How to Prioritize Tasks: 10 Techniques to Regain Control of Your Time

The modern workplace is constantly evolving to meet the needs of both clients and employees. You can find yourself pulled in many directions, with numerous priorities demanding your attention. 

It’s understandable if you are feeling overwhelmed. Don’t worry; it’s normal. In this article, we will share some coping mechanisms and useful tips that will help you manage workload and meet deadlines. If done right, you will save everyone involved a great deal of time.

Yes, some tools can make the process smoother. They come with built-in features that help you out. However, you still need a system for when you’re away from the software. That’s what we aim to provide in this article.

Why Task Prioritization Techniques Are Important

Here’s a secret: not all tasks are created equal. Some are urgent, others may be important, and then there are those that are neither. You need to decide which is which. The strategies we will discuss in the article will help you do just that. This prevents you from getting bogged down in low-value tasks while helping you identify which tasks need to be taken care of ASAP and which ones you can confidently say ‘no’ to.

The strategies become even more effective when combined with digital tools like Gem Team. This corporate messenger offers secure real-time communication—such as group chats, channels for sharing important information, and video conferences with screen sharing—which helps facilitate effective task prioritization. 

How to Prioritize Your Work and Why It Matters

You organize tasks by urgency, importance, or value. Clarity is essential here, as the process helps you answer questions like:

• What should I do next?

• What can wait?

• What’s just a distraction?

It’s very easy to let tasks pile up if you don’t know how to prioritize your work. If you fail to do so, your team will feel the effects of stress, and tasks will build up as deadlines are missed. In the next section, we’ll tell you how to do it properly.

How to Prioritize Effectively

The first unofficial step is to take a deep breath. Organizing your time can be frustrating if you’re already frazzled. So, once you’re settled, follow the steps outlined below to learn how to prioritize workload:

Step 1: List Your Tasks 

Write down everything on paper. Big or small, you need to list every single thing on the agenda. Whether it be emails that need to be sent or people you need to follow up with, everything goes into this.

Step 2: Choose the Right Task Prioritization Technique 

We haven’t listed the methods yet, but this is where you do it. This is a major part of how to prioritize workload, so match the task to the right method for maximum efficiency. 

Step 3: Add High-Priority Tasks to Your Calendar 

Once the list is categorized, set aside time for the most important things. Making a schedule for tasks makes them real. It draws lines. It keeps low-value work from taking up your whole day.

Step 4: Reassess and Adjust Regularly

Things change. What was important yesterday might not be important today. Look at your list of things to do every day or every week. Change duties as needed. Digital task boards can be useful here. And with Gem Team, you can stay flexible by coordinating through secure chats, group calls, and screen sharing, ensuring that everyone stays updated when priorities shift.

Benefits of Learning How to Prioritize Tasks at Work

Rank your tasks properly, and it will change the way you operate, whether you’re working solo or with a team. Here are some of the main reasons to stay focused on what really matters:

• Clear direction: You always know what to tackle next, wasting no mental energy.

• Higher impact: Important tasks finished first deliver stronger results for the team and clients.

• Less stress: A focused list calms the mind and reduces last‑minute panic.

• Efficient use of resources: Time, energy, and budget go to tasks with the best returns.

• Better deadlines: Prioritization prevents bottlenecks and keeps projects advancing on schedule.

• Improved quality: Attention centers on crucial work, allowing deeper focus and fewer mistakes.

• Increased accountability: Visible priorities make progress transparent and responsibilities obvious.

• Stronger motivation: Build momentum and boost team morale by ticking off tasks.

• Reduced multitasking: Multitasking is never a good idea. Give yourself a clear set of goals.

• Continuous growth: Routine priority reviews reveal patterns and support smarter future planning.

In summary, putting things in order of importance helps you work smarter, not harder. It makes things clear instead of chaotic, gives you the ability to act instead of being overwhelmed, and translates good intentions into measurable results.

How to Prioritize Tasks at Work: The 10 Best Techniques 

Now we’ll get into the meat of the article. We have listed ten efficient and effective techniques that will help you list tasks by priority very easily. So, without further ado, let’s learn how to manage time and prioritize tasks. 

1. Eisenhower Matrix 

This method is a visual aid. Basically, you create a grid like this:

Now, with this grid in place, fill in tasks that fit each category. For example, attending a meeting with a stakeholder is both urgent and important. Updating your supervisor is important, but not urgent. Giving a team member a task is urgent, but not important. Finally, cleaning up your workspace is neither urgent nor important (many people would disagree, but let’s go with it for the sake of example).

Focus on quadrant one to start with. Get those tasks out of the way first. Schedule quadrant two. You can get to those later. Delegate or ignore the rest. That’s how to prioritize a to do list.

