Effective time management - The Management Matrix

Before I go over to the important stuff I want to share something with you: Lately I've been very busy (hence no post for a while), actually so busy that for the first time of my life I felt struggle to keep up with all my responsibilities. My position has expanded pretty rapidly; I've got new categories, teams, external partners and people to take care of over the last year.

It's not the matter of bad prioritization, time management or delegation. It's a state where you've too many tasks that has to be done now, that it affects the quality and time that should be spent on long-term and important responsibilities (that don't really have deadlines).

Now over to the important stuff: How did I manage to solve it?

I reached out for a book I read a while ago - 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, by Stephen Covey (if you haven't read it, you should definitely give it a try). The book introduced me to "The Management Matrix" (illustrated below), it might look kind of boring but it's very simple and powerful.

The Management Matrix is composed by four Quadrants:

Quadrant 1: These are the important and urgent tasks you face; it might be issues that suddenly arise or frequent responsibilities that require significant amount of time. Urgent means it requires immediate attention and insist on action. Importance on the other hand, has to do with results. Important tasks contributes to your goals, values and mission.  In my case some examples are executing marketing activities, important client briefs, weekly category meetings etc.

Quadrant 2: The heart of personal management and long-term processes. It deals with things that are important, but not urgent - therefore easily interrupted by Quadrant 1 and 3 activities. These are tasks that you know you need to do, but sometimes get pushed behind because they're not urgent. In my case some responsibilities in this quadrant are; make sure my team is awesome and motivated, take leanings from campaign evaluation, keep track on long-term goals and personal development.

Quadrant 3/4: We all have these in our lives, but we want to stay out of them as much as possible. Urgent or not, Quadrant 3 and 4 activities are not important. By limiting time spent here, you have more time for Quadrant 1 and 2. In my case typical Quadrant 3 and 4 activities could be replying to unimportant mails, attending meetings to please someone, checking Facebook and sending out reminders.

Now most of us have plenty of Quadrant 1 activities, but having too many of them will eat you up, together with the time you should have spent in Quadrant 2. Personally I find the second Quadrant most important; it's here you're steering the ship, analyzing the ocean and making sure the crew is doing good. Your Quadrant 1 activities should be the result of what you do in Quadrant 2.

To convince the management I made my own Management Matrix, to illustrate that as my position expanded, several Quadrant 1 responsibilities stuck with me. Tasks I couldn't just delegate and forget about. So I gave them a clear choice; Do you want me to spend majority of my time in Quadrant 1 doing what has to be done, and occasionally visiting Quadrant 2? Or would you rather see me working on the important stuff (majority Quadrant 2 + some Quadrant 1)?

I encourage you to make your own Management Matrix, for me this was a great exercise - one I plan to revisit every now and then to remind myself. It's also a good tool to see how much time you can save in Quadrant 3 and 4, but for it all to work you have to be honest with yourself.