Yahoo's Marissa Mayer Loves her Unfinished To-Do List

Yahoo's CEO Marissa Mayer thrives on an unfinished to-do list. In the last 18 months, Mayer has managed to double the company's stock and has increased its number of mobile employees by five times. Yahoo even managed to register more web traffic in the U.S. than Google this past July, which hadn't happened since 2011. It seems she is doing something right, and a lot of it comes down to her to-do list.

Mayer took her cue from an old college friend. Each day, she would make a to-do list based on priority, listing the most important tasks at the top and the least important tasks at the bottom. She would then celebrate the fact that she didn't complete her long list, because that means she wasn't wasting her time on unimportant tasks.

"If I did [get to the bottom of the list] it would be a real bummer," Mayer said. "Because think about all those things at the very bottom of your to-do list that really shouldn't take time out of your day."

So, instead of getting overwhelmed that she isn't able to complete everything on her list, she revels in the fact that she spends her time on the truly important tasks.