2. Impact–Effort Matrix 

This is similar to the last one. Give each task a score based on how much work it will take and how much it will help. 

Put things that have a major impact and are easy to do at the top of your list. This quadrant’s tasks give value quickly. They’re your easy wins.

3. Cost–Value Matrix 

Commonly used in making new products. Figure out how much it will cost (time, money, and effort) compared to how much value it will bring. Example:

• Automating payroll: High cost, high value

• Posting on LinkedIn daily: Low cost, low value

Pick tasks that are cheap and useful. Put off or get rid of things that cost a lot but aren’t worth much. To support such decisions, you can rely on collaboration platforms like Gem Team, which help teams securely communicate and coordinate while discussing project priorities.

4. MoSCoW Method 

The title is just a name; this method focuses solely on task prioritization. Here’s a breakdown:

• Must have: Things that absolutely need to be done at any cost.

• Should have: Things that should be done, and completing them would be beneficial.

• Could have: Things that you could get to when other things are out of the way.

• Won’t have: Things you don’t need to do. Maybe later. If at all.

This method suits team-based work. It aligns everyone on what’s essential.

5. ABCDE Method

The alphabet method is a good way of prioritizing. While it works in a similar way to the last method, it adds some simplicity and flexibility. Below is a breakdown.

• A: Must do tasks. Not doing these will have serious consequences. An example could be a stakeholder meeting.

• B: Tasks you should do. There will be mild consequences to not doing them, for instance, looping your team members into changes in the plan.

• C: Tasks that are nice to do but offer no consequences if not done. Think bringing a coffee to a supervisor or coworker.

• D: D stands for delegate. It’s not worth your time. Give it to someone else. Maybe get an intern to make the call instead.

• E: E means eliminate. Tasks like these have no value to the overall functioning of the company. Remove them from your list.

As you can imagine, you need to start with A tasks first and work your way down the alphabet. Bonus points if you sing the alphabet song while doing this.

6. Scrum Prioritization (Value-Based)

Agile teams use this to prioritize tasks during project management. They put tasks in order of importance depending on their value to the business and the goals of the sprint. Over time, backlogs change. Being flexible is very important. Example:

• Feature A gets 5 votes and solves a key pain point → Do it first

• Feature B is cool, but no one asked for it → Push back

Gem Team supports team collaboration with secure messaging, calls, and screen sharing, helping agile teams stay connected and aligned as priorities evolve.

7. The Ivy Lee Method

This method is unique in that it begins at the end of your workday. It’s literally the last thing you do before you clock out. Here’s how it works:

• List six important tasks for tomorrow.

• Rank them by priority.

• Start with number one.

• Do not move on until it’s done.

This is a good way to start getting locked into your checklist and feeling productive. Also, you get the night before and the commute to work to psych yourself up to meet those deadlines. Example:

• Draft investor report

• Follow up on payment

• Review analytics

• Schedule team sync

• Plan marketing post

• Clear inbox

It creates a laser focus and stops you from chasing low-impact work. How do you prioritize your tasks? This is how.

8. Most Important Task (MIT) Method

Pick the most critical thing you need to do every morning. Before checking your emails or meetings, focus on it. It’s a method that requires a lot of discipline, and it’s good for both leaders and creative people. What makes this slightly better than the Ivy Lee method is that your attention isn’t split among six tasks. No, you only focus on one. There’s less to get overwhelmed by. And, if all else fails, at least you delivered that one critical project. That counts for something and makes your efforts feel meaningful.

9. 1–3–9 Prioritization Framework

This one is simple; you prioritize your goals into three categories. So, from your list, pick:

• 1 important task

• 3 medium tasks

• 9 small tasks

This gives you structure without being overwhelming. You know the order of importance, and dealing with tasks in line with their priority will give you a sense of accomplishment. Example:

• 1 Big: Design pitch deck

• 3 Medium: Fix bugs, onboard client, host call

• 9 Small: Slack replies, invoices, check server, etc.

It is a good way to make sure you stay on point.

10. Pareto Principle (80/20 Rule)

The Pareto Principle is a rule that has always worked for productivity. It says that 20% of the work leads to 80% of the results. This doesn’t have to be an exact ratio; it only signifies that a small part of what you do makes up most of your results.

Example: Imagine being on a marketing team that oversees ten campaigns. After looking over the data, you see that two of them are bringing in almost all the traffic and sales. Using the Pareto Principle, you would stop paying equal attention to all your campaigns and instead focus on making those two the best they can be by developing fresh ad text, A/B testing landing pages, and increasing your budget.

