Community Contribution from Jason Verly
On April 3, 2010, Apple released the iPad to the world. A day later I completely changed how I do my weekly reviews. Like most avid GTD’ers, I kept my weekly review to be a sacred and solemn time. I normally did my reviews on Sunday evening in my home office so I could really dig into what was happening so I could get clear about what I had coming up the next week. My weekly review was anchored to a time and place where I believed I needed to be to get through my lists. Not anymore.
The weekend the iPad came out my weekly review was done on the couch sitting next to my 5y old son while he watched a movie. I have to tell you, it was great. I was in a relaxed place, with little distraction, and I was able to focus and process like never before. Now before you hit enter on your comment asking how could I concentrate while sitting next to my son while he was watching a movie or stating there is no way someone could get a good weekly review done in that kind of setting, see if you can give me two more minutes to explain. I’ll bet I can convince you it can be done in that kind of setting and it is so worth it.
Quick, think of the three most important things to you? Got them? Great.
Do any of those things relate to some area of focus at one of your higher elevations? They do? Perfect, now you can do a weekly review on an iPad. Honest.
When I did my weekly review on my iPad I was able to do it while embracing an important area of focus for me – spend time with family. My son didn’t care that I wasn’t watching the movie, but that night it was important for him just to have me sitting next to him. I had my list manager open, was able to process my inbox, fire off a few emails, jot down some notes for later reference, and plan for my coming week on my calendar. The iPad offered a lower intrusion barrier while sitting there with my son and that was what made things nearly perfect.
As I’ve continued to do my weekly reviews on my iPad for the past month I’ve learned a few things about my system and have made a few adjustments. For example, I started to see my contexts list was starting to get out of control. I had @computer:work, @computer:home, @computer:Maximo, @computer:reports. Reviewing on my iPad allowed me to see that I had some contexts lined up almost 1:1 for a project list. Culling my contexts down has made reviewing and lining up what to do next even easier.
Now I will be the first to admit that doing your weekly review on an iPad may not be for everyone. For some, their weekly review is like I mentioned before, a solemn and sacred time for them to get clear – almost like meditating. If that’s your style, great, stick with it. No need to fix something that isn’t broken. My transition from laptop and desk chair to iPad and lounge chair was probably a little easier because I’m basically using all the tools I had before. I have an iPhone and a Mac, so most of the tools I had previously been using as part of my weekly reviews were ported almost seamlessly to the iPad.
The iPad’s form factor has also allowed me to do more mini-reviews and capture sessions. For example, I knew for a long time there was a gap in my system where I wasn’t doing a good job capturing action items form meetings. I have terrible hand writing and just the thought of having to try to review my notes repulsed me. Those notes would previously gone into my paper inbox for later processing. Now I just hold back for an extra 10-15 minutes after a meeting and capture my action items or needed follow-ups in electronic format.
OK… now you can you hit submit on your comment.
FWIW: The entire article was created, edited, and posted to GTD Staff via my iPad and iPhone.
Jason Verly is a Project Manager during the day and a tech crazy husband and father of two at night. He is avid GTD’er, longtime GTD Connect member, and can be reached via email or on Twitter as @MyGeekDaddy.
Jason, perhaps you could also share which tools you use on your iPad to do the review, i.e. which list manager works for you, etc.
Very nice article Jason! I don’t always do my weekly review on my Ipad but I do find when I’m not at home the Ipad is a great way for me to keep doing GTD. Thanks for sharing your story.
Cool, I continue using the MacBook for the WR, but that may change with the version of OF for the iPad… we will see
Kevin: I use OmniFocus as my list manager. I then sync my tasks across my devices via MobileMe. I use the iPad iWork suite to review documents and use GoodReader for PDF viewing/management. All other tools are stock iPad apps: Mail, Calendar, Notes, etc.
Jason, I talked to a friend who owns an iPad about this & he cautioned me that the iPad has no keyboard– just touch input. How do you deal with that?
I use both the touch keyboard and the keyboard dock. If you can do standard QWERTY typing, I believe you can adapt to the touch keyboard easily. If you have an iPhone you’ll adjust even faster because you’ll be used to how the iPhone OS predictive typing works.
FWIW: I would guess 1/3 to 1/2 the article was written via the touch keyboard.
I agree with Jason that everything changes when you have that iPad form factor. I have done my last two on the back porch, under a fan, with my feet up.
Once you get past the ugliness of OmniFu blown up to 2X size, you realize you have everything you need. In (hopefully) June, when OmniFu for the iPad is shipping, you will also have esthetic satisfaction.
Good article! This is why I would love to have an iPad.
Thanks for the article. I’m a GTD newbie, and an iPad newbie. I have been using the netcentrics gtd plugin for outlook on my work pc and was wondering whether anyone has tried syncing with one of the ipad apps and whether they’ve experienced any issues – good or bad.
I agree that the ipad is extremely convenient for a large percentage of things i do. I’d love to integrate it into my gtd system because i think i’ll have a higher probability of success. Thanks for comments…
If you want to sync your tasks from Outlook, then you could go with a variety of list managers: Appigo To Do, ToodleDo, or Remember the Milk. These list managers require an online account to centralize the synchronization between your Outlook data and the iPad list manager.
