Extract from How To Set Smart Daily Goals

From Mark McGuinness of Lateral Action:

What’s the ONE BIG THING you want to accomplish today? The big danger for hyperconnected creative professionals is that incoming demands and digital distractions get in the way of real productivity - i.e. making inroads on your big, scary, difficult, and (ultimately) rewarding creative challenges. If you do ONE BIG THING today - one draft design, one chapter, one photoshoot, one intensive rehearsal - it feels like a productive day. (Two or more is for superheroes.) But if you don’t nail that one thing, it doesn’t matter how many little jobs you get done, you know in your heart it was a wasted day.

Asking yourself this question first thing helps you focus and prioritize. After that, the only things that can get in your way are emergencies and excuses.

Something to consider as part of my strive to be effective (i.e. longer term goal focussed) as opposed to efficient (i.e. getting smaller and less important tasks ticked off the to do list)