Prioritizing Your Projects

When managing projects, it is easy to become overwhelmed - especially when you are managing multiple projects at once. The most important part of managing many projects is to look at the projects, determine which projects are the most important, and assign a priority to each task of each project. How do you determine the most important project? That's where the tips below come in.

The first question to ask yourself when managing multiple projects, is "Who is this project for?" Sometimes, in addition to work projects we manage personal projects in addition to work responsibilities. Freelancers manage both personal and client projects all the time. Intuition would have you believe that it is best to work on any work-related projects first, before tackling any personal projects. This is sometimes true, but before you decide, it is important that you ask yourself what the goals involved of your personal projects are. Some time management experts recommend that you spend an hour a day, at the start of your workday on projects that move personal goals forward so that your goals don't dissipate over time.

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Now, the reason you may feel as though you're constantly working to put out fires is that you have been focusing in the "Urgent but not important" quadrant of the urgent important matrix. This is the fastest way to get burnout at your job. Other times, those not urgent and not important tasks and projects (such as checking Facebook page) often tend to get our immediate attention. You should really focus on urgent and important tasks, and not urgent but important tasks each day. Take a look now at the projects you and your company are working on. Are any of those "Not urgent and not important?" Eliminate those if you can (if you can't, they receive the lowest priority). Are there projects that are important, but not urgent that are receiving attention? These should receive attention at least once a day. Urgent, but not important projects should be delegated, if possible, to those for whom the project is important. And of course, urgent and important projects are those you work on now.

Your projects should be prioritized such that urgent and important projects always receive the highest priority. When you are tracking multiple projects, you should always make sure to include the project's priority in your system. Important but not urgent projects should come next in priority, except for those (should be very few) urgent but not important projects, that you could not delegate or hold off on. Not urgent and not important projects shouldn't even be initiated, but if they have, then they receive the lowest priority. You should now be able to easily understand prioritizing projects and how to manage multiple projects as well as what tasks your team members should be working on at any given time.