When to Use Pareto Principle Time Management in the Tech World

When you have top-rate tech skills and the experience to back them up, you’re a hot commodity and can find amazing jobs in all sorts of technical fields. As you progress in your career, though, you’ll discover that those great jobs come with too many tasks and not enough free time. Fortunately, tools such as Pareto Principle time management concepts can give you the framework you need to get your priorities in order. With effective time management strategies, your tech career can take off in a hurry.

This article can help you start applying Pareto Principle doctrines to your workplace. You’ll find out the background of this time management concept, and we also show you how to approach your tech tasks. Our time management tips will help you become a better and more effective worker, and your employer will  take notice. Let’s get this party started, you young hooligans!

What is the Pareto Principle?

Over the ages, the business world has adopted lots of workplace principles. One of the beauties of business is that they are, as a group, shameless. They don’t care where an idea comes from and will grab whatever’s in the air if it can help a company steal a march on the competition. It’s always been that way, from the stone age to today. The Pareto time management approach, which states that, generally, two tasks out of ten are more important than the other eight tasks combined, is proof of that.

Vilfredo Preto was a nineteenth-century Italian economist. In 1895, he published a paper in which he observed that, in general, it seemed as if 20% of people were of real import and that the other 80% were significantly less important in the vast scheme of things. He would go on to expand this creepy, semi-eugenics philosophy to posit that 20% of the population controlled 80% of the wealth, too. The business community eventually jettisoned the sociological and economic baggage and applied the 80/20 rule to the workplace. 

When to Use Pareto at Work

Pareto management style is super popular, and it gets results. It’s one of the top tools in the business teamwork toolkit, and it can transform your tech career. You can use it to take control of your day and get a schedule in hand that prioritizes your energy efficiently. Start with the notion that you have two out of ten tasks—the “vital few,” in ol’ Vilfredo’s language—that are far more important than the remaining eight. Those tasks deserve your primary attention and should come first in your day.

Once you complete the largest and most time- and resource-consuming tasks, you’ll be able to turn your attention to the remaining issues. You’ll get a huge psychological boost using this method as well—having tough work hanging over our heads is stressful. Being unable to attend to that work because you have a million little fribbles to deal with can be frustrating and lead to long, unpleasant days. Completing the dreaded tasks first will send your team’s morale into the stratosphere.

So, there you go. Tech work is rewarding in many ways, but you can find yourself overwhelmed with work and unable to get your schedule under control. Our guide shows you when to use Pareto Principle time management tools to ride herd on your work and get your priorities straight. It’ll make your workplace a happier spot.