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118      <p class="eyebrow">Guide</p>
119      <h1>What is the Eisenhower Matrix?</h1>
120      <p class="lead">The Eisenhower Matrix is a simple way to prioritise tasks by asking two questions about each one: <strong>is it urgent, and is it important?</strong> The answers place every task in one of four quadrants: <strong>Do First</strong> (urgent and important), <strong>Schedule</strong> (important, not urgent), <strong>Delegate</strong> (urgent, not important) and <strong>Backlog</strong> (neither). Each quadrant comes with a default action, so the matrix tells you not just what matters but what to do next.</p>
121      <p class="meta"><span>Updated <time datetime="2026-09-28">28 September 2026</time></span><a href="/tr/eisenhower-matrisi/" hreflang="tr" lang="tr">Türkçe</a></p>
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123
124    <div class="wrap layout">
125      <nav class="toc" aria-labelledby="toc-title"><h2 id="toc-title">On this page</h2><ol><li><a href="#quadrants">The four quadrants</a></li><li><a href="#origin">Where the name comes from</a></li><li><a href="#decide">Urgent or important?</a></li><li><a href="#checklist">A 30-second checklist</a></li><li><a href="#examples">Worked examples</a></li><li><a href="#routine">A simple daily routine</a></li><li><a href="#mistakes">Common mistakes</a></li><li><a href="#todoist">The Eisenhower Matrix in Todoist</a></li></ol></nav>
126      <article>
127        <section id="quadrants">
128          <h2>The four quadrants</h2>
129          <p>The matrix is a two-by-two grid. Urgency runs across the top, importance down the side. The colours below are the ones <a href="/features/">Eisenhower Matrix for Todoist</a> uses for each quadrant.</p>
130      <div class="matrix" role="group" aria-label="The Eisenhower Matrix: four quadrants by urgency and importance">
131        <span class="axis corner" aria-hidden="true"></span>
132        <span class="axis axis-top" aria-hidden="true">Urgent</span>
133        <span class="axis axis-top" aria-hidden="true">Not urgent</span>
134        <span class="axis axis-side" aria-hidden="true">Important</span>
135        <div class="cell do"><span class="cell-axis">Urgent · Important</span><strong class="cell-title">Do First</strong><p class="cell-action">Do it now, one at a time.</p><ul><li>A client deliverable due today</li><li>A bug that blocks customers</li><li>A bill due tomorrow</li></ul></div>
136        <div class="cell schedule"><span class="cell-axis">Not urgent · Important</span><strong class="cell-title">Schedule</strong><p class="cell-action">Give it a date or a time block.</p><ul><li>Planning next quarter</li><li>Exercise and health check-ups</li><li>Writing the proposal before it is due</li></ul></div>
137        <span class="axis axis-side" aria-hidden="true">Not important</span>
138        <div class="cell delegate"><span class="cell-axis">Urgent · Not important</span><strong class="cell-title">Delegate</strong><p class="cell-action">Hand it off, batch it, or say no.</p><ul><li>Meetings where you only listen</li><li>Routine requests and forms</li><li>Ordering supplies, booking travel</li></ul></div>
139        <div class="cell backlog"><span class="cell-axis">
139Not urgent · Not important</span><strong class="cell-title">Backlog</strong><p class="cell-action">Drop it, or park it for later.</p><ul><li>Reorganising files that work fine</li><li>“Someday” ideas</li><li>Aimless scrolling</li></ul></div>
140      </div>
141          <h3><span class="q-tag do">Do First</span>: urgent and important</h3>
142          <p>These tasks have a near deadline and a real cost if they slip: a client deliverable due today, a bug that blocks users, a bill that is due. Do them now, one at a time. If this quadrant is always full, that is a sign that Schedule work is being left until it turns into an emergency.</p>
143          <h3><span class="q-tag schedule">Schedule</span>: important, not urgent</h3>
144          <p>This is where most long-term value lives: planning the week, writing the proposal before it is due, exercise, learning, fixing the process that keeps breaking. Nothing forces these tasks to happen, so give them a date or a time block. Many people find the matrix worth using mainly because it makes this quadrant visible.</p>
145          <h3><span class="q-tag delegate">Delegate</span>: urgent, not important</h3>
146          <p>These tasks feel pressing because someone is waiting, but they do not advance your own goals: many meetings, routine requests, some messages. Hand them to someone better placed, automate them, batch them into one short slot, or say no. If you work alone, “delegate” often means “do it quickly and with minimum effort”.</p>
