Introduction

This is part of a series where i talk about my GTD experience and  my setup.

Part 1 here talks about my plan and overview of my GTD system

Part 2 here talks about why i eventually chose iPod Touch 2G as my main to do list console

Part 3 here talks about why i choose Appigo ToDo for iPhone as my main task manager

Part 4 here talks about how to plan for big projects and smaller projects

Part 5 here talks about how to make use of Contexts, Tags to Execute your tasks

Part 6 here discuss about how you can review projects better using iThoughts mind mapping software

In today’s article i will talk more about execution of tasks and how you do that with the help of contexts and tags.

So what are Contexts and Tags?

In a sense, contexts and tags are categories that you assign to your tasks or projects so that you can better manage them. The problem for most people is that no one gives them a systematic way or methodology of grouping things. Because of this, alot of people i know feels categories dun work.

The worse i seen are color categories in MS Outlook. The problem with that is, whenever you look at that category color, you starting thinking:

What did i tie that color to?

and then,

What should i be doing for the category that this color is tied to?

That is just a waste of brain power i feel.You take 2 steps in your head to finally come to review what you need to do. Most of the time, u take so long to remember what that color is for haha.

How David Allen Categorize is based on primarily 3 kinds of actionable task that you will do:

Location Based

These are categorized as location restrictions that stops you from doing other tasks that happens when you are in this context. Some Examples:

• @Errands
• @Commuting
• @Office
• @Home

I usually have these contexts on my Appigo ToDo Context instead of Tags. Why i use context is because context on Appigo ToDo is because you can only select one context and not multiple. So essentially it means,

If i am at the office, i cannot be at home

I thought for location based categories these are the best. A note is that some people would include an @Anywhere category for tasks that you can do anywhere. I don’t have that in mine as if I don’t select a context to filter or i don’t assign one, it automatically means i can do it anywhere.

Mode,Chunk Based

This is abit more tricky. David Allen describes that there are tasks that when you are in that category you can be more productive doing them at one go. Mine would include:

• @Waiting For
• @To Contact
• @Online w Computer
• @Project A
• @Project B

Some people schedule themselves or have a mind trigger to let them know that they are in such a mode or schedule work chunks like these. They don’t belong to a certain location but if you are reviewing what you are waiting for to be done so that you can reach your objective, you might as well look at what other bottlenecks are there. Same as for online with computer. if you are online, might as well finish all you can do online.

On Appigo ToDo, I use Tags for these, more as a preference since I leave the location based categories as Context and those that i would need to select multiple categories as Tags. So it means that i can select @Waiting for and @To Contact to see bottle necks and people necessary to contact.

People Based

These are categories of stuff that you would want to review with a particular individual or group of individuals. Some common ones are

• @Boss
• @Project Team A
• @Colleague A
• @Wife

So as you can see, they are not location but adhoc meet ups or arranged meet ups with people(s). On Appigo ToDo I use Tags (similar to Mode/chunk based tasks) so that i can select multiple people I have agendas with.

Schedule and Execute

This flow chart illustrates how you can make a decision about what are the steps that can take place in your typical day to get things done.

Having contexts and tags are well and good but how successful you are at doing it or executing the tasks and completing them is a matter of your understanding of yourself and your categories. I learn the hard way that doing and execution is important, if not work just keeps pilling up while you put so much contexts and tags that you spare little time in doing the actual work.

[Read the rest of this entry...]

Introduction

This is part of a series where i talk about my GTD experience and  my setup.

Part 1 here talks about my plan and overview of my GTD system

Part 2 here talks about why i eventually chose iPod Touch 2G as my main to do list console

Part 3 here talks about why i choose Appigo ToDo for iPhone as my main task manager

Part 4 here talks about how to plan for big projects and smaller projects

Part 5 here talks about how to make use of Contexts, Tags to Execute your tasks

Part 6 here discuss about how you can review projects better using iThoughts mind mapping software

In today’s article i will share with  you how I normally go about planning for tasks, projects and sub-projects.

Where are we now?

Ok, so in Part 1 I have presented this workflow chart which is how i would illustrate my collection, planning, processing and execution model.

Today, I will talk a fair bit on project planning. I skipped the collection portion cause I think this is a more complex portion of GTD thus i would explain more on this first.

What Constitutes as Projects?

When you collected an idea, piece of information or a probem, you decide if it is actionable. If it is, the key to decide if it is a project or a simple actionable task is how much steps you need to execute to reach your successful outcome.

Remember, thinking about your successful outcome is important, just like defining clear and manageable goals, it keeps you on the right direction on what you are suppose to do.

Personally, that was what is described about projects, but to me there is no hard and fast rule. Why this is important is because you need to break a task down to actionable steps.

If it is too complicated, you do not know how to start the blardy task and you end up procrastinating on it.

So for task that is named:

“Get Son a new bicycle”

It can be a very simple actionable step, like go downstairs go to the nearest bike shop and buy the bike. That is, if you already know what you are looking for.  But most of the times it is not so simple.

