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I'm a big fan of GTD, which stands for Getting Things Done and is an approach to getting organized at work, at home, and in you life in general. You are supposed to keep track of all tasks you are supposed to do, in their respectful contexts.

By following the GTD principles, you can radically reduce the amount of stress in your life just by knowing exactly what you have to do, when you can do it, and most importantly - that you're not forgetting anything that needs to be done.

I'm not going to talk about the GTD theory here anymore, and just would like to share how I process information (tasks, reporting to other people, etc) at my workplace. This system proved to be effective and easy to use. At least for me :)

I use 3 tools: my monitor, a calendar and a bunch of post-it-notes.

Here's a picture of how monitor looks like. And the explanation will follow:

(you can click on the picture for a close-up)

How it works:

1. Inbox

I am usually getting lots of various tasks/mini-jobs etc during my work. Do this, fix that, take care of that server blah blah. There are also bigger "projects" like "add that feature". When such a task comes, the first thing I do about it is writing it on a post-it note, and stick it to the right side of my monitor. That's my Inbox.

I then can easily change priority of tasks, and see me workload at a glance (so I can say "Sorry, this can't be done today" without thinking twice, when I'm busy. Highest priority tasks go to the top.

I usually keep some space at the very top of the "Inbox", unless I have a very urgent job that needs to be done NOW (server is down and needs fix or something that needs to be fixes in next 2 hours, etc.. kind of stuff) . Once the topmost spot is occupied, I know that: I have a job that needs to be done FAST and NOW, and that I can't take any more urgent jobs. So this "topmost spot" proved to be very useful in lowering stress level at work. As you can see on the picture, I currently have no urgent jobs, so I can write this blog entry :)

The area below is for 1st tier jobs which needs to be done in next few days, then goes 2nd tier of jobs which needs to be done during next week or so, and lastly, goes a sort of "someday, but don't defer for too long" stuff.

As I noticed above, I can very easily change priority of jobs depending on situation. I can "stack " mini-tasks by sticking post-it notes above each other (for, say, lots of fixes on a single project, most of them taking 5-10 minutes). Stuff usually gets "stacked" when I'm getting fixes requests by phone. In case of email, I can just print out the list and track my progress there - but of course I would also have an "Inbox" entry stating "fix ….".

2. Completed stuff

It is very encouraging to have a list of your achievements, even if they are small. So, this is the place where I move completed tasks from the Inbox area of my monitor.

3. Deferred reports outbox

Sometimes I need to report about a job being complete, so somebody. I usually do it right after the task is complete, but if the person is unreachable at the time, I move the complete task to this area. Once I have reported on the task, I move the post-it note to Completed stuff area

4. External memory

This area is usually empty. I sometimes use it to store information I need to remember & I need to remember that I have this information. Sort of.. weird I guess :) In this case, I need to remember amount of money I have spent on mobile Internet which I need to report to the company I work at in order to get my money returned. But this will happen only after I get the details from my mobile operator. Sort of.. enless cycle :) Need to remember it. :)

And there's  of course a calendar I use. But there's nothing too fancy about its usage :)

Well that's basically how I have adapted the GTD system for my needs. There are lots of electronic organizers over there, and lots of GTD apps, but I found that there's nothing easier to use (and keep using) than tasks in their physical form of post-it notes.

Well that's it :)

This entry was posted on Friday, September 21st, 2007 at 1:56 pm and is filed under Misc blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.