TIME MANAGEMENT: THE COVEY MATRIX
Stephen Covey in his book, “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” explains that most people are driven by the concept of urgency. But to really affect positive change in our lives, we need to reorganise the way we spend our time; based on the concept of importance not urgency. He offers this well-known matrix for analysing how you spend your time, called the Time Management Matrix.
Covey’s Time Management Matrix suggests that we tend to devote too much time to Category 1 tasks (those that are urgent and important) and should prioritise Category 2 tasks (important but not urgent) instead. If we continually focus on Category 1, it can become overwhelming and dominate our time. It’s like facing a massive wave that knocks us down and leaves us struggling to get back up, only to be hit by another wave. This constant cycle of urgency can be exhausting, causing some people to retreat to Category 4 tasks (those that are neither important nor urgent) as a way of escape.
Effective people stay out of Category 3 and 4 as much as possible because urgent or not, they are not important, and the urgency of these matters is often based on the priorities and expectations of others.
Category 2 activities are those that are important but not urgent. Because they are not urgent, we tend to not get around to doing them. Because we ignore these strategically important issues, we have lots of firefighting Category 1 issues to contend with.
Covey’s approach emphasises the need to identify and tackle our most pressing and meaningful tasks before dedicating time to less significant activities. This tool will delve into the process of identifying time-consuming activities that don’t align with our priorities, so we can make more informed decisions about how to use our time. By doing so, we can increase our overall productivity while still focusing on what matters most to us.
“The key is not to prioritise what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.” ~Stephen Covey
Covey Time Management Matrix
Exercise: Time Management – The Covey Matrix
List the tasks/activities that you can allocate to each quadrant of the matrix.
Step-by-Step Guide
Step 1
Consider all the tasks you have to do each day. This should include everything that demands your time.
Step 2
Using the handout within this tool, plot where each task fits based on its importance and urgency. You are the only one who can determine which quadrant the task belongs within.
Step 3
Take some time to reflect where your tasks sit in the matrix. Typically, the average person would spend 25% of their time in Category 1, 15% in Category 2, 57% in Category 3 and 3% in Category 4. However, the average goal would be to spend 20% in Category 1, 64% in Category 2, 15% in Category 3 and 1% or less in Category 4. What is your own percentage breakdown?
Step 4
There will always be more work to do than we can ever get done but the key is to concentrate on the 20% that yields 80% of the results (Pareto analysis / 80/20 tool). Brainstorm 2 – 3 key ideas that will allow you to manage activities in quadrant 1, focus on activities in quadrant 2, and avoid activities in quadrants 3 and 4.