Eat That Frog!: 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time

by Brian Tracy

It is much better to plan your time carefully in advance and then build in a sizable buffer to compensate for unexpected delays and diversions. However much time you think a task will take, add on another 20 percent or more as insurance. Or make a game of getting the job done well in advance of the deadline.

You can use three questions on a regular basis to keep yourself focused on completing your most important tasks on schedule. The first question is, “What are my highest-value activities?” Put another way, what are the biggest frogs that you have to eat to make the greatest contribution to your organization? To your family? To your life in general?

The second question you can ask continually is, “What can I and only I do, that if done well, will make a real difference?”

The third question you can ask is, “What is the most valuable use of my time right now?” In other words, “What is my biggest frog of all at this moment?”

Make time for getting big tasks done every day. Plan your daily workload in advance. Single out the relatively few small jobs that absolutely must be done immediately in the morning. Then go directly to the big tasks and pursue them to completion.

Priorities versus Posteriorities Here is a key point. To set proper priorities, you must set posteriorities as well. A priority is something that you do more of and sooner, while a posteriority is something that you do less of and later, if at all.

Practice “zero-based thinking” in every part of your life. Ask yourself continually, “If I were not doing this already, knowing what I now know, would I start doing it again today?” If it is something you would not start again today, knowing what you now know, it is a prime candidate for abandonment or creative procrastination.

The first law of success is concentration—to bend all the energies to one point, and to go directly to that point, looking neither to the right nor to the left.

The ABCDE Method is a powerful priority setting technique that you can use every single day. This technique is so simple and effective that it can, all by itself, make you one of the most efficient and effective people in your field. Think on Paper The power of this technique lies in its simplicity. Here’s how it works: You start with a list of everything you have to do for the coming day. Think on paper. You then place an A, B, C, D, or E next to each item on your list before you begin the first task. An “A” item is defined as something that is very important, something that you must do. This is a task that will have serious positive or negative consequences if you do it or fail to do it, like visiting a key customer or finishing a report that your boss needs for an upcoming board meeting. These items are the frogs of your life. If you have more than one A task, you prioritize these tasks by writing “A-1,” “A-2,” “A-3,” and so on in front of each item. Your A-1 task is your biggest, ugliest frog of all.

A “B” item is defined as a task that you should do. But it has only mild consequences. These are the tadpoles of your work life. This means that someone may be unhappy or inconvenienced if you don’t do one of these tasks, but it is nowhere as important as an A task. Returning an unimportant telephone message or reviewing your e-mail would be a B task.

A “C” task is defined as something that would be nice to do but for which there are no consequences at all, whether you do it or not. C tasks include phoning a friend, having coffee or lunch with a coworker, and completing some personal business during work hours. These sorts of activities have no effect at all on your work life.

A “D” task is defined as something you can delegate to someone else. The rule is that you should delegate everything that someone else can do so you can free up more time for the A tasks that only you can do.

An “E” task is defined as something that you can eliminate altogether, and it won’t make any real difference. This may be a task that was important at one time but is no longer relevant to you or anyone else. Often it is something you continue to do out of habit or because you enjoy it. But every minute that you spend on an E task is ...

A key result area is defined as something for which you are completely responsible. If you don’t do it, it doesn’t get done. A key result area is an activity that is under your control. It produces an output that becomes an input or a contributing factor to the work of others.

Key result areas are similar to the vital functions of the body, such as those indicated by blood pressure, heart rate, respiratory rate, and brain-wave activity. An absence of any one of these vital functions leads to the death of the organism. By the same token, your failure to perform in a critical result area of your work can lead to the end of your job as well.

The key result areas of management are planning, organizing, staffing, delegating, supervising, measuring, and reporting.

The starting point of high performance is for you to identify the key result areas of your work. Discuss them with your boss. Make a list of your most important output responsibilities, and make sure that the people above you, on the same level as you, and below you are in agreement with it.

Rule: Your weakest key result area sets the height at which you can use all your other skills and abilities. This rule says that although you could be exceptional in six out of your seven key result areas, poor performance in the seventh area will hold you back and determine how much you achieve with all your other skills. This weakness will act as a drag on your effectiveness and be a constant source of friction and frustration.

The fact is that everybody has both strengths and weaknesses. Refuse to rationalize, justify, or defend your areas of weakness. Instead, identify them clearly. Set a goal and make a plan to become very good in each of those areas. Just think! You may be only one critical skill away from top performance at your job.

Here is one of the greatest questions you will ever ask and answer. “What one skill, if I developed and did it in an excellent fashion, would have the greatest positive impact on my career?”

Here is an exercise that we use with our coaching clients very early in the process. We give them a sheet of paper and then tell them, “In thirty seconds, write down your three most important goals in life right now.”

In 80 percent or more of cases, people have three goals in common: first, a financial and career goal; second, a family or personal relationship goal; and third, a health or fitness goal. And this is as it should be. These are the three most important areas of life.

Later in our coaching program, we expand this exercise by asking the following questions: 1. What are your three most important business or career goals right now? 2. What are your three most important family or relationship goals right now? 3. What are your three most important financial goals right now? 4. What are your three most important health goals right now? 5. What are your three most important personal and professional development goals right now? 6. What are your three most important social and community goals right now? 7. What are your three biggest problems or concerns in life right now?

Fully 85 percent of your happiness in life will come from happy relationships with other people, especially those closest to you, as well as the members of your family. The critical determinant of the quality of your relationships is the amount of time that you spend face-to-face with the people you love and who love you in return.

The purpose of time management—of eating that frog—and getting more done in less time is to enable you to spend more “face time” with the people you care about, doing the things that give you the greatest amount of joy in life.

Rule: It is the quality of time at work that counts and the quantity of tim...

To keep your life in balance, you should resolve to work all the time you work. When you go to work, put your head down and work the whole time. Start a little earlier, stay a little later, and work a little harder. Don’t waste time. Every minute that you spend in idle chitchat with coworkers is time taken away from the work that you must accomplish if you want to do well at your job.

By not working effectively and efficiently during your workday, you create unnecessary stress and deprive the members of your family of the very best person you can possibly be.

Your goal should be to perform at your very best at work—to get the very most done and enjoy the very highest level of rewards possible for you in your career. Simultaneously, you must always remember to “smell the flowers along the way.” Never lose sight of the real reasons why you work as hard as you do and why you are so determined to accomplish the very most with the time that you invest. The more time you spend face-to-face with the people you love, the happier you will be.

My personal rule is “Get it 80 percent right and then correct it later.” Run it up the flagpole and see if anyone salutes. Don’t expect perfection