Many experts recommend adding a specific number of tasks to your task list each day, or a specific number of projects for the week or month. They recommend limiting your “work in progress” to three to five tasks or projects and moving everything else to another list.

Choosing a small number of items helps you avoid feeling overwhelmed. You can see what’s on tap for the day or week, what to do first and what to do after that.

But no matter how many items you put on your list, in a way your list is always just one item. At any moment, you choose one thing you need to do or want to do and do it. If you’re smart, you don’t think about anything else until you’ve completed your number one task or taken it as far as you can go.

First things first. Second things never.

Gary Keller says, “Until my number one priority is done, everything else is a distraction.”

Okay, I’ve got to admit, I know what I’m going to work on after I finish this. After that? I don’t know. Its more fun that way.

Earn more, work less. This shows you how.

Another day, another study. This one says that we have “an urgency bias” meaning that “our brains pick urgency over importance, wanting the immediate satisfaction of a quick payoff”.

We prefer to do the quick and easy things on our list because important tasks are (or appear) more difficult and take longer to complete. “People want to finish the urgent tasks first and then work on important tasks later.”

I get that. I do that. I like to sprint through my email inbox first and get it out of the way before tackling more important work.

The researchers say one reason we tend to prioritize urgent over important because we find comfort in appearing busy. I get that, too. Who doesn’t like checking things off our list?

If we’re getting the important stuff done, however, does it matter when we do it? Kinda. We have more energy at the start of our day and should use that time for work that requires more focus.

If we’re not doing the important work, however, if our day is filled with putting out fires and reacting to what’s put in front of us instead of doing things that bring us closer to our most important goals, that’s a problem.

What’s the solution? The researchers say we should remind ourselves of the value of the bigger tasks we’re avoiding or postponing. Okay, but how? The article doesn’t say. But I will. It’s something I wrote about before and it’s about as simple as it gets:

Next to each task on your list, write down why you need to do it. In other words, write down the benefits it delivers.

This forces you to think about what each task is worth to you. Is it short-term and relatively low-value or something that advances your career? Is it urgent but otherwise not a priority or is it an important factor contributing to your success?

As you write down why, consider the price you pay for not doing the task. What do you give up if you don’t get it done?

We need to prioritize tasks that provide more value over those that are merely urgent. By consciously considering the benefits each tasks offers, we can be more intentional about what we do and when we do it.

One of the lessons of the 80/20 principle is that a few things matter but most don’t. “A minority of causes, inputs, or effort usually lead to a majority of the results, outputs, or rewards,” according to Richard Koch, author of The 80/20 Principle.

Figure out your 20% activities and do more of them. Spend less time doing everything else.

Now, every day we all make lots of decisions. What to do, what to read, what to say, how to make a point, what to buy, and many more. Unfortunately, many of us spend too much time making decisions about things that don’t matter or matter much.

We should train ourselves to make quick decisions about most things.

Where to go to lunch, what car to buy, whether or not to upgrade our computer–these are not “20% decisions likely to lead to 80% of our results”. Where to take a prospect to lunch, for example, shouldn’t take more than a minute or two. It’s just not that important.

On the other hand, opening a new office, starting a new practice area, getting in bed with a partner–decisions that require research, thought, weighing of risks and rewards–are 20% decisions that can indeed lead to 80% of our results.

In the course of a day, you might make dozens of relatively unimportant decisions. Make them quickly and move on. You might make an important decision once a week. Take your time and do it right.

Plan less, do more