147          <h3><span class="q-tag backlog">Backlog</span>: neither urgent nor important</h3>
148          <p>Ideas, someday items and low-value busywork. Keep them out of your daily list. Review the backlog now and then: promote what has become important and delete the rest. Deleting is a valid outcome.</p>
149        </section>
150
151        <section id="origin">
152          <h2>Where the name comes from</h2>
153          <p>The method is named after Dwight D. Eisenhower. In a 1954 speech he said, quoting a former college president, that he had two kinds of problems, the urgent and the important, and that the urgent are not important and the important are never urgent. Stephen Covey later turned the idea into a two-by-two “time management matrix” in <em>The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People</em> (1989). That grid is what most people now call the Eisenhower Matrix, the Eisenhower Box or the urgent–important matrix.</p>
154        </section>
155
156        <section id="decide">
157          <h2>How to tell urgent from important</h2>
158          <p>The two axes are independent, and mixing them up is the most common reason the matrix stops helping. Ask them separately.</p>
159          <dl>
160            <dt>Urgent is about time.</dt>
161            <dd>A task is urgent if waiting has a cost soon: it has a hard deadline in the next day or two, or something breaks if it is not done. “Someone asked for it” is not the same as “it is urgent”.</dd>
162            <dt>Important is about outcomes.</dt>
163            <dd>A task is important if it contributes to your goals, your responsibilities or your values, whoever asked for it. How loud a task is says nothing about its importance.</dd>
164          </dl>
165          <div class="callout tip"><span class="callout-title">When in doubt, the answer is no</span><p>If you hesitate on either question, treat the answer as “no”. That keeps Do First small, which is the point: a short Do First list is one you can actually finish.</p></div>
166        </section>
167
168        <section id="checklist">
169          <h2>A 30-second decision checklist</h2>
170          <p>Run each task through these questions, in order. Most tasks are decided by the second one.</p>
171          <ul class="checks">
172            <li><strong>Is there a real deadline in the next day or two, with a cost if it slips?</strong> If yes, it is urgent.</li>
173            <li><strong>Does it move a goal, a commitment, your health or a relationship forward?</strong> If yes, it is important.</li>
174            <li><strong>Would you still do it if nobody asked?</strong> If yes, that is another sign it is important.</li>
175            <li><strong>Could someone else do it well enough?</strong> If it is urgent but not important, that is a Delegate task.</li>
176            <li><strong>Would anyone notice in a month if it disappeared?</strong> If not, it belongs in the Backlog, or in the bin.</li>
177          </ul>
178        </section>
179
180        <section id="examples">
181          <h2>Worked examples</h2>
182          <p>The same kind of task can land in different quadrants depending on its deadline and why it matters to you. These are typical calls.</p>
183          <div class="table-wrap">
184            <table>
185              <thead><tr><th scope="col">Task</th><th scope="col">Urgent?</th><th scope="col">Important?</th><th scope="col">Quadrant and action</th></tr></thead>
186              <tbody>
187                <tr><td>Fix the report a client needs by 5 pm today</td><td>Yes, today</td><td>Yes, a commitment</td><td>
187<span class="q-tag do">Do First</span>: do it now</td></tr>
188                <tr><td>Checkout is failing for customers</td><td>Yes</td><td>Yes</td><td><span class="q-tag do">Do First</span>: drop other work</td></tr>
189                <tr><td>Draft next quarter’s plan, due in three weeks</td><td>Not yet</td><td>Yes</td><td><span class="q-tag schedule">Schedule</span>: block two hours this week</td></tr>
190                <tr><td>Book the dentist check-up you keep postponing</td><td>No</td><td>Yes, health</td><td><span class="q-tag schedule">Schedule</span>: pick a date now</td></tr>
191                <tr><td>A weekly status meeting where you only listen</td><td>It starts at 10:00</td><td>Low</td><td><span class="q-tag delegate">Delegate</span>: ask for the notes instead</td></tr>
