Get Everything Done

Imagine a bunch of children going on a hike. They are all trying to arrive at the campsite together so they can have a cookout.

Left to themselves, it is natural for the fastest children to work their way to the front, and the slowest children to fall to the back. Eventually, each child finds an optimum pace for himself or herself. This is fine for each child. But it has negative effects on the group as a whole. They are trying to reach the campsite together, so they can enjoy the campout together. The early hikers may have to wait a long time before the late hikers finally catch up to them at the campsite. Perhaps this is a minor issue, but it can have strongly negative consequences. Since the children are so spread out, it is easier for them to become lost. It is easier for the frontrunners to get bored and start the campfire on their own, depriving the latecomers of this pleasure. In other words it becomes difficult to keep the entire troop aligned toward a common goal and common experience.

A more complex situation makes these alignment issues more obvious and severe. Let's say you are in charge of a number of children, trying to get through the subway system in a foreign city on your way from the hotel to a point of interest on the other side of the city. This involves walking along sidewalks, entering the subway, getting on and off the trains, maneuvering through transfer points, emerging from the subway, and then more walking on more roads and paths. In such a scenario, the alignment issues become much more obvious. If everyone goes at their own optimum pace, they will not only get spread out, there is also a much larger chance of getting separated or lost or even injured. At a minimum, there are delays and annoyance as you shout and fuss and try to get everyone to stay together.

The negative effects at the group level can be described as an increase in WIP (work-in-process) and an accompanying increase in misalignment. The WIP is represented by the amount of road covered by the group. The frontrunner passes a milestone, thus beginning the group's conquest of that piece of the road.. Fifteen minutes later the last person passes the same milestone, thus completing the group's conquest of that piece of the road. Thus you could say the WIP is "15 minutes". Or another way to look at it, you could measure the distance between the first child and the last child; perhaps it's half a mile. So the WIP would be "half a mile". As the front child continues to go faster at his or her own pace, the distance increases. Thus, allowing each child to go at his or her own optimal pace, has the inevitable result that the WIP will increase.

As the WIP increases, the result is greater and greater misalignment. The risk of getting lost increases, as well as all the other risks. To address these problems, the leader is always calling for a halt to get everyone regrouped, causing delays and frustration for everyone.

The general concept is this. Whenever you optimize for flow at the local level, it causes WIP and misalignment to increase.

So how can this problem be fixed? One easy solution is to put the slowest person in front, and ask everyone else to stay behind that person. This will have the immediate impact of compressing the line, which represents a reduction of WIP. This also greatly simplifies all the alignment issues.

However, this solution creates annoyance for almost everyone. The faster children don't like being stuck behind the slowest person. They are bored and frustrated. They *will* arrive at their destination more quickly and have more time for the group activity -- but the only person enjoying the hike at his or her own optimal pace is the slowest person. And the knowledge of that fact can make the person feel uncomfortable, embarrassed, or even guilty.

The concept is extensible to any kind of organizational effort. Let's say you have six Agile development teams working together toward a common software release. The Agile methodology advocates for self-organizing teams that optimizes the flow of work through the team. It is exhilarating to be part of such a team - it's easy to get into a strong flow state, with strong focus, engagement, and execution, with a strong sense of accomplishment at the end of each step. However, it can be very challenging to align several Agile teams toward a common objective, common priorities, and a common schedule. They easily get out of sync with each other. When they do try to stay in sync, the overhead of coordination across teams causes severe disruptions to the flow within each individual team. There is a lot of pushback and resistance, as the teams resent your interfering with their flow and their self-determination.

I think these concepts are pertinent to time-management systems as well. I am reflecting on my experiences with systems that optimize for the flow of each task -- reducing resistance to each task. AF1, FVP, and Randomizer come to mind. They are all excellent at reducing resistance to any given task to near zero. This alone increases one's speed and capacity to take on work - often by orders of magnitude. But as the above examples demonstrate, it also has the unintended side effect of increasing WIP and misalignment between the tasks. And this means, at some point the lists can grow out of control; it becomes harder to stay focused on the larger outcomes; more attention is given to random administrivia and diversion tasks; and eventual resistance to the list as a whole.

