We hear about procrastination being a pernicious curse. But, have you ever heard the term “precrastination”? Simply put, precrastination is a mental strategy that some people employ to avoid procrastination. While precrastinating, one attempts to complete those tasks at hand that can be finished quickly instead of tasks that are more complicated (but also more important). This strategy is meant to achieve a certain level of productivity in your workday — after all, checking off those tasks from your to-do list does seem to be oddly satisfying, doesn’t it?

Still confused? Let’s consider a situation: It’s Monday morning, and you have a daunting list of tasks to be completed by the end of the day. You see the first few tasks, which include sending out a few emails and preparing an urgent and important presentation. Ultimately, you decide to spend 30 minutes (or less) on sending out the emails and plan to get down to making the presentation later. It’s just a few emails, right? Seems like you’ll get done with it in no time and achieve the efficiency that you want. But this is precisely where you go wrong – in the process of drafting those emails, you get distracted by even more emails and phone calls. By now, you would have spent the better half of your day (a “productive day”) sending out emails and answering phone calls. Subsequently, you are left with very little time to work on your presentation.

This is a prime example of precrastination: To avoid putting off a seemingly quicker task from your to-do list, you attempted to finish it before moving on to a more critical task.

Why do we precrastinate?

Why do we make these poor choices? The answer lies in the complexity of the human mind. Here are several possible reasons behind precrastination:

• Inflated satisfaction. Humans have an urge to achieve satisfaction, which can be instantly attained by accomplishing smaller, simpler, or quicker tasks at hand. Ever started with the easiest subjects while preparing for an exam, and felt productive and accomplished? You know you did it. Congratulations, you precrastinated!
• Survival of the fittest. Survival is hard-wired into human nature. Because of this, humans do things that are the easiest or quickest to do. You tend to go for the easy wins rather than those that can be fruitful in the long term. This might be why we try to make a few bucks fast instead of working our way to hoard earnings.
• Managing time vs. managing energy. From infancy, we are taught to manage our time against the work at hand. As a result, we naturally opt for completing easier tasks first and later move on to more complicated tasks. This is because the easier tasks can be successfully accomplished quicker, allowing us to feel as if we’re managing our time effectively. However, when operating in the real world, the better way to go about it is to manage your energy. It is no mystery that humans tend to be more productive and efficient during the day’s earlier hours. Hence, high energy levels should be reserved for complex and challenging tasks rather than more comfortable ones. The easier ones can be done with lower energy levels anyway.
• Diligence. Have you ever had an inner voice telling you to wrap up your work sooner due to a shortage of time? This nagging voice is the main reason some people — in an attempt to be diligent — want to just start checking off tasks from their frightening to-do list and work their way from most straightforward to more difficult ones. While trying to get your work done on time is an excellent trait to have, it needs to be interrogated every now and then. If you can only complete simple tasks by the end of the day, you aren’t really achieving an adequate level of productivity.
• A double-edged sword. It’s not all dark and gloomy when it comes to precrastination, though. Precrastination comes with a few benefits. It may enable some people to successfully complete their tasks; however, it is definitely a double-edged sword. While work and time management may be a good trait, it is vital to slow down, catch your breath, and reassess the situation to focus on the priority task. Crossing items off your to-do list does not automatically equal productivity or efficiency. It’s more important to get that massive boulder of a task off your list than all those smaller pebbles combined.

While it may be satisfying to see a number of items scratched off from your to-do list, doing so may compromise your ability to deliver essential results. Poor prioritization of tasks will not only lead to low productivity, but it will also leave you with little energy for more critical and challenging tasks. But it does not mean that you start slacking and start spending your entire day on one thing alone. Striking the right balance is the key — be balanced and mindful of both quality AND quantity.