Understanding Task Priority Levels
We know that most business owners won't have the time or money to complete all the legal tasks on their list, at least not immediately. With that in mind, we have organized your tasks based on their priority so you can focus on the highest priority tasks first.
This article will help you understand how we prioritize tasks.
We Rate Each Task
We start the process by rating the priority level for each task. While there is obviously some level of subjectivity in our ratings, we have established a process to make the process more rigorous. In rating each task, here's what we consider:
- Chance of Harm - This factor accounts for the likelihood of getting in trouble if you don't complete the task. In other words, how likely is it that something bad will happen to you? Obviously, a legal risk that will cause you harm 50% of the time is a higher priority than one that will only cause you harm 1% of the time (all other things being equal).
- Magnitude of Potential Harm - This factor accounts for how big the downside is if it comes to pass. In other words, how much money (or time) will it cost you if you get in trouble for this issue? A legal risk that could cost you $10,000 is a higher priority than one that will cost you $100 (all other things being equal).
- Difficulty of Task - This factor accounts for the time, money, and effort you must spend to complete the task. Adding this factor in allows you to maximize your impact with your limited time and resources. All things being equal, a task that will take 10 minutes and cost you nothing is a higher priority than one that will take you hours and/or thousands of dollars.
Our founder has evaluated each task and assigned values for each factor. From there, we apply a prioritization formula to rate each task.
Our Prioritization Formula:
(Chance of Harm * Magnitude of Potential Harm) / Difficulty of Task
With each task assigned a priority level, we order them from the highest score to the lowest score. This process allows us to create an objective prioritization of tasks for you.
The Priority Levels
While each task has its own score and is ordered based on its prioritization score in the Legal Task Manager, we know many business owners would prefer broader groupings of like tasks. That's why we created the task Priority Level.
We divided the list of potential tasks into three similarly sized groups: Highest-Priority Tasks, Elevated-Priority Tasks, and Standard-Priority Tasks.
Note: There isn't a significant difference at the edges of the different Priority Levels. In other words, the lowest-rated task in the "Highest-Priority Tasks" is relatively close in risk to the highest-rated task in the "Elevated Priority Tasks." That is the nature of drawing lines in a rating system. Think of the Priority Levels as a guide, but recognize that the overall order of tasks in your list is the best gauge of how best to prioritize your tasks.