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Prioritizing and Stack Ranking Work Requests

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When managing projects, I find it critical to develop a solid list of work requests. For larger projects, this list can get a bit overwhelming. To help me determine which work requests to tackle first, I use a prioritization system. My priorities are simple: I assign each work request a number from 1 to 4, with 1 being the highest priority. Multiple work requests can have the same priority - I use these priorities simply for rough-sorting them.

(I've seen some project managers use numbers from 0 to 3. I've also seen some project managers use words such as Must, Should, and Might, but the problem with words is that they don't always sort well in applications such as Excel and SharePoint.)

I also find it helpful to a assign a stack ranking to work requests so that I can sort them in absolute order. The most important item gets a 10, 20 for the next most important item, and so on. I use increments of 10 so that I can slot other work requests in between if I need to. Then I renumber them so that there continues to be plenty of room between them for even more work requests to fit in later.

Here's an example:

  • Investigate data backup options. (priority 1, stack rank 10)
  • Create Getting Started section. (priority 1, stack rank 20)
  • Create glossary page. (priority 2, stack rank 30)
  • Create editorial style guide page. (priority 3, stack rank 40)

In future posts, I will discuss how I create, phrase, assign, estimate, schedule, and track work requests to increase my efficiency.

-- Paul

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