Realizing you’re in task overwhelm …

Do you ever feel that when you look at your to-do list you’re never on top of things, have no idea where to start, and it’s all just too much? How do you identify what’s the most important? How can you get it all done? 

The ‘eat the frog’ strategy is attributed to Mark Twain but in modern times has come to mean a prioritization and productivity strategy used to achieve unpleasant tasks, stop procrastination or overwhelm, and improve personal productivity.

What does it mean to “eat the frog”?

The ‘eat the frog’ strategy isn’t about actually eating a frog obviously. It’s a euphemism for a prioritization and productivity method helping people identify unpleasant or difficult tasks and getting them done first thing in the day. The idea is that you identify one challenging task (the frog) and complete the task first thing in the morning (eating it). 

At its most basic level, ‘eating the frog’ is a strategy of identifying your most unpleasant or difficult task of the day and completing it before you continue with the rest of your day. If you have two or more unpleasant tasks (frogs) identify which task frog is more challenging and eat that frog first.

Does eating the frog actually work?

While eating a frog sounds nothing at all like a productivity technique, it is memorable and does help people get things done. Here’s how it works:

Yes, eating the frog sets you up for success early in the day

The ‘eat the frog’ strategy focuses solely on completing just one tough task, early in the day. That’s it. Then, after you’ve completed your most difficult or unpleasant task, you have the rest of your day to complete any smaller tasks on your to-do list without looming dread and defaulting to procrastination. Getting a hard task ut of the way early gets it off your plate and the feeling of achievement can often leave you mentally rolling in a type of flow state through the rest of your day, too.

Yes, eating the frog takes advantage of your most efficient working hours

Your brain is usually at peak performance in the morning, so why not take advantage of that fresh energy to tackle the most difficult or unpleasant frog on your to-do list to get rid of it quickly? That way, the frog doesn’t hang around taking up energy and looming dread in the back of your mind knowing you haven’t done the thing.

Yes, eating the frog promotes deep work

Extreme focus is needed for the ‘eating the frog’ strategy. It encourages you to choose the most difficult or unpleasant task each day and focus solely on doing that one thing first thing in the morning. This means putting your phone away, not checking or responding to emails first, or being distracted by social media or other notifications so you can solely focus on just the frog – everything else can wait.

How to identify “frogs”?

Understanding what’s a frog—and what’s not—is the best way for you to tackle your day. And sometimes it might even seem that all your tasks are frogs! Here’s a few tips to figuring out those frogs: 

Frogs are important, not urgent

Frogs are usually tasks that make a positive impact in your business, but which might hold things up down the track if not done: ie; big tasks that help you make progress on a project, or which helps move the needle in some way. An easy way to remember this is that important tasks that contribute to strategy or need to be done before others can do their work are often frogs. 

Small, reactive tasks like answering email, responding to notifications or other messages, admin work etc are not frogs. Most of the time those tasks can wait. If you’re having trouble with smaller tasks getting in the way of your frog-focus time, try the Traffic Light Strategy to help you focus on important frogs and later tasks.

Frogs often require more time or care than other tasks

Frogs can be big or small, depending on the nature of the frog. It might just be an unpleasant or difficult email you need to write you’ve been putting off, or it might be a bigger frog taking several hours to work through. If your frog takes longer than a few hours, try breaking it into smaller chunks across 2 or more days. Not breaking the frog into smaller chunks means the frog remains a whole frog and never gets eaten properly.

Frog resistance

For whatever reason, you’ve likely been putting off your frog or frogs and facing mental resistance towards tackling the frog. Maybe it’s because you fear the outcome, are worried about the task itself, you feel the task is too challenging (in a bad way), or it’s just not a task you enjoy. Putting off the frog exacerbates looming dread leading to procrastination (otherwise known as delaying the task to stave off feelings of unpleasantness or consequences as long as possible). You will know which tasks those are as you read this column: they’re the ones that have something about them that makes them harder to get done.

Top 3 tips for eating frogs

Try these three tips to eat your frog firsts thing every morning:

1. Frogs are best eaten regularly

You need to regularly eat the frogs to accomplish big tasks and make steady progress towards your goals (or your team’s goals). Think of each frog as a small part of a much larger goal or outcome, and by the time you’ve eaten your way through a whole bag of frogs, you’ll easily be able to look back and see the progress you’ve made.

2. Don’t plan your frogs too far ahead

Frogs shouldn’t be planned too far ahead. If you’ve got lots of frogs, you may have a longer lead-in time to start with, but eventually your frogs will diminish. Best practice is to plan your frog one or two days before. This way you know your frog du jour, and you don’t need to waste energy thinking about anything else until you’ve eaten it. Then you can get on with your day without looming dread.

3. Always eat your frogs first thing in the morning

The whole idea is eating the frog to get the task out of the way first thing in the morning so you don’t have to think about it as you get on with the rest of your day. Frogs are inherently tasks that are mentally challenging and difficult for whatever reason and can even be dealing with a particular person or work issue rather than an actual task. This is why people procrastinate when it comes to frogs. 

Eating the frog strategy conclusion

The point is to beat any temptation to put off the frog with procrastination with a mindset strategy of just getting the frog task done right away. This way, you clear your head and your desk, avoid wasting energy on a looming sense of dread as you go about your day, and avoid falling into default procrastination mode and eventual overwhelm.

If you continually eat a frog a day, you’re likely to find success coming your way.