Each system has various rules or techniques to compensate for this. For example, AF1 has the dismissal rule -- this gets rid of the extra WIP that isn't moving forward anymore. This can be effective but as we learned, it's difficult to carry out in practice. It is also a form of waste. It's like making a deliberate decision to leave some of the children behind. Maybe some of the children never even started walking down the path, so it's OK to leave them behind. Basically they decided not to come along on the trip. But maybe some of the children have already traveled some distance along the path -- and then we cut them off. This represents wasted effort. The dismissal rule is also a rather blunt instrument, and can create additional misalignments.

Probably the quintessential example of systems that have no explicit mechanism for aligning to larger outcomes is Randomizer. It makes no distinction between tasks and has no mechanism at all for ensuring alignment between them, nor aligning tasks to a larger purpose. One can enter tasks like "Project A" to help ensure that individual tasks for Project A are captured and actioned, but you really do need to rely on these kinds of techniques since the system's algorithm itself cannot ensure alignment. You also need to add meta-tasks like "weed the list", or enter some items multiple times so they get more attention, etc.

These observations match up with my own experience with the list-based systems. I know I am unusual in just how large my WIP could get (often exceeding 1000 tasks with these systems), but I don't think the basic experience was really unusual at all. My lists were always growing, things would feel out of alignment, I would eventually tend to process more administrivia and feel out of sync with my larger objectives. I was always trying to come up with mechanisms to get more focus on larger outcomes -- but they would always end up fatally interfering with the flow and engagement at the task level. Many of us reported these kinds of things. Often Mark would introduce new systems specifically to address these kinds of shortcomings in previous systems.

So please don't think I'm saying any of these systems are "bad" -- they are all still very effective. The reduction in resistance creates so much speed and capacity that a lot more can be accomplished. And the systems really engage one's intuition, generating a constant stream of insights into the dynamics of one's work.

The main thing I am pointing out here, is I think there is actually a theoretical, logical basis underneath many of these unintended negative effects. Let's find a way to leverage this inherent logic to get the flow AND the alignment.

In the end, the children-on-a-hike example made very plain to me that optimizing flow for individual tasks will inevitably increase WIP and misalignment. Thus, these systems need a systematic mechanism for generating the alignment as well. In fact, I think we need a mechanism to optimize for overall system flow and throughput, rather than individual task flow and throughput. But I don't see how to achieve this, without sacrificing the wonderful flow and engagement at the task level. And while we all work towards larger outcomes, we all "live" at the local, task level. That's where the action happens.

Lately I see this conflict everywhere I look - the conflict between local flow/engagement/responsiveness/effectiveness on one hand, and the global outcomes/alignment/delivery-to-commitment on the other hand. It's a deep fundamental conflict. The way we typically address such conflicts is with tradeoffs or compromises -- but this only favors one side of the conflict or the other -- *** it doesn't eliminate the conflict ***. There must be a way to eliminate it.

Ideas?

Thank you, Mark - I really like your analogy. Let me try to distill out the key principles and see if I understand you correctly.

Both of our analogies recognize that misalignment arises from excess WIP. I think they differ in the identification of the cause of the WIP.

Following the Tough Mudder analogy, you want to allow each task to find its own level. Thus you need to limit how many tasks you allow onto the list in the first place.

Your mechanism for doing this has always been to keep a tight limit on your overall commitments and projects, as represented by the “authorized project list”, the DIT “audit of commitments”, and so forth. The hard decisions should be made at this level. This is the mechanism that controls who is allowed onto the field. If this mechanism is functioning properly, then in the day-to-day processing of your tasks, you can optimize for the flow of each individual task and it won’t create the problems I described. But if the gate isn’t functioning correctly, the result is overcommitment - and that is the primary cause of the WIP getting out of control, which disrupts the flow of tasks and creates the misalignment problems.

Is that essentially what you are saying?

