Important, Urgent or Trivial: Your Day Made Easy

As a stay-at-home mom/Virtual Administrator, my day is full of pressing tasks. Tasks, that in the past, became overwhelming because I was attempting to address EVERY issue/request as they would arise. This, of course, made for extremely stressful days and a lot of sleepless nights. In my blog about prioritizing I express that because of the fast-paced environment that we live and work in, we can sometimes fall prey to EVERYTHING is URGENT, but actually EVERYTHING is NOT URGENT. Most of us fail when we want to do everything all at once. We leave ourselves too exhausted and by the end of the day, we either have left some tasks half-done and others not done at all. Identifying what’s urgent, important or trivial in your day to day activity helps you manage your expectations of yourself and of those around you.

There are definite lines between something being urgent, important, or trivial, however these difference often feed one another. For instance something that is urgent and important requires your immediate attention, whereas something that is urgent and not important can most likely wait.

Ok, examples: you are currently writing a blog and a client e-mails you to book a flight, for them, to fulfill a last minute request to speak at a conference, the conference is Friday and today is Tuesday. Your client’s request is both urgent and important (urgent because of time constraints and important because it could generate profits to your client) and therefore requires your immediate attention. Another example: You are currently in the process of conducting a meeting with your team and the phone rings. Answering the phone is urgent, again because of time constraints, but in this case, not important because of what you are currently engaged in, plus, you can always return the phone call.

Deciding, for yourself, what requires your immediate attention versus what can wait, can help with those rattling impulses we get when we are disturbed. Because, face-it, disturbances occur… how will you deal with them?

MH

Gold Star Admin

Graphics by Alexia Lewis