Impact effort matrix

- Some people struggle coming up with ideas, while others struggle with knowing how to choose which ideas to move forward with. If you fall in the second camp, I'm going to give you a powerful tool to help. This tool is called the impact effort matrix. If you want to follow along, grab some sticky notes and be prepared to pause the video a few times. Here's how it works. Step 1, write down all the names of your ideas for your problem to solve on sticky notes, scrap paper, or an index card, one idea per note. Step 2, you've got all your ideas written down, right? Now you're going to determine how much impact this idea would make to your target audience if you were to implement that idea. Since you're solving this problem for yourself, you're thinking about yourself. Would it make a big impact? A small impact? You're going to determine what this is for each idea relative to one another. Draw a line on the bottom of the piece of paper and label it Impact. On the left side, write Low, and on the right side, write High. Now the easiest way to start is simply pick up one of your ideas and place it in the middle of the line. Now get another idea and determine, is this higher or lower than the one in the middle? You'll do this exercise for all your remaining ideas. Please note, your ideas cannot occupy the same space on the paper; it cannot overlap. Eventually, you'll have a list of prioritized ideas in order of impact to the audience, AKA you. Step 3, now that you've prioritized your ideas in order of impact, you're going to prioritize your ideas in order of effort. To do this, draw a vertical line on the very far left side of your page. Label it Effort. Write Low on the bottom, and write High on the top. Now, you're going to move your ideas vertically on the y-axis. You're going to consider how much effort it would take to implement the idea. Think of effort as how much time would this take you? How much money would it cost? How many resources are needed? Like the other exercise, start with one and determine the relative effort in relation to the other ideas. Again, this idea cannot occupy the same vertical space on the paper. If you've been doing this activity, great job. You now have a prioritized list of your ideas according to impact and effort. Here's what we'll do next. Step 4, I want you to draw another two lines across your page to create a four-quadrant access. Let me explain what these quadrants mean. The bottom left quadrant are your low-hanging fruit. Ideas here have low impact to your audience, but it also requires little effort to implement. If you have the time, it's worth considering. The bottom right quadrant are your quick wins. Ideas here are the ones you want to do right away because they have high impact to your audience, and it requires low effort to implement. The top right quadrant are your major projects. Ideas here have high impact to your audience and require high effort to implement. It's a strategic decision to do these. The top left quadrant are ideas not worth doing. Ideas here take high amounts of effort to implement and with little impact to your audience. Label your quadrants, and take a look at where your ideas fall. Do you have any in quick wins, major projects, low hanging fruit, or not worth doing? If you have ideas in quick wins, these are the ones you should go forward with. Or if you have ideas near the quick wins quadrant, these are the ideas you want to go with. If you have some in major projects or low-hanging fruit, these decisions are entirely up to you. Label your own quadrants, and take a look at where your ideas fall. The idea with the highest impact and lowest effort is the one you're going to move forward with. It'll be in the quick wins quadrant. Star that idea. As we wrap up this video, remember this. The impact effort matrix is a tool to help you evaluate your ideas and provide a systematic way to prioritize the ideas you came up with. You've now selected the idea you're going to move forward with in the next stage of the innovation process. Congratulations. You should feel really good about getting to this stage as you've completed a lot of work. I hope you're excited to dive in.