Four quadrants of your desktop
A friend of mine had this interesting suggestion for personal effectiveness in 2008: Use the Covey idea of Four Quadrants of Activity Management on your computer's desktop.
Save this Four Quadrant image as your desktop.- Drop your active work (files) onto the four quadrants
- Work on the Important-Not Urgent and Important-Urgent activities in much larger proportion to your Not Important-Urgent and Not Important-Not Urgent tasks.
Of course, this works well when you are heavily file-centric in your work. I note that most email applications let you drag and drop messages, but that would be a little cumbersome on the desktop. Just imagine doing this within your mail app too!
Here is a sample of the results (click for full image). I might leave all the applications off the quadrants. But placing them in the Not Important-Not Urgent quadrant is probably a good idea.
11 Comment(s)
said:
Thanks, Marina. Very helpful - I hadn't thought of the multiple screens in the Mac being used for the four quadrants. It'd be a nice way to get rid of the not important activities altogether...
I'm not sure that having files on your desktop slows the computer -- it certainly slows mental processing (finding stuff), just like having files all over the physical desktop. You are taking the GTD approach, which I think is right on as well.
Hm, I'm not sure that having such a cluttered desktop would really aid in productivity; seems to me that you'd be busy arranging your desktop way too much. Personally, I think the desktop should remain file-free and only contain application links; all files should reside in "My Documents" (for Windows users), which is the default folder opened in most any program, hence saving you the trouble of having to dig for any other folder, or Desktop, where you might be storing your files.
On a more subjective level, having a cluttered desktop just don't feel right: it's all about the zen!
Umm.. why should we priortise work?
That in itself consumes time, is n't it? :)
said:
Ottayan-
Of course, prioritizing takes time. But if you have work that will take more than a few minutes, AND you have other things to do, you need to make decisions on whether the item is something that should be done and when.
said:
I tend to agree. I'd much rather put things in their proper folders and have a trusted system that gets me back to those items at the appropriate time.
But, this Four Quadrants suggestion is the attempt for people with already-cluttered desks to begin uncluttering them.
Jack,
How can work, regardless of its duration, be deemed unimportant?
Jack, point taken. My hairs bristle when I see some people's desktops filled to capacity with icons... so this may be a way for these folks to impose some order onto the chaos.
said:
Ottayan- I can't tell if you are being serious or pulling my leg.
We need to set priorities all the time. Which book do I pull from the pile? Which emails deserve a detailed response vs. being deleted right away? Which of the five projects do I complete in the space available for only two? There are priorities and balancing acts, etc.
The Four Quadrants model is a nice mental image of the kinds of work that people do. There is a surprising amount of unimportant work that could be left alone and no one would ever notice. The point is that we should be doing much more of the important stuff and much less of the unimportant.
Figure out the mechanism that works best for you!
Jack,
I am serious. What I was driving at is that people define work incorrectly.
If they are able to define what is work and what is not, then they dont need to prioritise further.
When they are able to do that, they dont require any of these tools.
(Sorry, I just read your reply, hence the delay)
said:
Ahah! Ottayan, now I see what you are saying. Of course, "work" has to be defined well. We are probably looking at the same problem from slightly different angles.
People have been living with bad definitions of work for so long that they've gotten themselves in the habit of trying to do everything at once, and thus getting nothing done. These tools give people a starting point on realizing what really _is_ the nature of their work and what _isn't_.
Mac users who upgrade to Leopard can instantly flip around a grid of screens using Spaces, taking this idea to a whole other level.
Keeping files on your desktop slows down your computer, so I make sure to clear it off regularly, and at least every Sunday. I keep active files in a folder called @INPROGRESS in my Documents folder.