How to figure out priority for tasks, from Terry Matlin's book, Survival Tips for Women with ADHD

I learned of a new way to figure out priority for tasks.


You need a table with three skinny columns, and a wide column. I just drew lines on the page in my 3 by 5 notebook.


Then label the columns as value, urgency, priority, and the wide one is the task list.
Value is how important is the task, gets a number between 1, most important, & 4, less important. Urgency is how soon does the task need to happen, use same 1-4 scale, with 1, soonest, and 4, last.


To get priority, multiply the value number by the urgency number. This will result in a number between 1 & 16.


The instructions I saw for this process said to rewrite the list by ordering all the ones together, then the twos, and so on. I am too stingy with paper and refuse to do that when I can just look down the list at the priority column to see if there's any more ones etc.
My list had 8 ones, one two, two fours, one six, and an eight. I still have four ones, two of which are appointments so will happen at specific times, one of the fours, and the six. Five items done and I feel good about it. And, like I'm getting the important things done first, rather than haphazardly tackling things and not getting any of them done.


Yay for working smarter not harder!