That simple task normally consist of:

1. Ask Son what kind of bicycle he likes
2. Find out how much your family have to pay for the bike (budgeting)
3. Research on where to buy the cheapest bike on the internet
4. Give son a look at the bike see if he likes it
5. Find out what to look out for if it is the first time you are buying a bike
6. Go down and buy the bike
7. Wait for the bike to be delivered to you

So, you see, our task may not be that simple at all.

Another small problem that maybe isn’t that small

In life, most of the time don’t end up the way you wanted it to turn out. Take the example that in your work as an IT engineer, you are suppose to solve a problem on your IT system you are supporting.

So again, the simple task will go something like this in your normal to do list:

“Solve why the entries do not show up on the procurement page.”

It is a simple task, if you investigated and found that a bug in your source code will delete off these entries when the user view it. So Simple

Or it could be you investigated and turn out that the entries don’t come just from your system but goes to another system and then back to your system.

Then it becomes a bigger problem that could go something like

1. Find out from database whether the entries are there
2. If database entries are there, investigate at source codes to find out if there is a problem with the codes
3. If your codes do not have a problem, find out if the other system did give us the right entries to combine to ours
4. If they didn’t inform the engineers from the other system to investigate and get back to you
5. Engineer gets back to you say that the problem is related to them but they do not have the expertise to fix it nor the budget
6. Inform your boss about this and discuss with him
7. Set up a meeting between the manager of both projects
8. more shit stuff
9. more shit stuff

Yes, sometimes our lives can get quite bad in IT line. but it is a good illustration and our friends in other industry can attest that one small problem can remain small but most times they just get bigger and bigger and take longer and longer.

The above 2 serves as examples of why certain task, you have to break them down into projects with actionable steps. Had they remain as the original task entry, you will not see what needs to be done. I can list down the steps to this xamples well because i have experience with them, but sadly not everything is like that. Making them actionable and asking “What is the next action?” would enable you to kick start the engine to perform the work.

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Introduction

For those new to this article, it is part of a series of articles where I share my GTD system.

Part 1 here talks about my plan and overview of my GTD system

Part 2 here talks about why i eventually chose iPod Touch 2G as my main to do list console

Part 3 here talks about why i choose Appigo ToDo for iPhone as my main task manager

Part 4 here talks about how to plan for big projects and smaller projects

Part 5 here talks about how to make use of Contexts, Tags to Execute your tasks

Part 6 here discuss about how you can review projects better using iThoughts mind mapping software

In this Part 2 of the series I will share about some of my past systems that i used to do organizing and planning as well as my default choice now.

My past systems

I tried quite a fair bit of systems before this since my school days years ago.

Microsoft Outlook

I have never know to use a to do list but find out Microsoft Office opens me to a software that almost every knows about in Microsoft Outlook. It was fashion as an email client, but it does provide a rather robust Calendar, Contact List and To Do list functionality.

Problem

I thought the first thing that i don’t like about it is how hard it is to clear off all the done tasks from the list! I never had problem with the Calendars and Contacts but that is one aspect that i cannot stand.

What got me off this system wasn’t that however. As a student then, it involves alot of moving to school and really i cannot sync my task management system when in school since during that time computer wasn’t that advance and not many schools have very fully functional computers.

PDAs – The Sony Clie and the Windows Mobile PDAs

As i approach university, i began to use my hard earned pocket money on PDAs. They were expensive then, but damn were they useful.  You can plan your time table and create reminders and read books on them.

I especially like my experience with the Palm based Sony Clie. Its very responsive and together with Agendus for palm it was enough for me then.

I subsequently sold off my palm when i decide to move over to Windows Mobile Platform. My options were to get a PDA and i promptly got a HP iPaq 2210. The windows mobile platform offers more software and functionality, but also more niggling problems such as memory leak, crashes and all. But with Pocket Informant, it turned out to be one of the best capturing and organizing platform. I got myself a second hand O2 Mini when i decide to try an integrated device.

Problem

However, it is during this period that i realise the flaws of the To-Do list. Even with a robust software like Pocket Informant, having a single layer task management system  without buckets or multiple lists just does not make sense, cause that is just so much you can put in categories until it overwhelms you.

It is also during this period that i realise i got alot of tasks note down but which one do i do first? Before GTD, I got to the point where i didn’t check on my list for some time and just got completely off the system

Web Based Remember the Milk Heaven

In the first years of my working life, I had a much earlier experience compared to my peers on cloud computing and one of the first software that caught my attention was Remember the Milk.

Remember the Milk is a web based To Do list software that is hosted on their private server. There are paid versions and free ones but really if you are using web based task management the free one will just suffice.

Its got to be one of the most extensive javascript application that i have ever seen. Everything occurs almost on one single page and it works because of the extensiveness of ajax scripting.

When i first saw it i was thinking why i will not use it. I wouldn’t be online most of the time, if i don’t have internet connection, does that mean i can’t plan and do stuff any more? Luckily, Remember the milk have incorporated Google Gears which allow offline viewing. (its really well done.)