Matt Gregory -

<< That prompted some rough early morning, pre-coffee thoughts, so forgive me if this is not that coherent. >>

No, it is quite coherent! :-)

I think you are pointing in the same direction as Mark. The mechanism for controlling overall WIP should be happening at the commitment level, not at the task level. But I think you describe quite clearly how difficult that can be. The audit procedure engages a very different part of the brain than the intuitive, stand-out procedure that we use for selecting tasks. It can be very jarring to break away from that intuitive flow, and try to force clarity at the commitment level.

It's especially difficult for those of us who spend most of our time in chaotic and complex environments, where it's frequently unclear whether or how some new demand on our time is connected to existing commitments. Sometimes these things need some percolation and exploration before the real connection (or lack thereof) becomes clear. I don't think any of that exploration is waste - we are getting valuable information from it. But it can lead to waste if this percolation process takes too long, or there is so much stuff in the percolator that it gets clogged up and can't process everything effectively.

Mark Forster wrote:
<< No, that's not quite what I'm saying. I don't think it necessary to limit the number of tasks you allow onto the list, provided that you allow the tasks to be naturally weeded when it's apparent that they are going nowhere. I think it's important to allow the system to act as a selection process. >>

<< As for "S", what of him? He will have processed more people through his course, but at the cost of a worse experience. Yet the people who do arrive at the far end will be the best, while the less suitable will have been weeded out. >>

Thanks Mark, this is helpful.

Let me try again to restate it, to make sure I understand what you are saying:

As you try to process more WIP, each individual task will have a worse experience (worse flow for each task, more wait time, more tasks that make some progress but are killed off before completion, etc.) and thus a somewhat more difficult experience overall. Only the strongest tasks (the ones with the best alignment to your goals, needs, and intuition) will make it to completion.

A more effective weeding process will reduce these negative effects -- either before the tasks start at all, or soon after they have started and gone nowhere. You will have better flow and better results overall. The way to do this is not to hang onto tasks when it's already clear they are getting no traction. Allow the repeated exposure to the tasks, as well as system effects like attenuation and clumping, to reveal what should be trimmed.

Is that a more accurate re-statement?

Hi Christopher --

Thanks so much for these comments. I love it when I stir up some intelligent disagreement. It forces me to challenge and sharpen my own thinking. :-)


<< I can't think of a single task of mine that suffers, just because I finished something else fast and good. >>

What about the opportunity costs? Saying YES to some tasks means you are saying NO to many others.

If you always have enough capacity to do everything on your list, then I suppose this isn't an issue for you. Mark's systems can vastly increase one's capacity to get things done, so I would not be surprised if this is true for some people.



<< One hypothetical: there is a task that I should work on (nearly) every day. If I fail to do so, the experience suffers >> "The fast kids already started the camp fire." >>

I am not really sure I understand how you are interpreting the analogy.

Here is what I meant by the analogy of the fast kids starting the campfire even though the slow kids haven't arrived yet: You have several tasks that must be coordinated to get some larger outcome. Some of those tasks are done early. Others are lagging behind. You decide to proceed with pushing for the larger outcome anyway -- you try to call it "done" when only some of the prerequisites are completed. I can imagine many situations where that might be just fine (Pareto Principle and all that). But in other situations, it only creates more problems - workarounds, hacks, etc. In IT this is "technical debt". In other domains it can trigger other kinds of debt. It leaves lingering issues that will eventually come around and bite you. The problem is getting alignment between all the prerequisites. If all the tasks are completed more closely together, in a more coordinated way, it's easier to keep the alignment and avoid these issues.

The speed and engagement that Mark's systems generate can easily overcome these problems, as long as WIP remains low. But with high WIP, it's easy for individual tasks to get out of alignment, and engage your intuition in a less consistent way, leading to greater misalignment. Thus the need for better flow of overall outcomes, not just flow of individual tasks.


<< Prerequisite: I do scan the list completely at least once per day. >>

Yes, if your WIP is low enough to allow this, there are far fewer problems. With higher WIP and less discretionary time, it's harder to cycle through the list fast enough for the system to work effectively.


