The short answer: Hardest task first is Day 17's documented prompt and the work standard's answer to postponement: the hardest work task takes the first real slot of the workday, before the day can spend itself on easier fog.
What it is
The hardest, most-carried work task — named, slotted first, attempted before the inbox gets its turn.
Why first
The hardest task is usually the postponed one — the call, the decision, the job pushed to next week. Taken first, it stops taxing every other hour. Week 3's theme takes the standard to work: same rule at work as in training — schedule it, do it, mark it.
How Frank runs it
Week 3's Monday rant asks his audience the diagnostic: "What's the one work task you've been carrying for a month?" His system answers with placement: the carried task becomes tomorrow's first work block, in writing, graded at night.
How it scores
Hardest task attempted in its slot: done or not. Attempted-and-hard still counts as kept; rescheduled without a new slot counts as a miss — the calendar doesn't grade adjectives.
Keep going
- How to stop procrastinating — the doctrine underneath
- Hard decisions, made this week — the weekly form of this standard
- I work better under pressure — the excuse first-slot placement kills