I really feel this is the right system and i blog about it extensively here how i used to work with it. Do take a look at this article to find out more.

[Read the rest of this entry...]

Introduction

Folks will be interested to find out how i actually carried out the things thatI often blog about. And this series of articles is an illustration to show how i actually do that.

Part 1 here talks about my plan and overview of my GTD system

Part 2 here talks about why i eventually chose iPod Touch 2G as my main to do list console

Part 3 here talks about why i choose Appigo ToDo for iPhone as my main task manager

Part 4 here talks about how to plan for big projects and smaller projects

Part 5 here talks about how to make use of Contexts, Tags to Execute your tasks

Part 6 here discuss about how you can review projects better using iThoughts mind mapping software

For this series, I will talk about how i carried out Getting Things Done in my daily personal and work life.

What is Getting Things Done and why do I use it?

Getting Things Done is a method Mr David Allen came up with to help get things out of your brain so that it frees up the memory and processing capabilities of our tiny brain to do the things that actually matters.

Simply put, its  a productivity and organizing technique that serves an alternative to Stephen Covey and his method listed in The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.

Getting Things Done or GTD in short ain’t something new. Its been blogged about for sometime but I would recommend for people who want to practice this seriously to pick up David Allen’s book and read it. You won’t get a better picture then from the man himself trust me.

I know different people work differently but perhaps you can contrast it against Stephen Covey’s methods. In that case, do pick up his book to find out more about his method.

I always wondered if i can organize what i do and the things and people that i worked with better and i used to bump around solutions to make things work, organize tasks so that it makes sense to me. But sooner i realise that it just not working. I would just stay away from my task / todo list or my calendar cause they just don’t make sense.

My Experience With the 4 Quadrants

I even tried out marking things into the 4 categories listed in 7 habits of highly effective people and really to me its very hard to make sense.

Consider things like:

Its a good thing to focus on the 80/20 rule, which is the 20% that is most important and matters, but really, as an individual, the 80% needs to get done as well.

Another gripe about this system is that what if the important and urgent things gets too much. Which one should you focus on first? Hey, they are all important and urgent isn’t it?

Do also note that things that are Important and not urgent would eventually move into Important but urgent. In that case, you will really get your hands tied up with alot of important and urgent stuff.

I always think that this only address the problems of managers who look at things on the strategic levels. When you are a small fry like i am, I have to think about the strategic stuff and worry about the small, time intensive things that i cannot delegate to others since i am the lowest of the lowest.

Why i find Getting Things Done better

GTD in a sense, is a god send. I used to think that GTD is all about creating Tasks and categories. That was before i read David Allen’s book and realise that it actually make a lot of practical sense compare to the 7 Habits.

Applying the living with it shows that its not the perfect system. Rather people spend alot of time creating the perfect GTD system. But hey, i think it gives quite alot of tools in the book to create your own system compare to the other book.

It makes sense to me because it explains strategic and day-to-day planning for an individual well.

The 6 Levels of Focus

The 6 perspectives illustrates planning at different levels and how it all adds up.

• The small Actions forms the goal to finish the Projects.
• The projects will eventually satisfy the Area of Responsibility
• Reaching the goals set for your area of responsibility will satisfy your Yearly Goals
• Which should be inline with your Life Goals or 5 Yearly Goals

As an illustration, I will not list out my Vision, Yearly Goals upwards but my Area of Responsibilities.

I don’t think i need to defined whether they are for work of personal since its pretty intuitive. These areas will eventually be your Big Project Buckets or Lists and you might get increase area of responsibility when

• you evaluate that you have new personal goals, and what is the big areas of responsibility that you need to achieve it. e.g. take good care of grandmother whose health is not in the best condition
• when your boss adds more assignments to you such that, you need special attention to it as it consumes much of your mental and physical resources e.g. handle the transition and knowledge transfer of Project B

My Work flow Process

Your work flow process will take care of how you execute the stuff that you get spammed with in life and how to make sense of it physically. Normally this would be where most people need the most help since people don’t normally think every day about what i want to achieve rather when would be a good time to do task A or task B or should i file or throw away this brochure.

The work flow process described treats every thing that comes along as a conveyor belt that gets rinse and repeated every time things comes along your way:

I am not gonna overload you by explaining my workflow but i will be explaining in the subsequent posts how all these will pan out. Having such a workflow looks complex but really it isn’t. Let me just say that without such workflow things that goes within your brain is even more complex than this diagram!

Conclusion

I realise the hard way that its not at all about coming up with the most fool proof plan. You learn along the way the flaws about your plan, about yourself and you improve upon it.

But i do realise that everyone is searching for the holy grail but perhaps there isn’t.Thats why i blog about this so that i hope people can contrast against the way i do things and refine or justify that what they do is better or worse than mine.

Next Up i will talk about Appigo ToDo, my current Life Planning Project Management software.

[Productive Organizer GTD Series Part 2:iPod Touch as an organizer]