You have seen these people are all around us (and may be one yourself) - they are not present in the physical world, but rather are doing that cell phone pacing, teetering march while looking down with a pivot/spin move on the corner or worse yet, cutting us off in traffic while connected somewhere else. You can look straight into their eyes, and they will not see you. Some expect some sort of nodding praise that their multi-tasking is a sign of productivity. Next time, ask them what they are working on simultaneously right now. More often than not, you will hear a list of very low priority tasks that seem to take longer than usual to complete. They chose these tasks based on factors that are personal to them or they are chasing the latest fire to put out as it appears at the top of the inbox.

Very rarely will you hear a response that is ordered, hierarchical or based on priority dependencies or sequences. The first things first approach is what PlanDone has analyzed and listed in its Top10 page.

Productive people use their time wisely and do not seem rushed because they don't sweat the little details. Many times, solving the big problems first eliminates the little details downstream, but rational, informed decision making is still a choice. Fortunately, PlanDone can strongly suggest an order to help teams make the right choices to complete their tasks on time.