Eat That Frog: A Practical Approach to Reaching Your Goals

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'Eat that Frog'

This is a productivity method developed by Brian Tracy. The 'frog' refers to the most important and most impactful task you have to complete.

If you work on it first thing every morning, you'll be more productive and successful, and you'll reach your goals more quickly.

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Clarify your goals

If you don't know what your goals are, most likely you won't be able to identify and prioritize the specific tasks you need to work on to achieve those goals.

Write your major goals down and break them into tasks. Your goal tasks are your frogs, the things you want to work on first thing every day for greater productivity and success.

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Think long-term

... to make better short-term decisions.

If you question the consequences of doing/not doing a to-do before you start on it, it not only makes it easier to find your frogs, but it also makes it easier to find time-wasting tasks that are better deleted from your list or delegated to someone else.

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ABCDE prioritization method

A tasks: things you must do - they're your frogs.
B tasks: things you should do. Replying to emails or attending meetings are often should-do tasks.
C tasks: nice-to-dos. You probably want to do them, but there are no consequences if you don't.
D tasks: things you should delegate to someone else so you have more time for your A tasks.
E tasks: things you should eliminate. You don't need or want to do them.

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Understand your key result areas

Understand what you were hired to do and the results you are supposed to deliver.

By being aware of hat you're truly accountable for, you can justify delegating and deleting tasks that aren't related to your job-specific tasks and goals.

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Prepare for your work

Plan your frog for the next day at the end of the previous workday and block off time to work on that frog so you can tackle it with no interruptions.
Make sure you have all of the things you need to do your work and a comfortable workspace to do it in.

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One task at a time

Once you have your goals broken down into tasks, you have to work on those tasks one at a time.

Prioritize them, schedule them, and then when it's time to eat your frogs, focus on them completely.

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What's holding you back

Identify the things that are holding you back, internal and external and eliminate them.

More often than not our constraints are internal: we procrastinate because of impostor syndrome, or we fill our time with low-value tasks and distractions.

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Schedule your 'frogs'

Schedule time on your calendar at the end of every workday for working on your frog the next morning, or create a recurring meeting for the first hours of every day to make sure you always have time blocked for goal tasks.

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Finish your tasks

After you start working on a frog, continue working on it until you can take it off of your to-do list.

To do this effectively, you'll need to make sure you have tasks that are small enough to complete in one sitting. Also, make sure you have time blocked to work on your task.

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'Eating that Frog' in short

Define your goals and write them down.
Break those goals down into tasks.
Break those tasks down into the smallest possible subtasks.
Prioritize your tasks, and delete/delegate tasks you don't need to do.
Schedule time on your calendar every single day, ideally first thing in the morning, to work on your highest-priority goal task.
Focus on your goal task during your scheduled time, and work on it until it's complete.

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