Prioritization is the single highest-leverage productivity skill. Do the wrong things efficiently and you're still busy going nowhere. These six methods help you consistently pick the right things first.
1. The Eisenhower Matrix (urgent vs. important)
Split tasks into four quadrants:
| Urgent | Not urgent | |
|---|---|---|
| Important | Do it now | Schedule it |
| Not important | Delegate it | Delete it |
The magic is in quadrant two — important but not urgent work (planning, prevention, growth) that's easy to neglect until it becomes a crisis.
2. The ABC method
Label each task A (must do, high consequence), B (should do), or C (nice to do). Finish all your A's before touching B's. Simple, fast, and hard to game.
3. MoSCoW (Must, Should, Could, Won't)
Popular in projects: sort tasks into Must have, Should have, Could have, and Won't have (this time). It's great for scoping and for saying no explicitly.
4. Value vs. effort (the impact matrix)
Plot tasks by value delivered against effort required. Do the high-value / low-effort "quick wins" first; plan the high-value / high-effort "big bets"; drop the low-value / high-effort time sinks.
5. The Ivy Lee method
Each evening, list tomorrow's six most important tasks in priority order and work them top to bottom. Forcing a single ranked list removes the paralysis of choice.
6. Eat the frog
Identify the one task with the biggest impact (often the one you're avoiding) and do it first. When your most important task is done by 10am, the day is already a win.
You can't do everything — and you don't have to. Prioritizing is choosing what to leave undone, on purpose.
Go deeper: our sister site TaskTips covers task prioritization with more real-world examples.