<< Coming to my point here… Seraphim, YOU once wrote here, that working on one task improves the whole lot. That observation I found very helpful. It has become a sort of mantra for me since then. >>

I still think that's true, especially in chaotic/complex environments. It doesn't even matter which task. Just choose one randomly. "Act, assess, respond" or "Probe, assess, respond". Any action will give you information and help you see what needs to be done next, and what other tasks can be dropped altogether.


<< Now you are saying the opposite: working too much on one task worsens the overall situation. Which one is it now? >>

If you spend too much time with one task, then it neglects the "assess and respond" part of the cycle, creating more misalignment with the overall outcomes you are trying to achieve.


<< ...Agile... >>

"Agile" makes a big deal about optimizing the flow of work through each team but struggles to align the efforts of multiple teams collaborating toward a single outcome.

Factories and logistics operations have the same issue. When every resource tries to operate at 100% utilization (optimizing for the flow capacity of each resource, rather than the flow of the system as a whole), the only result is longer lead times, growing piles of WIP, more expediting, and reduced throughput.


<< Having to remind oneself of the most important goals is easily done by re-reading them once in a while. This can be a task on a Long List. >>

If that works for you, don't let me stop you. :-)


To summarize, I realize my original post is valid only when WIP is already high. If you are able to consistently manage your list in such a way that your total WIP is at or below your capacity, or maybe a small level above your capacity, then it works extremely well to allow each task to go at its own pace, optimizing for the flow of each task, letting your intuition operate at the task level. The increased flow and engagement can sharply increase your overall capacity as well.

But when WIP crosses above a certain threshold, allowing each task to run at its own pace starts to create significant alignment problems, *and this causes WIP to increase even more*. This creates a kind of vicious cycle that's very hard to break without some mechanism to significantly trim the list -- without thereby creating even MORE alignment problems (by trimming the wrong things).

This comment is something of a sidebar, but it's related to everything in this thread, so I will post it here.

Above, I wrote:
<< But when WIP crosses above a certain threshold ... >>

There is a common phenomenon that Mark has often cautioned against: as soon as we realize our time management skills / systems have improved, we immediately take advantage of it by taking on more work. Thus if we were overloaded to begin with, and we achieve a significant improvement in our capacity, we quickly fill that capacity back up again with new work, and we end up overloaded again.

Not everyone I know has 1000+ tasks on their lists -- in fact very few people I know use any definable system at all, and certainly not these wonderful list systems, except for all of us who frequent this website. (And just to be clear, I haven't had such high numbers of tasks on my lists in years, and I've only found two or three other people on this forum who have ever approached those levels. But it's pretty easy for me to get to well over 100 tasks within a day or two of starting a new list-based system.)

OK, so not everyone has ever had the huge numbers of tasks that I would sometimes have. But almost everyone I know must deal with overload and overwhelm. It seems to be a feature of the modern world. There is always pressure to do more. It can't just be the High Tech industry. The Healthcare industry is probably even more deeply buried in chronic overwhelm -- just to mention one example.

So I am always a little perplexed when my high-WIP situations are seen as anomalies... Don't other people here deal with these issues too? :-)

Also, I've written quite a bit here how my own situation is not really a bad situation. I am generally pretty happy with the results I am getting. I really *like* dealing with extremely chaotic and complex situations, and am finding it's a valuable skill. There are tremendous opportunities hiding in the chaos, and the complexity often masks an underlying simplicity once you identify the cause-and-effect relationships that cause the vicious cycles and conflicts to persist.

The chaos does tend to generate a lot of things to sort through -- a lot of ideas for tasks, some of which may bring results, others of which will be shown to be ridiculous ideas almost as soon as I write them down, and many many others in the middle ground which need some percolation before their real value (or lack of value) clearly emerges.

All this presents some time-management challenges, to be sure, and it probably generates more WIP than is typical for folks who aren't actively seeking out the chaotic and complex situations like I tend to do.

So let me ask the question again - is having a very high level of WIP really so unusual? Isn't it one of the reasons people look for time management solutions in the first place?

Hi Mark,

You wrote:
<< I depends on what you mean by WIP. Does a task become WIP when you write it on your list? Or when you start doing some work on it? I think it's the latter, but I have a feeling that you are referring to the former. >>

No, I agree with you, it would be the latter; at least, this is what I had in mind when I started this thread. Just writing a task on the list doesn't make it WIP.

