To-do Lists: 8 Things That Can Make Them Super Effective

Creating to-do lists is an easy way to fix constant overwhelm, dwindling productivity, and the wrong use of your time.

If you’ve ever used to-do lists before but it just didn’t seem to work out well for you

OR

You’ve never used to-do lists before;

I made this post for you!

Today on the blog, you’ll be learning simple strategies that’ll help you create super effective to-do lists.

Every Minute Spent Planning Saves 10 in Execution – Brian Tracy

But heads up…

Before you get all excited about skyrocketing your productivity using fancy to-do lists (I’m not saying this is bad though)

You need to know that what you should aim for while you write to-do lists is its effectiveness, not its fancy nature.

So.. how should we create effective to-do lists then?

I outlined 8 things you should do to make your to-do lists super effective when you start creating them and they arrreeee….

8 Things To Look Out For When Creating Super Effective To-do lists

1. Personalise your Method of Creating To-do lists.

When it comes to planning, it’s best to pick a medium for planning that suits you best.

For beginner planners though, I’d recommend handwritten to-do lists that could be created on journals, sticky notes, or even a plain notebook.

If you’d rather go digital then you could try a few productivity tools like Asana, Google tasks, Trello, Evernote, Todoist, TickTick, and a few others.

I love handwritten to-do lists because writing things down helps improve the mind’s ability to retain information and increases your chances of achieving your goals too. You shouldn’t discard the idea before trying it out!

2. Create Multiple Lists.

After all the hassle of picking the right medium to create your to-do lists on, you might have to create daily, weekly, monthly, and someday to-do lists to avoid getting confused about what you should be doing at a particular time in your entrepreneurial journey

Also, separate your work to-do list from the one that contains the tasks that you need to carry out at home so that you don’t end up thinking about the tasks you have to do at home while you’re at work and vice versa.

Separating your list like this helps you to narrow your focus to only what’s important at the moment.

3. Prioritise Your Tasks.

Prioritising tasks simply means allocating time and energy to those tasks.

You need to know the amount of time and energy required for each task on your list and allocate realistic deadlines to them.

Figure out the urgent and most important tasks first and fix them on the top of your list.

Prioritising tasks help you to know what needs your attention the most and what doesn’t (what you can easily outsource)

4. Have a Daily Task Limit.

This right here is the key to remaining consistent & avoiding burnout.

Productivity isn’t about doing more work, it’s about doing less stuff, but doing them better.

It’s not a good idea to overload your to-do list with multiple tasks that are impossible to complete in a day.

Doing this would only make you feel disappointed in yourself. You would then start to procrastinate tasks and slowly dump the idea of creating to-do lists altogether.

To avoid this, limit yourself to about 6-8 tasks daily, depending on how difficult they are to complete.

6 tasks might seem too small to you while doing this, but think of what it takes to complete them. You’d see that it’s not as small as you think.

Since you’re not a robot, avoid overloading your to-do list. With time, you can increase the number of tasks you do daily, that’s if you’re constantly able to finish the tasks on your list.

5. Make Your to-do Lists Simple.

To-do lists are meant to be simple tools that help you remain organised. Always write them in a clear, navigable outlined format that is easy to use and understand.

Don’t make your to-do lists so fancy to the extent that it becomes difficult to navigate through tasks with ease.

6. Make Opening Your List A Habit.

Make a habit of writing to-do lists; but also make a habit of opening them too.

The whole point of having a list is to get tasks off your mind and into print so that you don’t give your brain the extra work of having to remember every single thing you have to do daily.

Document your tasks somewhere that it would be easy to constantly check for unfinished tasks, whether you use the digital or handwriting method.

An easy way to do this is to visualise your lists.

You can write them in small journals that are easy to carry around. Better still, you can use sticky notes or boards that you can always place anywhere on your walls.

That way, you can always keep tabs on your progress level each day.

7. Write Your To-do Lists Before You go to Bed.

Some people like to create their lists in the morning and get to work immediately after.

But, the best way to make sure your lists are super effective is to write them before going to bed.

It helps you clear your mind as you sign out of work mode for the day. It also keeps your mind fresh and organised for the next day so you’re ready to crush all your goals for the day as soon as you wake up.

Generally, it gives you more work-life balance as an entrepreneur.

Related: How To Balance Work and Personal Life as an Entrepreneur

8. Be Open To Improvement.

To-do lists are very helpful with tracking your progress on long term goals (after you’ve broken them down, of course)

Using your lists, carry out a weekly self-evaluation by asking yourself how you can do better in the coming week.

Now…..

You’re Ready To Create Your Super Duper Effective To-do List!

Creating a to-do list wouldn’t seem difficult or unproductive if you know what works for you and follow the guidelines above to create the perfect list for you.

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