Question: You say you shouldn’t write anything on a day when it doesn’t absolutely have to be finished by then. Furthermore, you tell that priorities are depended on time, energy and a lot more, but I miss one thing there: deadlines. What if I make a list of things to do, and find on Monday that there was something I should have done on Saturday or Sunday, but didn’t do it because I didn’t go through my entire list?
David Allen: Deadlines (especially “hard” ones that you have external commitments about) should be tracked on the Projects list, and any pre-warnings inserted on appropriate dates in your calendar (that’s “day-specific information”, e.g. “Budget due in 10 days” would be on your calendar 10 days ahead. ) That, plus regular Weekly Reviews, prevents what you describe — missing deadlines.
I am missing the logic. Isn’t the very definition of a deadline something that has to be finished “by then”? Put that date on the calendar! And check your calendar along with your list of next actions.
I agree that this does not look inherently logical. A note that “X is due in 10 days” is really a tickler, not a hard calendar item. However, on an electronic calendar, you are very often combining your calendar and your tickler file (whether they are notes or tasks) in the same screen shot Many of the new paper calenders include a notes section that you can use as a tickler file.
If you find that you are not doing a full weekly review, adding tickler notes to your calendar (paper or electronic) might be a big help. This is especially useful for events that require only one or two discrete steps ahead of time so you don’t automatically think of them as a project that you have listed next actions for.
Hello there,
Well, a deadline could also be applicable to a next action, not only a project. E.g. ‘draft report on xyz’ needs to be done by Thursday. If my Weekly Review happened last Friday and the this next action popped up Monday, following my understanding of the GTD recommendations, here’s what I would do: –
– On Monday, create a next action (in the appropriate context, perhaps @Office) called ‘draft report on xyz’
I could leave it undated, or since this has a deadline, set it’s due date to Thursday.
And then I move onto some other task…
There’s some chance here that I may miss seeing the ‘draft report on xyz’ until it stares at me in the face on Thursday! And then I’m in crisis mode.
I just described it for one next action; imagine this multiplied by many more.
What’s a good suggestion here? Basically, in this example, I have tried to describe what I struggle with the most about GTD: setting a date to a next action only if it absolutely must be done on that day, otherwise just leave it undated.
The way I see or follow it at least, I see lot of potential here to miss out doing tasks until the date they’re actually due. And yes, I do scan my next actions multiple times a day and do my review weekly.
Any suggestions (to improve my understanding or implementation of GTD) would be highly appreciated.
Thanks much!
Sajid.
Hello Sajid,
I am very judicious in how I use due dates, so that I trust them, but I also use them to get my attention on something. Often I’ll add a due date to get me to do it by a certain date, even if it won’t really expire by then.
Kelly