How to Prioritise Tasks When Everything is Urgent

You’ve arrived at your desk. You’ve done your daily brain dump and now have a list.

Fantastic job. What next?

Prioritisation is the next logical step. We all know we should analyse our task list and determine what to do first, second, third… and so on.

And yet many of us skip prioritising altogether, opting to brace ourselves while our most urgent, important task presents itself — a fire, ready to be fought.

In this article, I will investigate why avoiding prioritising is so common and argue the case for daily task prioritisation. I will also share examples of prioritisation models and suggest ways to incorporate (almost) effortless prioritisation into your work.

Why Do We Avoid Prioritising?

I took to social media and spoke with colleagues to find out whether my suspicion that we avoid prioritising our task lists was correct, and if that was the case, why we do it.

The overwhelming response was — yes — we avoid prioritising.

Some felt prioritising was a luxury that only people with spare time could afford. Ironically, those lucky folks with all that extra time probably manage their workload effectively by planning and prioritising.