What follows comes from Brian Tracy’s “21 Great Ways To Double Your Productivity - Number 5″ Podcast.

Everything you do throughout the day fits into one of four categories:

1. Urgent AND Important Tasks

You have to complete these tasks immediately. These are in your face. These are things like phone calls and meetings. You can’t put them off without causing serious problems.

These are the tasks on which people spend most of their time.

2. Important BUT NOT Urgent Tasks

According to Brian Tracy, completing these tasks will have the greatest possible long-term benefits in your life.

The tasks in this category include personal renewal, physical fitness and exercise, updating your skills, and spending time with your family.

You can put these tasks off until later; but don’t! Brian Tracy indicates you can change your life dramatically by working on these tasks.

And if you don’t get these Important but not Urgent tasks done now, they’ll eventually catch up to you as URGENT! These are things like term papers and reports for your boss.

3. Urgent but NOT Important Tasks

Included in this group are phone calls, talking with coworkers, who drop by, about non-work related stuff.

Brian Tracy expresses that these tasks will have no effect or negative effects on your success. This is not real work. This is busy work.

In fact, these kinds of tasks are great time- and career-wasters. Stay away from tasks in this area.

But even these aren’t the biggest time-wasters. The biggest time-wasters are:

4. Neither Urgent Nor Important

Don’t spend any time on these tasks. They’ll produce no results for you. At work, don’t read the newspaper, don’t surf the internet, and don’t call home to chit-chat. You’ll be wasting your company’s money and your time.

In Summary…

Start with the Urgent AND Important Tasks. Then go to the Important BUT NOT Urgent Tasks. Remember to stay away from all non-important work.

You should always be asking yourself: What are the potential long-term potential consequences of doing this task?

When you answer this question, you’ll know what to work on.