Great article, read it on my iPad in front of the TV on Friday evening :). I will do my weekly review this week on the iPad and will see how it goes. I think it will improve my WR, reduces the resistance to getting started (I dislike having to go to my home office on the weekend and spend time away from the kids). On iPad I use the Things app as I could not stand the OF interface from the iPhone app. Also find myself doing a lot more mind maps using the iThoughtsHD app. Really good and can export to MindManger on my laptop. I love the keyboard on the iPad as well, very easy to use.
Thanks for the great thoughts
Interesting stuff and a great point about spending time with family and doing your work at the same time.. instead of hiding away in the office or at the desk. What a win-win situation
But, Jason, do you do all your weekly reviews like that?
For me your style seems perfect for the two first parts of the weekly review if you split it up into “Get Clear, Get Current and Get Creative”
.. but how do you get “properly” creative?
Do you have all your project plans, drafts, written-down-ideas etc. on the iPad and are you able to juggle with all your creative components in the lounge chair and on the iPad form factor (i.e. (IMO) not high-speed-typing friendly, not so much screen-real-estate to unfold the big mindmaps, spreadsheets or plans, not near to your reference files and physical project folders)?
I’ve been trying to keep my reviews on my iPad partly as an experiment, but mostly as a way to force other aspects of how I work to conform to being able to do the review on an iPad. For example, I’m guessing I’ve increased the number of emails I send to myself from from 0-5 per day to 15-20 per day. The email may include an attachment I need as reference during my review or it could get fed into OmniFocus to automatically create a new task for me. The point is I know the formats I have to play with on an iPad to allow me to get my review done. This is making my collection phase to be a much tighter process.
Am I getting 100% collected? No, but I can see the results in how my upcoming week is getting planned and the accuracy of my collection steps are better now than they were when I did my review sitting at my desk on a Sunday night. Am I getting better? I sure am. I’ve closed a gap that I knew existed in my system for a long time related to meeting minutes, I’ve cleaned up my contexts, and I’m able to do this in a manner that’s less obtrusive to me and my family.
My goal for my weekly review is to get my inboxes empty, process/file new information I’ve collected in the past week, plan out my upcoming week, review/update my action lists and take care of any two minute or less action items. For creative parts, like mind mapping a new process or delving into a deeper review of some action, those become tasks that I will do outside of my weekly review.
The keyboard and the predictive typing the iPhone OS is definitely something you have to get used to. I know I’m not as fast on the touch keyboard as I am on a normal keyboard. But the amount of typing I have to do in my review, as compared to the capture phase, is much smaller. My list manager’s inbox is pretty much filled out due to the emails getting processed by OmniFocus.
Hope this helps.
This post seems too much like an iPad advertisement to me (especially with that travel mug in the picture). I don’t see the advantage of doing your weekly review on an iPad versus a laptop, since the main virtue you’ve espoused here is its portability. Am I missing something?
Christine beat me to the same question. I’m guessing your life wasn’t changed by watching Avatar in 3d either, Christine?
There is definitely a difference between doing a review on an iPad and doing it on a laptop. Portability was only part of the appeal I’ve found with doing my weekly reviews on my iPad. The biggest difference I found was the perception barrier and tool sets when using an iPad. I was able to sit down next to my son for an hour and get through a review that I normally would have done upstairs and away from him. I probably would not have pulled out my laptop and done the same thing because of how I feel a laptop intrudes in that kind of space. Now that’s just me. I know plenty of parents who are comfortable sitting down and pulling out their laptop on the couch with their kids. Great, that works for them and they are able to get things done.
Ultimately, do what works for you so that you are getting a weekly review done. That should be the biggest thing to take away from the post. And the picture… I did that just for fun.
Craig – Thanks for the tip on iThoughtsHD. Grabbed the app after reading your comment.
I like to have the iPad in Landscape mode, and not be forced to have the keyboard attached, so the Apple Bluetooth wireless keyboard works well. The black Apple case allows the iPad to be tilted up in Landscape mode.
I just got my iPad and am fascinated with the thought of using it for the weekly review. For those uncomfortable with the touchscreen typing (I’m used to it now because I have an iPhone), try the Dragon dictation app. It allows you to speak and then copy the text into any app you like. It’s quite amazing..
The speed of the iPad has made a world of difference for me. It simply takes too long for my laptop to fire up. I often let ideas go because I didn’t feel like waiting for my laptop to boot, or even for my iPhone to open an app (still on an old 3G….4 is in the near future). This is the same logic that requires me to keep those things I need most often near my desk.
Jason is right about how different the iPad feels from a laptop.
Jason – I’ve got one big hurdle that I can’t seem to get over with this. I use the Netcentrics GTD plug in. When I send my task list info over to ToodleDo, I cannot find a way to send the Netcentrics specific fields over (Project, etc). How did you handle this?
Thanks for any advice you can give!