Urgency – Importance Matrix (UIM)

Our newly introduced inventive tool is an effective instrument for task prioritization. It is based on the process of Urgency – Importance Matrix (UIM) in conjunction with Round – Robin Ranking (RRR).

Eisenhower’s UIM decision matrix is driven by very clear and effective concepts:

• If everything is urgent, then everything loses its urgency.
• If everything is important then nothing is most important.

The matrix is shown below:

Urgency and Importance are the coordinates of the space. There is no regular separation of the axes by continuous values, just binary separation: “yes” or “no”, “Urgent” and “Not Urgent”, “Important” and “Not Important”.

The Right top field corresponds to “Urgent & Important” tasks.
Tasks that are Urgent and Important at the same time will fall into this category. For example, addressing safety or quality issues. These tasks receive the highest priority: “Do First”.

The left top field corresponds to “Important & Not Urgent” tasks.
For example, projects aiming to improve production yield, reduce cost or improve the reliability of the product. According to UIM, all tasks that fall into this category are getting priority: “Do Later”.

The right bottom field corresponds to “Urgent & Not Important” tasks.
For example, participate in a meeting where you are not a decision-maker. It is urgent because the meeting is scheduled to start in 30 minutes, but the importance is zero since you cannot impact the decision-making process. UIM recommends delegating such tasks – “Delegate”.

The left bottom field corresponds to “Not Urgent & Not Important” tasks.
For example, some tasks that are not impacting your current status or the status of your activity at work. Such as analyzing daylight saving impact on some production parameters. Simply drop such tasks, eliminate the tasks or the projects that fall into this category – “Eliminate”.

Our proposed approach of Urgency and Importance designation rules are summarized in the table below:

How our UIM application is working?

1. Go to the ONLINE PLATFORM by clicking any of the orange buttons: ONLINE PLATFORM

2. Sign up or Sign in. All of your projects will be saved and accessible to you and only you under your account.

3. Click “New Project” button, insert the project title and click the “Create” button to create your new project.

4. Fill in project details: a brief description of your project and Problem Statement in the relevant fields and click the “Next”.

5. Click the “+New” button and choose “Urgency -Importance Matrix”. By clicking the “Use” button you will be navigated to the UIM work page.

6. Add your tasks one-by-one using the button “Create Task.”

7. When the list is completed start analyzing the tasks, click the arrow of “Flaw Expectancy” and choose one of the options “Expected” or “Unexpected”. Click on the arrow of “Flow Cost” and choose “High” or “Low”. The priority recommendation (“Do First”, “Do later”, “Delegate” or “Drop”) will appear in the right column

8. When all your tasks assignments is completed, click the “Complete” button. The system will navigate you to the summary table

9. In case there are more than 2 tasks under the same priority, the tasks can be additionally ranked with the Round Robin Ranking tool that we already discussed.

10. The results of the ranking will be available in the final report.

Click on any of the orange buttons to LOGIN and start using the UIM tool.

Additional information can be achieved by our blog How to Manage Tasks Priority with Urgency – Importance Matrix (UIM)? and How to define urgency and importance of tasks when prioritizing?

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