If everything in your business feels urgent and you can't tell which thing to touch first, this article is for you. Our short answer: before you hire, buy software or work later, sort the pile. Get it out of your head, give each item one of four letters, do only the few items that hurt if they wait, and tell the people waiting on you when they'll get an answer.
By the end you will have one page with every open item on it, four letters that decide what goes first, and a fourteen-day check that shows whether the pile is shrinking.
You can sort the whole pile in five moves, without hiring anyone
This section is the method: five moves, done in order. The first four fit in one sitting; the last one sets up a review fourteen days later. None of the moves needs a hire, new software or a new plan for the business.
1. Get every open item out of your head and onto one page
Do this. Set a timer for thirty minutes and write every open item on one page: tasks, decisions, replies you owe and worries. Don't sort, judge or fix anything while you write.
It worked when the timer ends and you can't think of an open item that isn't on the page.
Why. In studies by E. J. Masicampo and Roy Baumeister, unfinished goals caused intrusive thoughts during an unrelated reading task and poor performance on an unrelated anagram task 1. Letting participants make specific plans for their unfinished goals eliminated those effects 1. We read that as a reason to put the pile on paper before you try to clear any of it.
Example. The first step of David Allen's Getting Things Done method is to capture: "Write, record, or gather any and everything that has your attention into a collection tool" 2. In our view, the thirty-minute page is a one-sitting version of that capture step.
2. Give each line one of four letters, asked in a fixed order
Do this. Ask three questions of each line, in this order. If it can't wait until your review in fourteen days without someone getting hurt, or money or a deadline being lost, mark it H. If someone can't move until you answer, mark it W. If nothing would break if it didn't happen at all, mark it D. Mark everything else P.
It worked when every line on the page carries exactly one letter and you didn't stop to do any item while marking.
Why. We put harm first and people second because, in our view, an item that hurts if it waits should beat an item that only feels loud. Our rule of thumb is to letter every line before you do any of them, so you decide each line once instead of deciding the whole pile again every hour.
3. Do the H items first, one at a time, three at most
Do this. Rank the H items by which one hurts soonest. Do the top three, one at a time, before you touch any other letter, and leave any other H items at the top of the page.
It worked when your top three H items are done and you finished each one before you opened the next.
Why. In four experiments by Joshua Rubinstein, David Meyer and Jeffrey Evans, switching between tasks cost time, and the switching costs grew with the complexity of the rules involved 3. We read that as a reason to finish one H item before you open the next, rather than moving between them. Our rule of thumb is three H items before anything else, so the people behind the W items hear from you the same day.
Example. The FAA reminds pilots that they are taught an order of priorities from their earliest flight training: "Aviate, Navigate, and Communicate" 4. The FAA says the top priority is always to aviate, which means flying the airplane with the flight controls and instruments 4. In our view, your H items are the flying: the work that keeps the business in the air while the rest waits its turn.
4. Tell each person behind a W item when they'll get an answer
Do this. Send each person behind a W item one line that says when they will get your answer, and write that date next to the line on your page. If the person is on your team, ask them to send the answer they would choose, so you only approve or correct it.
It worked when every W line has a date beside it and each person on it has your message.
Why. In our view, a date turns a person who is chasing you into a person who is waiting for a known time. We also read each date as a specific plan for that item, the kind of plan the studies in the first move tested.
Example. The FAA says keeping control of the aircraft may mean delaying replies to air traffic control and passenger requests, "or not responding at all" 4. We read that as permission to make people wait on purpose while the H items are open, as long as they know when you'll get back to them.
5. Cross out the D items and park the P items until the review
Do this. Cross out every D line and send one line to whoever expects it, saying it won't happen. Copy the P lines onto a separate page, put it away, and set a reminder to review both pages in fourteen days.
It worked when your main page holds only H and W lines, the people behind the D lines have been told, and the review is in your calendar.
Why. Our rule of thumb is to park new ideas and nice-to-haves for a while before you act on them, because every change costs something before it pays. In our view, the time you free up gets filled by other people's requests unless you decide in advance what it is for, so pick one P item for that time at the review.
Example. Allen's second step is to clarify each item: if it is actionable, decide the next action; if not, "decide if it is trash, reference, or something to put on hold" 2. The method's fourth step is to review the system frequently "to regain control and focus" 2. The fourteen-day review is our version of that fourth step.
Urgent work can win your day even when it pays less
In a 1954 speech, Dwight D. Eisenhower quoted an unnamed former college president: "I have two kinds of problems, the urgent and the important. The urgent are not important, and the important are never urgent." 5. Eisenhower added: "Now this, I think, represents a dilemma of modern man" 5. We read that line as the problem in one sentence: the loud item and the important item are often not the same item.
Across five experiments, Meng Zhu, Yang Yang and Christopher Hsee found that people were more likely to do unimportant tasks with objectively lower payoffs over important tasks with better payoffs when the unimportant tasks carried only spurious urgency, such as an illusion of expiration 6. The researchers called this the mere urgency effect and wrote: "People behave as if pursuing an urgent task has its own appeal, independent of its objective consequence" 6. One person who runs an IT services business with five employees wrote: "This year it finally caught up with me. I kept postponing the filing because I was dealing with other business challenges and ended up paying penalties to the government." We read that as what losing to other work can cost: the filing kept slipping until it cost money. Another person, years behind on their own books, said: "Always thinking I'll find the time, but it NEVER happens."
