Productivity: Getting thing done by Four quadrant task management

Today I noticed that if I didn’t declutter my mind by categorizing and prioritizing the tasks, I couldn’t stay organized with the tasks and side projects at work.

During this summer vacation, there are multiple side-projects I wanted to complete such as reading books, following online courses on Skillshare, starting my YouTube Channel. Moreover, there are loads of different things happening in my life. I have to work two part-time jobs, researching on investments. On top of that, I also was distracted by Social Media, Netflix, and YouTube. I felt like I was in a three rings circus and could not get anything done. Therefore, it’s the right time for me to take a step back, prioritizing each task.

The first thing I did was shutting down all of my digital devices and left myself a pen and my journal on a desk. There is always a magical element within a pen and paper, which always gives me a sense of tranquility so that I can take my time to settle down, and thoughtfully dump everything in my mind onto the paper. As one of the best books about productivity: Getting Things Done by David Allen: “Your mind is for having ideas, not holding them.” Contrariwise my laptop and phone are super stimulus and hijack my brain into the “Autopilot Mode” which ends up aimlessly scrolling social media and watching YouTube. After jotting down everything, my brain finally could settle down.

Here is an example of my note:

Just ignore something random things in my mind

Next, I used one of the techniques that are extremely practical in the book Hyperfocus by Chris Bailey is categorizing tasks into four quadrant:

• Necessary work: unattractive yet productive: for example writing a report in a course you don’t enjoy, but it’s productive because it relates to your grade.
• Unnecessary work: unproductive and unattractive: a thing that keeps interrupting and annoying you, it could be doing household (except you enjoy do it)
• Distracting works: unproductive and stimulating: activities that make you joy but it doesn’t lead to actually accomplishing anything such as browsing through social media or having a chat with your co-workers when you’re working on an important project.
• Purposeful works: productive and attractive: the tasks we’re most engaged in as we do them and lead to a huge amount of accomplishment. Few tasks fit into this category, most of the people only have three or four at most.

Here is the result:

Let me shed the light on how I categories some of my tasks:

1. Purposeful works: Reading
2. Necessary works: Anki

In my humble opinion, the difference between both of those categories is that purposeful works are the thing you’re passionate about most, and necessary works are the things you got to do because it’s important. Both of them are sequential. For instance, I enjoy reading books because first it gives me a sense of tranquility and showers me with loads of wisdom. Moreover, it’s also sequential because reading lets me absorb tons of new knowledge which not only benefits myself but also I could share it with other people by writing blogs and making YouTube videos. On the other hand, Anki (an e-flashcard system to remember things, English vocabulary for example) is quite tedious to stare at the screen all of the time but it’s important and sequential because that is the most effective way for me to retain knowledge.

1. Distracting works: Netflix, YouTube, and Social Media
2. Unnecessary works: Email, household

Netflix, YouTube, and Social Media mostly will fall in the distracting works because those are attractive things but most of the time, we didn’t accomplish anything besides entertainment. Honesty is the best policy. Sometimes I also struggle to tackle this, I usually assign a specific time at the day as a reward only after finishing purposeful and necessary work.

Replying to Email/Message, from my perspective (it could be varied for each individual), it’s quite annoying because most of the Emails and messages are unurgent and unnecessary, if it was I usually use my phone call. Other unnecessary tasks I will erase or delegate to the other person.

By following this technique, I can set my intention clearly for each task and prioritize the thing that values most in my work and life. Additionally, it also makes me reevaluate all of the tasks and erase some unnecessary things in my life so that I can work purposefully and less overwhelmed.

What about yours? Please comment how do you stay organising at your work and life?