I think this is logically consistent with everything I have written above. If a child never leaves the starting place, they have basically decided they are not going on the hike. That's fine. In terms of tasks, these are the tasks that you have decided are not needed at all to achieve your desired outcome.

The tasks that ARE started need to come to a final conclusion that's in alignment with the desired outcome. For the children, that means they arrive at the campsite. For tasks, it means they achieved their purpose in delivering the desired outcome -- which means, they were either completed, or deleted once it was discovered they were no longer needed to achieve the outcome.


<< How many of the 1,000+ tasks that you regularly have on your list actually result in finished work? And how many get weeded out? And at what stage? >>

As I wrote above, I haven't had lists anywhere near that long in many years.

I have been giving Simple Scanning a try at work over the last few weeks, and my current list is 154 tasks.

I probably add from 15-30 tasks per day.

About half of my days, I have no time to work the list -- these days are dominated by meetings, and in between the meetings there is generally enough time for urgent (top-of-mind) tasks that don't need to be written in the list; and I also stay on top of my email and deal with whatever few Outlook reminders pop up during the day; and maybe escape for a bit to whiteboard and think through whatever happens to be on my mind (I find this relaxing and don't need a list to guide it).

The other days, I can usually get through my list once or twice. I typically delete 1/3 to 1/2 of the tasks that I pause on long enough to really take them in -- either they are already done, or I see they are no longer needed or will come back by themselves later if needed. I also find myself grouping up tasks that are related to a particular project or area of concern, so I can look at them all together and assess what needs to be done -- I generally put these on a "dynamic list" or side list of some kind, so this has the side benefit of decluttering the main list somewhat. So I usually end up taking care of several one-off tasks and recurring tasks, deleting a bunch of stuff, archiving some stuff I don't feel like deleting, and then narrowing my focus to one or two of the groups of tasks, related to a particular project.

Not sure if that helps you assess my level of WIP. :-)

Christopher,

I don't think I've ever entered 189 independent options for a particular outcome I want to pursue. It doesn't seem like a realistic example to me -- or at least, it's not one I can relate to -- not realistic for *me*. I'm not saying it's unrealistic for *you* -- it's just hard for me to relate to it.

Sometimes I've entered up to maybe 20 or 25 independent options for a particular outcome. But even that number seems high. In any case, I don't think I've ever had the experience of being so certain about the first one that really stood out. I might find I really like one option, and run with it for a few hours or even a few days. But when I finally let it rest, it's probably because I've hit an obstacle of some kind. Maybe the obstacle is I just need a break. Or maybe it's more substantial than that -- a real block of some kind.

In either case, the other options give me some areas to explore further, and I may find that one or more of them continue to stand out. Maybe I tinker with them and then return to the first idea. Or maybe I find I like these even more than the first idea. In any case, I don't think I would normally find myself DELETING all of them, just because the first idea held my attention for awhile.

If it works that way for you, and you like it that way, then please carry on! It just doesn't match my own experience. Everyone works differently.

Anyway, for me, it can go along like that for awhile, if I just go with my intuition. Especially if I am hitting real obstacles from time to time. I would go back and forth between a few options for awhile.

At some point, my intuition might start saying "it's time to make a decision already and get something done!!" This can cause some anxiety if I happen to like 2-3 different options, into each of which I've put time and effort. Or maybe not. Maybe I'll just push through, despite the obstacles, and get one of them done. Or maybe more than one. It depends.

So I guess the process is a little messier for me, than for you.


Further, in the examples I gave at the top of this thread, I didn't really have in mind, several different independent options for achieving the outcome. This would be like several children on a race to see who gets to the campsite first. I had more in mind several interdependent tasks that must all come together at some point to deliver a final outcome. Maybe call it a project. Maybe not. But the "final outcome" of all these interdependent tasks is what I meant by having all the children arrive at the campsite. All the tasks are completed and aligned together enough to get the outcome you want.