How to Prioritize Projects When You’re Managing a Team

Setting priorities for a team is challenging. There are a lot of things to keep track of, like deadlines, dependencies, and changing goals. This is how to make it easy:

1. First, make sure everyone knows what is most important. Is it speed? What about quality? Saving money? Even the smartest people can go after the wrong goals if they don’t have this insight. Have a meeting to kick things off. Talk about your objectives. Use collaboration tools like Gem Team to communicate securely and keep everyone aligned. This helps your team work toward the same thing.

2. Big goals can be hard to handle. Turn them into tiny chores that you can do. Let’s say you’re creating a new website. Divide it into wireframes, writing, design, testing, and launch. Make sure each step is clear.

3. Each member of the team adds something unique. Some people are good at fixing things at the last minute. Other people are great at making plans. Put people in charge of the jobs they do best. Let someone who is good with details do the testing and QA. Get someone who is quick and imaginative to come up with the campaign idea. Play to everyone’s strengths.

4. Not all tasks require the same amount of effort. Set aside time on your calendar for important tasks. Get your team members to do the same. Turn off notifications. Be respectful of those blocks.

5. Tasks can get stuck. The root cause isn’t always clear. Someone might be waiting for a response. Make it easy for your staff to bring up problems. Daily check-ins help with this, as do visual dashboards that show when things are moving slowly.

6. Plans evolve, things change, but don’t change the rules too often. It makes the squad feel bad. If you need to adapt your priorities, tell everyone why. Don’t just say that it’s “important.” Show how the objective of the business has changed. Use your task tool to adjust the order of your priorities in a clear way.

7. It’s not only about what gets done. It’s also about the way it gets done. When a hard job is finally completed, celebrate! Give the person who cleared it a cheer. Recognition makes people feel better and more motivated. Keep the momentum going by celebrating minor triumphs.

8. At the end of the week, look back at what was achieved. What worked? What didn’t? Perhaps one of your priorities took longer than you thought it would. Maybe someone had too much to do. Change your plan for next week based on that information.

Put the strategies we’ve outlined here to work, too. Pick one and stick with it for a week. Change your approach or double down depending on what works and what doesn’t.

How to Prioritize Workload When Managing Multiple Projects

Keeping track of several different projects at once is challenging. 

First things first: out of all the initiatives your team is working on, which ones are the most impactful and in line with your goals? Pay attention to that first. Since not every project is equally significant, it’s crucial to be forthright about which ones make a difference.

After that, set due dates and dependencies and divide projects into smaller jobs. Visual tools like Gantt charts and Kanban boards make it easy to identify conflicts and keep track of your work across tasks.

Remember to think about when your crew is available. When key players are stressed, they don’t do as well. If someone is too busy, don’t be afraid to give them less important jobs or even take them off the priority list.

Lastly, make reviewing your priorities a regular habit. Things change fast, so check in weekly to adjust deadlines and redistribute tasks. And always keep communication open—letting stakeholders know what’s taking priority keeps everyone aligned and reduces surprises.

With a clear overview and regular check-ins, you’ll learn how to prioritize workload with multiple projects on track without burning out.

Mistakes to Avoid When Prioritizing Tasks

Besides general pitfalls, learning how to prioritize your tasks often fails due to technical oversights. Here are several technical mistakes that can slow you down or cause inefficiencies:

1. Ignoring Task Dependencies and Deadlines

Prioritizing tasks without understanding dependencies creates bottlenecks. Map dependencies using tools like Gantt charts or Kanban boards. Prioritize tasks on the critical path to prevent delays.

2. Not Factoring in Resource Availability

Consider who is available before setting tasks and deadlines. Use resource management features in software like Jira.

3. Overlooking Task Effort and Complexity

Focusing only on importance or urgency can cause you to underestimate how long tasks take. Estimate effort using story points or time-based estimates. Balance quick wins with longer, high-impact projects.

4. Failing to Set Clear, Measurable Goals 

Vague tasks are hard to prioritize because their impact is unclear. Define SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-Bound) goals for tasks. Use these criteria to assess task value and urgency objectively.

5. Neglecting to Integrate Feedback Loops

Without revisiting and measuring outcomes, prioritization becomes guesswork. Regularly review progress and adjust priorities based on results. Use analytics or performance dashboards to guide future prioritization.

By avoiding these technical missteps, you can create a prioritization system that’s not only practical but also scalable and aligned with real-world constraints.

A Few Words in Closing

Now that you know how to manage time and prioritize tasks, it’s time to put it into practice. You won’t always do it perfectly. Some days, it will seem like there are a lot of things going on. However, with repetition, planning becomes second nature. You will start to see which chores are important and which ones merely waste time.

If you’re working with a team, it’s even more important to prioritize multiple tasks correctly. Missing a single deadline can create ripple effects throughout the project. Gem Team and other collaboration tools can help you stay connected, coordinate work securely, and ensure everyone is on the same page.