Easy and Quick Tips For Priority Setting - A Step-By-Step Guide

Easy and Quick Tips For Priority Setting - A Step-By-Step Guide

In our weekly blog, we'll be talking about priorities and how to achieve them consistently. Our goal is to provide you with easy and quick tips to make your life easier. We hope you find benefit from these articles and can implement the tips into your day-to-day life. We talk about priority setting and the tips and tricks needed for priority setting will be mentioned in our upcoming blog post. 

a close up of a sign

Establishing priorities and importance of each priority:

Its everyone's desire to reach their life goals but the path to achieving those goals is not so natural. Setting your goals, prioritizing those goals and planning to reach them is essential. Prioritizing is a way of creating boundaries for yourself. It helps you to make it easier for you to choose the right opportunities for you.

We have to make a clear picture in mind of our priorities; otherwise, it's elementary for us to fall prey to other people's preferences and you will be living another person's dreams or goals. If you feel like you're continuously being pulled in each direction, you will have to make your priorities.

Every task does not have equal importance. The most essential duties move the work closer to long term goals.

Prioritizing allows you to identify the most critical tasks at any moment, and It will enable you to spend more time on the right things. It helps everyone to plan. It is an excellent way to ensure that deadlines are met and stress is minimized.

Establishing priorities helps you to manage your time, especially when you seek to accomplish multiple goals. It helps you to have a clear focus on the crucial goals first and ensures you are taking the right steps.

It allows you to move towards your vision rather than worrying about the future. Almost all of us are wasting our time on small tasks and bragging about it, but when you have priorities, you give your time to things that matter. 

Basically, if you are staying busy but still feeling unproductive, then this article is for you. 

This daily planner can help you prioritize your daily tasks and make it easy for you to track them for the remainder of the year. It will allow achieving your goals, managing your schedule and it could be a work-life balancing diary. 

This planner looks absolutely beautiful. The gold edge added a funky twist to it! Check out the link below to order yours from Amazon: 

Undated Organizer Planner for Minimalists| Daily Agenda to Achieve Goals and Management of Your Schedule| Productivity Goal Planner for Work & Life Balance| A5 (5.5”x8.5") Diary Notebook 2019/2020

a close up of a computer keyboard

How can we establish priorities?

It's not hard to establish priorities. You just need some tools, firm attention to detail and sincerity towards your goals. I will walk you through an easy step-by-step process to list out your priorities, so you can focus on the most critical tasks in your life.

These tasks will allow you to reach your goals and ultimately feel successful. 

List tasks/goals:

The first step is to list out all of the tasks that you are thinking about. This is the brainstorming phase, where you write everything down. You can create a mini checklist for all types of tasks such as daily checklists, wedding checklists, work-day checklists and house chore checklists. Here are some of the customers' favourites:

 The Wedding Planner Checklist (A Portable Guide to Organizing your Dream Wedding)

Knock Knock Reality Checklist Note Pad, 6 x 9-inches

Identify urgent tasks/goals:

Next, you should identify the urgent tasks that are to be done immediately. This includes a task that if neglected, can harm your progress towards your goal. Check to see if any high-priority tasks are to be done on you finishing up a piece of work now. This will have an impact on your bottom line or get you some new business for your company. 

a close up of a book

Post-it Notes Super Sticky Notes, 3" x 3", 5 Pads, 90 Sheets/Pad, Rio de Janeiro Colours

Determine other tasks value:

Next, look at your task and identify what carries the highest importance to achieve your goal. You have to know exactly which types of jobs have top priority over the others.

a close up of a suitcase

Action difficult tasks first:

If some jobs have the same priority, then check their time estimates and start with the one that will take most time and effort. This technique is also suggested by most of the productivity experts. But, sometimes you feel like that you cannot do the lengthier task before you finish up the shorter job then you should do that first. It can be motivating to do small tasks first then going for the lengthier ones.

a knife on a table

Be adaptable:

Priorities can always change as uncertainty is part of life, but you have to stay focused on the committed tasks. Don't waste unnecessary time on the small tasks that do not bring you any benefit in the long run. Be accepting of the situation and revaluate your priorities to include it in your overall plan. 

Important/Urgent tasks first: 

Focus on the most important / urgent tasks for your organization - a bigger impact task that will help your grow your business or have a bigger impact on the organization that you work for. Don't waste time on the smaller and non-urgent tasks because you can easily delegate these tasks to others.

There are multiple graphics and quadrants that can be found online to help you assess your tasks based on urgency and importance!

Know when to stop:

You probably can't get to everything on your list so look at your estimates and cut the remaining tasks from your list if some task may affect your progress. Try to focus on the priorities that you know you must and can complete for the day. Try to focus on the three main tasks for the day and only do what you can do easily. Don't overdo it because it won't be beneficial for you in the long run. It is important to consider health, prayer, nutrition and a productive morning routine as your priorities for the day. 

a red stop sign sitting on the side of a pole

- Make dua and recitation of the Quran an integral and important part of your daily routine. Finding small chunks of time to read the Quran brings immense barakah into the day, even if it's only for 5-10 minutes. Once you develop a routine that works for you, it will become a habit and you will have immense barakah in your daily life. The morning and evening adhkar are also another practice that is beneficial. 

Here are some of our previous articles to make it easier for you to plan your day: 

Time Management and Nutrition Tips: 

https://www.hijabsandmore.ca/blogs/hijab-fashion-blog/time-management-nutrition-tips-for-mothers

Develop an Effective Morning Routine: 

https://www.hijabsandmore.ca/blogs/hijab-fashion-blog/what-is-the-benefit-of-a-good-morning-routine 

Here are some motivational quotes about productivity to inspire you and help you move towards your dreams and goals: 

1. “Focus on being productive instead of busy.” - Tim Ferris

2. “Do the hard jobs first. Easy jobs will take care of themselves.” - Dale Carnegie

3. “Productivity is being able to do things that you were never able to do before.” - Franz K.

4. "You don’t need a new plan for next year. You need a commitment.” - Seth G.

5. “He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life.” - Muhammad Ali


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