Steven Covey ‘The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People‘ – Urgency v Importance

Below is the ‘Matrix of Importance vs Urgency’ from Stephen Covey’s book ‘The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People‘. The ‘Matrix of Importance vs Urgency’ is used in deciding where to invest your time.

Priority should be given in the following order;

• Quadrant I. Urgent and important (Do) – important deadlines and crises
• Quadrant II. Not urgent but important (Plan) – long-term development
• Quadrant III. Urgent but not important (Delegate) – distractions with deadlines
• Quadrant IV. Not urgent and not important (Eliminate) – frivolous distractions

The order is important; after completing items in Quadrant I, you should spend the majority of our time on Quadrant II.

However many people spend too much time in Quadrant III and Quadrant IV. Delegation and Elimination are effective reminders of the relative priority of the tasks ie they are of much less importance.

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