Interrupted work can get done faster and still cost you more stress
In a 2008 lab study by Gloria Mark, Daniela Gudith and Ulrich Klocke, 48 people, mostly students, answering emails finished interrupted tasks in less time with no difference in quality 7. The interrupted people paid for that speed with more stress, higher frustration, time pressure and effort 7. The researchers summed it up: "interrupted work may be done faster, but at a price" 7. We read that as a warning against answering overload with speed: you may get more done and still pay for it in stress.
Masicampo and Baumeister concluded that committing to a specific plan "may also free cognitive resources for other pursuits" 1. In our view, that is the reason the method starts on paper and not with the first task on the pile.
The owner answers whatever is loudest, works faster and later, and hopes the pile shrinks.
The owner sorts the whole pile first, does the few items that hurt, and gives each waiting person a date.
This starts the move from level one to level two on decisions: from every item running through you unsorted to a pile you sort before you act. At level two, tasks are handed over, and you still approve everything.
A written triage order says out loud which patients can wait
START (Simple Triage and Rapid Treatment) was created in 1983 by the Newport Beach Fire and Marine Department and Hoag Hospital in Newport Beach, California, and CHEMM, a US Department of Health and Human Services site, calls it the most used mass casualty triage algorithm in the US 8. START sorts patients into four categories, each with a tag colour: Immediate (red), Delayed (yellow), Minor (green) and Expectant (black) 8.
A Delayed patient in START is one who is "not expected to deteriorate over several hours, so transport can be delayed" 8. A Minor patient "can wait for treatment/transportation until more serious patients are handled" 8. First on START's list of five clinical signs is the patient's ability to walk 8. We read the Delayed and Minor tags as the lesson for your pile: the system says out loud what can wait, so waiting is a decision and not a failure. Our four letters borrow that idea of naming what can wait, not its medical categories.
The FAA notes that NTSB accident data suggest pilots have lost control and crashed while distracted by less essential tasks 4. We read that as the cost of letting less essential work pull at you while the main job is open. In our view, both systems fix the order before the pressure arrives, and your four letters do the same for your pile.
Sorting won't add hours, and it can't replace help you need
One owner who builds custom outbuildings on his own wrote: "But I constantly feel like I'm so far behind and there's never time or energy to catch up." The same owner on marketing: "I don't have a website or any marketing. That feels important, but if it worked, I would just have more leads that I don't have time to convert." One person put it this way: "Sometimes being overwhelmed by great opportunities is more curse than blessing." In our view, that is the case for parking growth moves as P items until the H and W lines are clear: a fix that brings in more work can make the pile bigger.
One owner who has run an online store alone for two years wrote: "But lately I'm drowning. I'm handling everything: sourcing, inventory, customer service, shipping, social media, and somehow still trying to sleep." If you have no one to hand work to, you can still use the method. Three of the four letters are decisions only you can make: what to stop, what to delay and whom to tell.
I'm drowning in repetitive tasks.one owner who runs a consulting business alone
One owner who runs a consulting business alone put it this way: "I'm drowning in repetitive tasks." The same consulting owner: "I'm skeptical because I don't want to lose the personal touch with clients, but I also can't keep working 60-hour weeks where half is just admin." In our view, a pile that fills up with the same admin every week needs more than one sort: it needs rules, recordings or bought hours. Our article on replacing yourself covers that next step, after the sort.
In our view, if more than a handful of lines get an H, the problem is bigger than sorting, and the cash or the legal deadline needs outside help first. We also think the method only works if you run the review: a sorted page you don't look at again is the same pile on paper.
Your first sitting starts with a thirty-minute page, and the recount comes fourteen days later
Within seven days, block a sitting: thirty minutes for the page, then the rest of the checklist below. Fourteen days after that sitting, count the open items on both pages and compare the number with your first count.
Sort the pile
You now have a page, four letters and a date to check whether the pile is shrinking
You started with a pile where everything felt urgent and nothing showed you where to start. You now have one page with every open item on it, out of your head. You have four letters that decide what goes first: H, then W, with D crossed out and P parked. And you have a fourteen-day check: count the open items again and see whether the pile is shrinking.
Read before: which level your business is at. Read next: How to Replace Yourself in Your Business (Before You Can Afford a Team) and How to Build Systems in Your Business That Your Team Actually Uses.
Where do your decisions stand today? Take the Scorecard and check the Decisions row.
Sources
- Consider it done! Plan making can eliminate the cognitive effects of unfulfilled goals · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (E. J. Masicampo and Roy F. Baumeister), October 2011
- What is GTD? · David Allen Company, undated
- Executive control of cognitive processes in task switching · Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance (Joshua S. Rubinstein, David E. Meyer and Jeffrey E. Evans), August 2001
- Fly the Aircraft First · FAA Aviation Safety, General Aviation Joint Steering Committee, January 2015
- Address at the Second Assembly of the World Council of Churches, Evanston, Illinois · The American Presidency Project (Dwight D. Eisenhower), August 19, 1954
- The Mere Urgency Effect · Journal of Consumer Research (Meng Zhu, Yang Yang and Christopher K. Hsee), October 2018
- The Cost of Interrupted Work: More Speed and Stress · CHI 2008 (Gloria Mark, Daniela Gudith and Ulrich Klocke), 2008
- START Adult Triage Algorithm · CHEMM, US Department of Health and Human Services, updated September 2, 2026