192                <tr><td>A colleague asks you to find a file they could search for</td><td>It feels urgent</td><td>Not for your goals</td><td><span class="q-tag delegate">Delegate</span>: point them to the folder</td></tr>
193                <tr><td>Reply to a newsletter survey</td><td>No</td><td>No</td><td><span class="q-tag backlog">Backlog</span>: skip or delete</td></tr>
194                <tr><td>Reorganise your browser bookmarks</td><td>No</td><td>No</td><td><span class="q-tag backlog">Backlog</span>: leave it; revisit monthly</td></tr>
195              </tbody>
196            </table>
197          </div>
198          <p>Notice the Schedule rows. They are the tasks that quietly turn into Do First emergencies if they never get a date.</p>
199        </section>
200
201        <section id="routine">
202          <h2>A simple daily routine</h2>
203          <ol class="steps">
204            <li><h3>Collect</h3><p>Get every open task into one list, the one you already use.</p></li>
205            <li><h3>Sort</h3><p>Put each task in a quadrant. Decide quickly; you can move it later.</p></li>
206            <li><h3>Act by quadrant</h3><p>Work through Do First, give Schedule tasks a date, hand off or batch Delegate tasks, and leave the Backlog alone.</p></li>
207            <li><h3>Review every morning</h3><p>Look at what carried over from yesterday, re-sort anything that changed, and pick the two or three tasks that matter most today.</p></li>
208            <li><h3>Prune every week</h3><p>Open Delegate and Backlog. Delete what no longer matters and promote what has become important.</p></li>
209          </ol>
210        </section>
211
212        <section id="mistakes">
213          <h2>Common mistakes</h2>
214          <ul>
215            <li><strong>Everything is Do First.</strong> If more than a handful of tasks are urgent and important, you are rating urgency by feeling. Re-check the deadlines.</li>
216            <li><strong>Confusing urgent with important.</strong> A ringing phone is urgent, not automatically important. Loud tasks tend to crowd out valuable ones.</li>
217            <li><strong>Never scheduling Schedule.</strong> Important-but-not-urgent tasks without a date quietly become urgent later. Give them a slot.</li>
218            <li><strong>Treating Delegate as “someone else’s problem”.</strong> A delegated task still needs a clear owner and a follow-up.</li>
219            <li><strong>Hoarding the backlog.</strong> A backlog that only grows becomes noise. Prune it.</li>
220            <li><strong>Sorting once and never again.</strong> Priorities change as deadlines approach. The matrix works when it is reviewed, ideally every day.</li>
221            <li><strong>Keeping the matrix apart from your to-do list.</strong> A matrix on paper or a whiteboard drifts out of date within days. It works best on top of the list you already use.</li>
222          </ul>
223        </section>
224
225        <section id="todoist">
226          <h2>The Eisenhower Matrix in Todoist</h2>
227          <p>If your tasks already live in Todoist, you don’t need a second list. <a href="/">Eisenhower Matrix for Todoist</a> is a web app that connects to your Todoist account and puts the matrix on top of the tasks you already have:</p>
228          <ul>
229            <li><strong>Your Todoist tasks, in four quadrants.</strong> Nothing is imported or copied; the app reads your tasks live from Todoist.</li>
230            <li><strong>Sorting is saved in Todoist.</strong> Each task’s quadrant is an ordinary Todoist label (<code>do</code>, <code>schedule</code>, <code>delegate</code> or <code>backlog</code>), so you see it in the Todoist apps too.</li>
231            <li><strong>The routine above, built in.</strong> A morning daily review, a Today’s focus list of up to three tasks, Single Task Focus with a Pomodoro t
231imer, and focus statistics.</li>
232          </ul>
233      <figure>
234        <a class="shot" href="/assets-static/img/clean-matrix-view.webp"><img src="/assets-static/img/clean-matrix-view.webp" width="1440" height="898" alt="Eisenhower Matrix for Todoist, Clean view: Todoist tasks in Do First, Schedule, Delegate and Backlog, grouped by Late, Today and This week." loading="lazy" decoding="async"></a>
235        <figcaption>The Clean view of Eisenhower Matrix for Todoist, with demo tasks. Urgent is on the left, important on top.</figcaption>
236      </figure>
237          <p>Read the <a href="/todoist-eisenhower-matrix/">step-by-step guide to using the Eisenhower Matrix with Todoist</a>, browse <a href="/features/">every feature</a>, or check the <a href="/faq/">FAQ</a> for pricing and data questions.</p>
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