If you have 10-15 tasks on your list, and all of them are connected to some final outcome you have in mind, then they need to be coordinated somehow to achieve the final outcome.

When WIP is low, this is pretty easy: you see each task repeatedly through the day, you can keep a good sense in your mind of how they are related and how each is progressing and contributing toward the final outcome. You can keep them aligned without any effort just by following your intuition, and there will be some natural synergy between these tasks -- in system effects like clumping and attenuation but also in just naturally flowing from one task to a related task, following the intuitive standing-out process.

But when WIP starts to get beyond a certain level, this process can be disrupted. You see each task less often. The status of the various tasks and how they inter-relate and how they are contributing to the final outcome is no longer fresh in your mind. The clumping and attenuation still occur but are more disjointed and irregular. There are more interruptions. The focus is lost. As a result, some tasks might stand out and see significant progress -- but other tasks, related to the same outcome, and REQUIRED for the same outcome, might feel stale by the time you see them on the list. They are too spread out. Thus things get out of alignment, and just following your intuition produces disjointed results.

I think this happens even if all the tasks on your list are all related to only a few key outcomes. Just following whatever stands out will generate misalignment, if the WIP is large enough that you can't hold all the tasks' context in your mind.

Erin, thanks for the validation, it is good to know I am not alone. :-)

Alan - Great example!

Christopher - Here is my example (but I think Alan's is clearer, and a lot shorter!)

I recently returned to work after a rather long vacation. When I returned, my team had just finished a project and was getting ready to start a new one. It seemed like a good time to start fresh with Simple Scanning, which I had been wanting to give a trial run. I had a backlog of email -- easy to handle using Mark's techniques. My calendar was mostly clear -- hadn't been filled up yet with meetings. And it looked like we had a clear focus and priority -- basically just start up the new project and get aligned with our stakeholders and partners. My list was rather short and easy to maintain. "Standing out" was working just fine.

[This is like going on a simple hike. Not a big problem. We can keep things in order. WIP might increase as a result of too much focus on any one task, but I have enough capacity to correct for this problem quite easily and keep things flowing, aligned, and in balance.]

Soon, however, it became clear that there was another important project that needed my team's attention, but nobody had realized we were already fully allocated to the first project. This created immediate resource contention, a pressing need to sort out all the stakeholder impacts and figure out whom to pull into a room to make a priority decision. Also, there were a few lingering issues from the previous project that needed attention. And then a series of distracting interruptions blindsided the team and demanded their attention. On top of this, all of us were being asked to take a new series of training and pass an exam to get certification. Also, a new pile of compliance documentation landed on my desk. My calendar was beginning to fill up. Meanwhile we had a number of pressing things happening at home that also needed attention.

[This is more like the subway museum trip example. Too many children to keep together and coordinated to arrive at the goal. Although, instead of just one group of children trying to all arrive at one destination, it's more like coordinating several groups of children, each of which is going to a different destination. It's easy to get absorbed in a single task, because there are so many things that need to be done. But if any one task gets too much attention, it can cause very significant problems with the other tasks. This creates pressure to stop and start more frequently and to switch between tasks, diffusing focus, and increasing overall WIP. At first this can be OK and can give you "little and often" benefits, and you can keep everything aligned simply by frequently scanning your list and keeping a fresh intuition of the overall context. But with too much WIP it creates a vicious cycle and the WIP accelerates out of control. It's harder for the "standing out" to work effectively. It's also harder to decide what tasks are safe to delete. I have to step back and look at the larger context -- very frequently -- and figure out where to focus and what to ignore temporarily. But this never happens by writing "step back and look at the larger context" on my list and waiting for that task to "stand out". When it reaches this point, I just have to get AWAY from the list and all the individual tasks clamoring for attention, and think through the core conflicts and where I can focus to make the biggest impact most quickly.]

Christopher wrote:

<< In both examples, the one from Alan as well as Seraphim's, the goal is changed on the fly. >>

In my case, the goal is to stay on top of all of my work.


<< I also cannot see how this connects to the Long List. Not clearly anyway. >>

Yes, I probably shouldn't have begun with an analogy. A clear cause-and-effect analysis would probably have been more effective at making my point.


