgent and Not Important

Other Urgent tasks that add little to no value

 

Phone calls that are off topic Email that you have to reply to right away or it loses value (Do you want some donuts? I have some in my office!)

Quadrant 2 Not Urgent And Important

Your overall health is something you may take for granted today, and may not see urgency in dealing with it but long term, we know its of supreme importance. There are some other important, yet not urgent, things that fall into this quadrant as well:
  

Exercise Reviewing your career path Maintaining relationships with family/friends

Quadrant 1 Urgent and Important

Perhaps not entirely rational, but at least her priorities are in order. Other examples:
 

Family Emergencies Real, hard deadlines for important projects

Coveys, Blanchards and Market Quadrants

y y y Which items on a todo list are important? Which are unimportant? Which should be done first, and which can be postponed for later (or never perhaps).

The problem with listing todo items in simple order of priority, lets say 1, 2, 3 and 4 where 1 is highest priority is that such a listing doesnt really reflect the importance of an item, only its urgency. For example, taking out the trash isnt really all that important. It could wait for the next pickup. Its not like they dont pick up once a week. And when youre in the middle of a great project, taking out the trash is just a distraction. Some of you readers probably have trashed piled up, dont you you know what Im talking about. Listing by priority would be fine within each of Coveys quadrants. But when the priority listing is spread over multiple quadrants, the sense of importance for any particular task is lost.

Let s take a look at Steven Covey s Time Management grid:

URGENCY Quadrant 1: IMPORTANCE Urgent and Important, Fire Fighting Quadrant 2: Important but not Urgent Production

Quadrant 3: Quadrant 4: Urgent but not Important, Not urgent, not important, Distraction Time wasting
Coveys Quadrant Taking out the trash goes into Q3 Distraction quad, right along with getting groceries, vacuuming the family room, doing the laundry, paying the bills, etc. For me, Q3 is Procrastination Station. I might have all the bills paid. That is, all the checks in stamped envelopes sitting on the desk for a week until I get around to it. Which reminds me, I need to run a quick trip to the post box.Back in a bit

Nice. Found a nickel on the sidewalk. Its my lucky day. Back to work.

How to use Coveys Quads Coveys quadrants, AKA Coveys time management grid, works best with well-defined tasks, where task is defined as an activity that can be succinctly described in a single sentence to capture the essence of the activity. For example, Cook Christmas turkey is a task. Tasks may have subtasks (Fix stuffing for turkey), and may be subtasks of some other task (Cook Christmas dinner). In any case, the directions for accomplishing a task (lets call them directives) dont go into this grid, and are handled in detail elsewhere, ideally in checklists (open to suggestions for checklist web applications).

Blanchard s Quadrant
Blanchards quadrants are a somewhat different way of examining the getting things done process, as explained by Mark Forster in a guest article on Andrea Novakowskis blog. The quadrant itself it simple:

Want to do/Don t want to do Have to do/ Quadrant 1: Don t have to do Have to do, want to do Quadrant 2: Have to do, don t want to do

Quadrant 3: Quadrant 4: Don t have to do, want to do Don t have to do, don t want to do

The key to using Blanchards quadrant is defining exactly what constitutes Haves and Wants. One way to do this is to convert Wants into Haves. For example: if you WANT to live indoors, you HAVE to pay the rent. Tying wants into haves using material association helps reduce emotional fogginess.

Curiously, for me, Quadrant 3 in Blanchards system corresponds to Quadrant 4.

Blanchards Quadrant 4 is a very curious thing, tasks or actions you dont have to do and dont want to do. These are probably emotionally driven. For example, I dont want to drink a cup of coffee in the morning, and nobodies holding a gun to my head making me, but if theres coffee in the house, Im having a cup. Maybe 2 cups. Tastes good!

The Market Quadrant

That reminds me I wrote a blurb a while back about being smart versus being dumb. Or dumber. Or even dumberer. Lets see how that fits in with fun and make money. Lets say fun is stuff you like to do and not fun is stuff you hate to do. And making money requires that other people want your stuff. Sorting it all out, look like we have a market quadrant here:

Dave s Market Quadrant

You you hate it you like it smart! you re an entrepreneur and work for yourself, or you re an employee where the responsibilities are accompanied with the required authority, and you have enough autonomy to get the job done. Rare.

somebody wants it

dumb They call it work for a reason!

Your market nobody wants it

dumberer Total waste of time. Doing it because you have to. Meeting terms on an onerous contract, where the product or service is irrelevant, and politics reigns supreme.

dumber Self-indulgence. Trustafarianssometimes live here. Good work if you can get it.