“Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out”...Anton Chekhov
In the modern days, we all have mastered the art of procrastination to the extent that we have attained the expertise at the cost of getting stressed out. For example, let us take the example of saving money for Income tax exemptions. We know even in April that how much one needed to save. We knew even in April that it takes a bit of thinking to invest wisely in a good savings instrument. We knew even in April it would help to save systematically over the financial year. And, We knew even in April that my Organization asks for the proof of savings in January of that next year. Despite knowing these, How many of us rushed in the last moment to put money in dud investment merely for the sake of “producing the proof” of investment?
Our day-today living is nothing but a string of such projects or tasks in personal & professional life that we are aware of, but not willing to apply more thought to make them happen unless it becomes an emergency. If you ask my wife, she would tell that I am not fit enough to write this article because of my inertia to action...Nevertheless, I would like to share the solution that I learnt from the book “Getting Things Done”..by David Allen(in short GTD). I would suggest you all to read the book.
David Allen proposes the following process to effectively keep track of all your tasks to completion...Collect,Process,Organize,Review,Do (strictly in that order)
Collect :
You should trust your memory only if you want to fail. So, collect all your “To-Dos” to a trusted “Inbox”. As you remember about something to do, just make sure to record it outside of your brain that you can retrieve it later. I usually carry a pocket notebook and pen to record the things through the day and later I transfer it to my “Inbox”. I would recommend rememberthemilk or Todoist applications as your Inbox simply because they are Cloud based Apps. In my example above, I would record in my Inbox as Investments for Tax exemptions
Process:
“Process” phase is to determine what you needed to do with each of the item in your “Inbox”. So pick the item at the top of the “Inbox” & ask yourself the following questions ...
“Is this a Task or Project?” :… A task has a physical action associated with it, while a Project is a series of tasks with sequence and priority. So, the Investments for Tax exemptions is a Project that would need set of tasks such as Identifying the Savings instrument, Determining the amount to invest & When to invest? If it is a project ,it becomes all the more important to determine the set of tasks to be done.
“Who should do it?” : Is this task needing action from you or someone else?
“Is there a date & time associated ? ”
This is an important step, because, unless you drill down your project or task to a physical action (called as Next Actions) that you need to do your project may not move forward at all.
Organize :
For Organizing your tasks, you got to have the placeholder for your Calendar & Next actions list. Then you need to organize your tasks using the “4D Rule “ ….Do It ; Defer It ; Delegate It; Delete It;
If a task is no longer relevant you just Delete it off your list
If a task needs to be done by somebody else, you need to Delegate it;
If a task requires 2-minutes of your time to do, such as calling the Investment consultant you should Just Do It(Nike!) ;
If it requires more than 2-minutes and is going to happen at a specific date & time, it goes into your Calendar (Defer It); If there is no specific time date & time and it has to be ASAP , it goes into the Next Actions list.(Defer It)
Review:
This is the periodic review (at least Weekly) of your “Inbox” & process/organize to be focused only on the relevant stuff. This step cannot be overemphasized as without a periodic review ,the “Inbox” becomes defunct & useless. Please set aside at least 1 hour every week to review all your meeting notes, Calendar ,Next Actions list & “Inbox” to ensure that your tasks don’t fall through the crack
Do:
As surprising as it may seem, Doing is the last phase. And Please, no more daily To-Do lists. You may then ask : “It is 9:00 am…What do I need to do?” … You just go through the Calendar to look for an appointment; If none of them exist, you pick an item from the Next Actions and do it;
This is the essence of GTD. And yes it is a bit longish and requires discipline / trial & error till you hit upon the sweet spot of doing things on-time ,every time…Nevertheless I guarantee you will not feel disappointed ..Why not try it?
In the modern days, we all have mastered the art of procrastination to the extent that we have attained the expertise at the cost of getting stressed out. For example, let us take the example of saving money for Income tax exemptions. We know even in April that how much one needed to save. We knew even in April that it takes a bit of thinking to invest wisely in a good savings instrument. We knew even in April it would help to save systematically over the financial year. And, We knew even in April that my Organization asks for the proof of savings in January of that next year. Despite knowing these, How many of us rushed in the last moment to put money in dud investment merely for the sake of “producing the proof” of investment?
Our day-today living is nothing but a string of such projects or tasks in personal & professional life that we are aware of, but not willing to apply more thought to make them happen unless it becomes an emergency. If you ask my wife, she would tell that I am not fit enough to write this article because of my inertia to action...Nevertheless, I would like to share the solution that I learnt from the book “Getting Things Done”..by David Allen(in short GTD). I would suggest you all to read the book.
David Allen proposes the following process to effectively keep track of all your tasks to completion...Collect,Process,Organize,Review,Do (strictly in that order)
Collect :
You should trust your memory only if you want to fail. So, collect all your “To-Dos” to a trusted “Inbox”. As you remember about something to do, just make sure to record it outside of your brain that you can retrieve it later. I usually carry a pocket notebook and pen to record the things through the day and later I transfer it to my “Inbox”. I would recommend rememberthemilk or Todoist applications as your Inbox simply because they are Cloud based Apps. In my example above, I would record in my Inbox as Investments for Tax exemptions
Process:
“Process” phase is to determine what you needed to do with each of the item in your “Inbox”. So pick the item at the top of the “Inbox” & ask yourself the following questions ...
“Is this a Task or Project?” :… A task has a physical action associated with it, while a Project is a series of tasks with sequence and priority. So, the Investments for Tax exemptions is a Project that would need set of tasks such as Identifying the Savings instrument, Determining the amount to invest & When to invest? If it is a project ,it becomes all the more important to determine the set of tasks to be done.
“Who should do it?” : Is this task needing action from you or someone else?
“Is there a date & time associated ? ”
This is an important step, because, unless you drill down your project or task to a physical action (called as Next Actions) that you need to do your project may not move forward at all.
Organize :
For Organizing your tasks, you got to have the placeholder for your Calendar & Next actions list. Then you need to organize your tasks using the “4D Rule “ ….Do It ; Defer It ; Delegate It; Delete It;
If a task is no longer relevant you just Delete it off your list
If a task needs to be done by somebody else, you need to Delegate it;
If a task requires 2-minutes of your time to do, such as calling the Investment consultant you should Just Do It(Nike!) ;
If it requires more than 2-minutes and is going to happen at a specific date & time, it goes into your Calendar (Defer It); If there is no specific time date & time and it has to be ASAP , it goes into the Next Actions list.(Defer It)
Review:
This is the periodic review (at least Weekly) of your “Inbox” & process/organize to be focused only on the relevant stuff. This step cannot be overemphasized as without a periodic review ,the “Inbox” becomes defunct & useless. Please set aside at least 1 hour every week to review all your meeting notes, Calendar ,Next Actions list & “Inbox” to ensure that your tasks don’t fall through the crack
Do:
As surprising as it may seem, Doing is the last phase. And Please, no more daily To-Do lists. You may then ask : “It is 9:00 am…What do I need to do?” … You just go through the Calendar to look for an appointment; If none of them exist, you pick an item from the Next Actions and do it;
This is the essence of GTD. And yes it is a bit longish and requires discipline / trial & error till you hit upon the sweet spot of doing things on-time ,every time…Nevertheless I guarantee you will not feel disappointed ..Why not try it?
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