This template offers a simple but useful time management tool you can use to create a hierarchy of tasks based on how important and urgent they are. By offering a pre-structured spreadsheet, it helps you distribute work better while ensuring that the most critical tasks get the most immediate attention.
The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.
– Stephen Corvey
From business development to self-care, there comes a point in life when you simply have to make a list. Putting things to-do on a list (or better yet, a live spreadsheet) not only frees your mind, but it also helps you organize your time in a way that the most critical tasks come first and the least rewarding ones are left on the back burner. After all, no one has the time, resources, or frankly, the energy to do everything in one day.
Now, if managing your time doesn’t come to you naturally, there’s no need to panic. All you need is a simple prioritization tool to help you filter out the ‘worthy’ tasks from the less worthy ones. One popular way of doing this is the Eisenhower Matrix – a simple but effective time management tool used to create a hierarchy of tasks based on how important and urgent they are (trust us, they are not the same thing, but more on that later!).
What’s an Eisenhower Matrix?
In a typical Eisenhower Matrix, you sort your tasks into four quadrants. The goal is to improve your time management, distribute work better, and ensure your most critical work commitments get the right amount of attention at the right time by the right people!
In our editable spreadsheet, each task is defined, categorized by nature, assigned a deadline, and most importantly, marked as either important, urgent, both, or neither. Once your task inventory is fleshed out, we automatically place each task into one of four categories: (a) Urgent & Important; (b) Not urgent but important; (c) Urgent but not important, and (d) Neither urgent nor important.
By offering a pre-structured template that saves you hours in research & design work, our template helps you focus on critical activities, delegate less important ones, and eliminate non-essential tasks, leading to more focused action and delegation. We also identify corresponding work strategies you will need to handle different types of tasks: Do/Schedule/Delegate/Eliminate.
Now, let’s dive into our template in a bit more detail:
How Our Template Works
Are you looking for a premade spreadsheet to help you organize your workload? In our template, we use a grid-style view that makes it easy for you to see all of your task-related information at a glance. Unlock effortless planning by focusing on the most critical tasks first.
Use these simple steps to pursue any professional or life goal with our free, 100% customizable template:
Step 1: Compile a task list
First things first, create a list of everything you need to do. Our template also allows you to categorize tasks by nature.
Use the separate configuration sheet we have provided to customize this Category List to the kind of activities you are invested in!
Total vs. completed tasks
At the top-left of the mainsheet, we use doughnut charts to give you a quick and easy breakdown of how many tasks (of each priority level) you are done with, and how many are still in the works. This easily-digestible information can be helpful for project managers as it indicates how much work you still have left, and what category of tasks to focus on.
Step 2: Categorize tasks like Eisenhower would!
After having a good think about what you need to do, you will end up with a list of tasks of mixed urgency and importance. At this point, use our drop-downs to decide if a task is important, urgent, or some combination of both.
Once you flesh out basic details for each task (such as type of task, deadline, and level of urgency or importance), we automatically create four lists for you in Column L, N, P and R.
Each of these columns contains tasks prioritized at the same level. For example, all tasks where you selected ‘Yes’ under Importance (Column F) and Urgency (Column G) will be listed in Column L (Do First). Tasks appearing at the top of the list are ones due sooner, and as you move down the list, tasks become less time-urgent.
Deadline tracker
Our built-in calendar lets you assign a specific deadline to each specific task. As you can see, at the top-right of the spreadsheet, we have a protected cell with today’s calendar date. This helps our template give you a day-wise round-up of what to do/prioritize on a given working day.
If a deadline passes, and your task is still in the works, our template will automatically inform you that the task is ‘Overdue’ in Column J in red font so you can be quickly alerted to missed task deadlines at a glance. All tasks you have already finished will be crossed out and appear in black font.
Step 3: Take responsive & strategic action
Based on all this information, our template classifies tasks into four different categories while also pointing to the kind of action strategy you will need in response to each. Now, you might think urgent and important are the same thing, but think again! While urgency refers to the temporal necessity of a task- that is, how soon it needs to be checked off the list – ‘importance ’ is more to do with the relationship of each task to the broader, overall goals you are trying to achieve.
In the next section, we sum up the Eisenhower principle for you as understood and applied in our template:
| Nature of Task | Action |
|---|---|
| Urgent & Important | Do First |
| Not Urgent but Important | Schedule |
| Urgent but NOT Important | Delegate |
| Neither Urgent nor Important | Eliminate |
Action bar chart
Right at the top of our main spreadsheet, there is a quick Action-Wise Breakdown in the form of a bar chart. This chart tells you the total number of each type of task in terms of the corresponding actions recommended for each. All changes made in the main sheet are automatically reflected & updated here in real-time. The purpose behind using these action categories is to make it intuitively easier for users to guide their future efforts in a more results-driven direction.
Use Our Template to Define Today’s Agenda
The ultimate winning feature of our template is a daily to-do list you can access in the last column of our spreadsheet.
All your tasks, regardless of what level of priority they are at, will be found on this list (so it’s definitely a bit of a scroll).
But how do we organize this list in terms of which tasks appear first? Our template uses task deadlines and assigned priority levels to determine which tasks appear first on the list. For instance, a ‘Do First’ task with an imminent deadline will be top of the list. This allows you to focus your energy & time on tasks that matter the most.
