Why Ivy Lee’s six-task method still beats most modern apps, and how simplicity might be the ultimate productivity tool

6/20/20255 min read

My Monkey Mind Was Running The Show

My mind has generally been sprinting in too many directions at once.

I’m not just talking about getting sidetracked, my attention often jumped like a monkey on acid: from working on a go-to-market strategy, to an AI research thread, from an idea for a blog post to a new supplement I want to research, from a PowerPoint slide I am working on to an email I suddenly “have to” answer.

I’m wired to be curious. And I love that about myself. But sometimes, that curiosity leads to an overfull schedule and a mind that doesn’t easily wind down. I’ve spent more than a few nights wide awake, mentally cycling through open loops and half-finished ideas. I even feel guilty when I give myself a rare moment of quiet and not listening to a podcast or article when taking the dog for a walk. It’s something I am working on because this behaviour comes with a cost: an overstuffed schedule and mental scatter.

Productivity apps made things worse. I’d spend hours tinkering with systems in Obsidian or setting up “second brains” in Notion. They felt productive until I realized they’d become distractions disguised as solutions. I was optimizing my tools instead of doing actual work. I know that both, Notion & Obsidian, have cult followings and for good reasons but it’s just not for me.

Something had to change.

That’s when I returned to a 100-year-old method I had once read about, a relic from the steel-and-railroad era that turned out to be the most focused, calming, and effective system I’ve ever tried.

The Ivy Lee Method (in 60 Seconds)

Here's how it works:

At the end of your workday, write down the six most important tasks you need to do tomorrow.
Rank them in order of priority (no ties).
The next morning start with task #1. Work on it exclusively until it's done.
The move to task #2, then #3, and so on.
Do this every day.

That’s it. It sounds disarmingly simple, but it works because it removes noise, forces prioritization, and prevents task-hopping.

It’s not a hack. It’s a shift in how you decide what matters.

I Tried It for 14 Days. Here's What (Might) Happen.

I decided to try the Ivy Lee Method not as a novelty but as a real experiment. A 14-day sprint to reset my mind and reclaim my focus.

There were challenges. Interruptions from urgent calls sometimes broke my flow. I learned to return to the list as a kind of anchor, which helped.

Another insight: I initially left out email from my top six, thinking it wasn’t “important enough.” But by day 2, I realized I couldn’t fully concentrate until I had at least checked my inbox for anything urgent. Especially since I worked across time zones (Europe and North America) emails accumulated overnight. So, I added email review (time-boxed to 30–60 minutes) as task #1 or #2. That adjustment made a big difference.

I also overestimated what I could realistically accomplish on a few days. One task, preparing a project presentation, took far longer than expected, partly because I was waiting on input from others. That taught me to consider dependencies when setting my six tasks the night before.

Blocking calendar time was a game-changer. I began reserving specific hours for my top tasks and protecting that time from meetings and calls. It made a huge difference. To-do lists are great, but they’re even better when synced to your actual calendar.

There was also one total failure day: urgent work came up a call first thing in the morning and hijacked the entire day. But that’s life and it’s not about perfect execution every single day. It’s about having a rhythm that prioritizes what really matters.

The hardest and most valuable part? Sticking to the order. My borderline-OCD brain wanted to jump ahead to the fun tasks, but forcing myself to go in sequence trained a new kind of discipline. Prioritizing and then honouring that order turned out to be one of the most transformative parts of the system.

By the end of two weeks, my stress was lower, my focus was sharper, and I consistently completed five or six of my daily tasks. I’m keeping this method because it works.

But where did this deceptively simple method come from?

A Method Forged in Steel and Scripture

The method’s origin story is legendary.

In 1918, Charles M. Schwab, president of Bethlehem Steel and one of the richest men in America, asked consultant Ivy Lee how to increase productivity. Lee offered a bold proposal: let me teach your executives this method for free. If it works, pay me whatever you think it’s worth.
Three months later, Schwab sent him a check for $25,000 (close to $600,000 in today’s money) and called it “the most profitable advice I ever received.”

But who was this Ivy Lee?
B1orn in Georgia in 1877, Lee was the son of a Methodist minister, raised in a household of sermons, ethics, and order. He studied at Emory and Princeton, worked as a journalist, and eventually pioneered what we now call public relations. But at heart, Lee was a systems thinker, someone who believed that clarity of thought could lead to clarity of action.

It’s not hard to see how his background shaped the method. The daily discipline. The focus on essentials. The belief that simplicity can guide even the most complex lives. The Ivy Lee Method isn’t just a tactic; it’s a quiet philosophy of attention.

The Complexity Theatre: What Everyone’s Getting Wrong About “Productivity”

We’re drowning in tools. And we’re convinced the next one will fix everything.
But here’s the thing: most productivity tools don’t reduce your load they reshape it into something even harder to manage.

I’ve tried a lot of them. Next to Notion and Obsidian, I used Bullet Journals, PARA, Zettelkasten etc. They promise clarity. What they often deliver is complexity theatre: dashboard-driven procrastination in a prettier package.

As Will Kelly writes in The Illusion of Productivity Tools: “The tools have become the work.” Modern productivity culture worships optimization. But what if that’s the wrong god? What if chasing the perfect system is the very thing keeping you from doing the actual work?
The Ivy Lee Method is different. It doesn’t ask you to organize your life. It asks you to make six decisions.

Making It Stick: Troubleshooting and Enhancements

Now that you know the method, here's how to handle the challenges that might derail you and ways to make it even more effective.

What Could Derail You:

“What if my task is too complex to finish in one day?” Break it down into smaller, clear subtasks and only list the next actionable piece.
“What if I don’t finish all six?” That’s expected. The point is progress with priority, not perfection.
“What about meetings?” Use task slots for prep, follow-up, or strategic decision-making.
“Six isn’t enough!” That’s the whole point. More than six is clutter disguised as productivity.
“I’m too reactive.” Use the method to anchor at least half your day. It’s a focus ritual, not a straitjacket.

Enhancements:

Use a paper index card. It’s low friction, and always visible.
Add a 0–10 “focus score” at day’s end. Track for two weeks.
Pair it with a single line of reflection: “What made today work or not?”
Tie your to-do list to your calendar. Block out chunks of time for each task so your priorities don’t just sit on a list, they have a time and place to get done.

The Case for a Simpler Identity

Maybe you don’t need a new tool.
Maybe you need an old sheet of paper.
The Ivy Lee Method has lasted a century not because it’s fancy, but because it’s true. It meets us in our scatter. It slows us down without numbing us. It helps us finish what matters — and ignore what doesn’t.

You don’t need a new app. You need a new habit.

Join the Quiet Tribe

If this resonates, try it for 14 days. Really try.
Track your six tasks. Track your stress and focus. Share your reflections.
Then tell me:

Did you feel lighter?
Did anything meaningful get finished?
Did your apps start to feel… unnecessary?

Here's to a quiet tribe of paper-first productivity rebels.