Managing time is not about making a list of activities and then deleting them as they are completed, but about knowing how to plan, prioritize, rate and, of course, pull. There is a method that helps us manage the time needed to complete them. all the tasks, and it also teaches us to identify what we need to use our time in: these are Stephen Covey’s four quadrants.
Covey himself points out that time management is not just about organizing tasks, this ensures that it is a true philosophy of life because our well-being also depends on how we manage time.
- “There’s never enough time to do everything.
- But there’s always enough time to do the most important thing.
- “Brian Tracy?.
Stephen Covey quadrants are simply a matrix, a model composed of four sections, each of which represents a certain priority category in tasks, while each quadrant includes a set of activities that must be managed differently.
Imagine a cross. When drawing it, four empty spaces appear, each of which is one of Stephen Covey’s quadrants, above, on the left, it is the first quadrant, it corresponds to everything that has two characteristics: urgent and important.
In this space are all the tasks that cannot and should not be moved, it is really a priority, it is the only thing that matters more than the rest, you have to do it immediately, leaving aside any other activity, until it is resolved.
In this quadrant you will find situations such as a power outage in the house, much depends on it, so you can not postpone, situations such as illness, a domestic accident, etc. , are also part of this space.
Stephen Covey’s second quadrant is everything that does not need to be treated immediately, but which is of great importance; in other words, which is important, not urgent. They are activities that are not decisive in the short term, but in the medium and long term.
In this quadrant are all those tasks that are not cases of life or death, but that are decisive for quality of life or well-being. The first is health. It all depends on health and it’s important to take care of it, the effects of not taking care of your health appear over time and can be devastating.
In this space there are also other tasks such as preparing the final exams of a class or maintaining a good relationship, we can include other aspects such as training or updating knowledge, etc.
It’s one of Stephen Covey’s most deceptive quadrants. Sometimes it is not easy to determine what these activities are and/or tasks because urgency catches the eye. In the end, however, it is irrelevant.
In this quadrant we can find all these superfluous activities that are carried out by custom or by chance. For example, meeting someone and chatting for a while, not knowing exactly why; Join a discussion on social media about an unimportant aspect.
In Stephen Covey’s fourth quadrant, we can put anything that’s useless, not urgent, or more relevant. Still, they are activities that absorb some of our time.
In this quadrant we place tasks that are absolutely irrelevant, such as checking emails every five minutes, following a conversation on social media where there are no important things to say, watch TV, talk, etc.
Most people who draw Stephen Covey’s quadrangular matrix and try to apply it find that the first full quadrants are 1 and 3. That is, important and urgent emergency quadrants that are urgent and not important.
Covey says it’s because people tend to think everything is urgent; this sense of urgency is precisely what underlies stress, so learning how to manage these two spaces can help us improve time management.
The author of this model recommends focusing particularly on Quadrant 2 and says that’s where well-being and happiness reside If we can clearly identify what needs to be put into this space and focus on its realization, Stephen Covey’s quadrant model will have met its goal. Objective.