Note that only Do First tasks that fall under the status category of ‘Not Started’ (Column) will appear in red font.
Tasks (of any priority level) that are still ‘In Progress’ will appear in yellow font while tasks that are still on hold will appear in Pink. These colors reflect the color-coded system we use to nail down the current status of each individual task under Column E (see below).
Now, let’s explore the different types of tasks falling under each quadrant and how you can strategically work your way around each:
1. Urgent and important (do first)
These are tasks that require your immediate attention and are vital to your success. They are also the easiest ones to spot as they are the ones you (or your manager) are most stressed about. These tasks can lead to burnout or major delays if not delivered on time.
The best way to distinguish these tasks is simply asking yourself: Will there be any major negative consequences if you don’t finish these tasks within a certain timeframe, say, by day end? If the answer to that was a loud & clear yes, then this is where that task belongs.
Here are some examples:
- Completing a critical project deadline
- Handling an urgent client request
- Fixing a busted pipe in your apartment
- Reviewing an important document for your manager
2. Not urgent but important (schedule)
But not every task that matters needs to be done right away. What about tasks that contribute to long-term goals but do not really need an immediate action or response from you? If you are a project manager, the best way to deal is schedule them for a later time but always follow up regularly to avoid any last-minute pressure & time-crunch!
Quote of the Day“I have two kinds of problems, the urgent and the important. The urgent are not important, and the important are never urgent.”
– Dwight D. Eisenhower
This is arguably the ‘safest’ quadrant for you to be in as it gives you just enough room to work on things at your own pace while also contributing to your project’s growth or success in a significant way.
Here are more examples of the kind of tasks we thought best fit the bill:
- Planning an extension of a project
- Building strategic partnerships with potential business partners
- Enrolling for a professional development course
3. Urgent but not important (delegate)
Think of tasks that require quick action, say, getting back to an email that requires a quick reply, but the content isn’t critical or time-sensitive or directly contributes to the broader goals you are pursuing. These tasks are usually time-consuming and should (ideally) be delegated to other team members, automated when possible or outsourced to an external agency.
Remember, delegating tasks is one of the most efficient ways to manage your workload and optimize workflow. Keep track of delegated tasks by e-mail, telephone, or in-person meetings to follow up on progress made. Examples of tasks that are probably best delegated are:
- Attending non-critical meetings
- Responding to non-client emails
- Completing menial tasks like restocking office supplies
- Transcribing meeting notes
4. Not urgent and not important (eliminate)
These tasks do not add any value to the project and are a waste of time. They are best seen as distractions or attempts at procrastinating that often leave you feeling unfulfilled or unproductive. For example,
- Sharing status approvals
- Attending unnecessary meetings
- Unnecessary use of social media during working hours
- Surfing the internet without a reason
- Avoidance activities like organizing emails instead of answering them
Because these non-essential tasks end up draining your energy or resources without any positive returns, it’s best to cut them out entirely. It’s common to eliminate these types of tasks first (that is, before mapping out the rest of your task list), as this speeds up the prioritization process, freeing up time for more productive pursuits.
Status Checker
No matter how urgent or trivial, every task comes with a deadline. Whether you work in HR or want to report to the board every month, keeping track of your activities is the key to the successful and timely round-off of every project or activity.
In our template, we use a color-coded system where you can check the status of each task using four default options:
- Not Started
- In Progress
- Completed
- On hold
If you want to customize this list, we also provide a configuration sheet so you can add, replace, or remove categories to suit your own project needs, organisational or individual context.
How Can You Benefit from Our Template?
- If you are managing a complex project, you can use our template to prioritize tasks, allocate resources effectively, and meet deadlines.
- For team leaders and supervisors, a template like this helps you organize daily workloads and improve efficiency in task execution.
- Senior executives and business owners can use it to focus on strategic decision-making and high-impact activities while delegating operational tasks to subordinates or external agencies.
- Freelancers and entrepreneurs can use it to manage work responsibilities independently and avoid distractions.
- If you are consulting for multiple clients, this template can help you structure your workflow and optimize productivity while handling multiple clients.
What’s Our Template For?
- To facilitate effective task prioritization by distinguishing between what is urgent and what is essential.
- Improve time management by ensuring that crucial project activities are addressed first, helping you prevent project bottlenecks.
- Prevent burnout and inefficiency by helping individuals focus on meaningful work rather than being overwhelmed by trivial tasks.
- Enhance decision-making by providing a clear framework for determining which tasks to complete, delegate, schedule, or eliminate.
- Boost productivity by encouraging a proactive rather than reactive approach to project execution.
Wrap Up
Whether you are a busy project lead who wants to optimize your team’s workflow or someone looking to add a bit of regimen & discipline to their personal lifestyle, the Eisenhower Matrix can be used by anyone who wants to make the most of their time by focusing on what really matters.
Remember, with this template, we only use 2 variables to categorize & prioritize tasks, but these variables are by no means the only determining factors out there. For example, in our Task Prioritization Matrix, we use other defining variables, such as the impact of an action and the effort needed to complete it. You can also use variables like money and risk to determine priority.
Grab our free Eisenhower Matrix template to boost your productivity so you achieve your work or life goals in less time.