<< I think what you are doing here is switching the overall objective ("all kids in camp") from that one first project to all of your work at work. First you cite that one project and say that was manageable, but now, the WIP increased, yes, but also the overall amount of work as well. (Suddenly there are much more kids at the starting point beginning to walk.) >>

Earlier in this discussion, I had the realization that the increasing WIP is perfectly fine if it doesn't much exceed your overall capacity. As WIP grows, things can get out of alignment but you can still maintain a strong intuition for the overall situation, and correct any imbalances. So I corrected my original premise. Once the WIP exceeds the threshold where can't maintain a strong intuition for the overall list, the "standing out" process becomes less and less effective on its own.


<< What I presume Mark would say is, to write down the task "step back and look at the larger context" and the immediately do it. No need to leave the list. Put it on the list and start working on it. >>

Yes, that's a good point, though in practice I find it's more effective to break away from the list entirely in these situations. When I stay on-list, the list keeps calling me back to the task-level. I find that individual tasks have a very strong pull when compared with more generic project-level tasks. They stand out more easily because it's easier to see how to get started and exactly how it will make an impact.


<< The misalignment is created because the overall objective changes constantly, mainly in the direction of requiring ever more work. >>

The overall objective is always the same - to stay on top of all my work. This objective is being met when


<< Ah, this is clearly a disfunction of the TM-System! >>

I have repeatedly said that Mark's TM systems increase flow, engagement, capacity, and results by orders of magnitude. I would guess this is a typical outcome of using Mark's systems. That doesn't sound "dysfunctional" to me.

But does this mean the systems are completely free of dynamics that can generate undesirable outcomes? If that were true, I don't think we would have seen Mark's continuous development of better and better systems over these last decades.

My objective in posting here is to clarify my own thinking, not to "blame the system" but to continuously improve. Which usually means, Mark sees all the stuff we're talking about, and together with his own constant experimenting and exploration, it sparks some new idea, which leads to another breakthrough, and we all benefit from his genius. :)

So to be clear, I am not saying that following a "standing out" method to work through a long list is "dysfunctional". But it can and does lose a lot of its effectiveness when the work increases beyond the point where you can maintain a strong intuition for the overall list. Once it crosses that threshold, continuing to focus at the task level causes this problem to accelerate to a degree that the only solution is to break away from the list. This might not be everyone's experience, but I suspect it is a common experience for those of us who work in these very chaotic environments.

Mark wrote:
<< I'm trying to think in these circumstances how my intuition would work. >

What you describe is almost exactly how this has all played out in reality.


<< Now I realize that this is probably an oversimplified scenario. Your intuition will already be telling you what the likely problems would be as you read this. Trust it! >>

There is an oversimplification in arriving at a single, short list like that. Those 6-8 items that you listed really appear on my list as 100-120 tasks that arrived in ones and twos, or maybe larger clumps, sometimes as individual "action items" or tasks, sometimes as a reminder of the overall project or concern, and often as questions to explore. As the list grows, the meetings and interruptions also grow, reducing the time available to work the list.

But you did get to the heart of the matter. And even when I go off list, I still rely very heavily on intuition to guide me to the right focus. So I agree we should trust our intuition.

So I think the disconnect here is not in the need to trust one's intuition. Rather it's my perceived need to go off-list in order to allow my intuition to work through the problems effectively. When I can't cycle through the list enough, I need to put some other structure in place to allow my intuition to work effectively.

Hi Christopher -

<< Usually what I find out is that major projects are in misalignment. >>

Yes, that's what I usually find also.


<< The system is free of dynamics. >>

I don't know about that. I can have the same basic list of stuff, and the same "dynamo" (me), but get very different flow, engagement, resistance, and results depending on the way I structure the work.

I observe very different dynamics when trying to use something like GTD (inboxes and context lists and weekly reviews, etc.) compared with, say, Randomizer.

<< Now, why that is? Good question. >>

Yes! Isn't the main question behind this whole forum? :-)

Here's another thing I find myself doing when I am feeling the overload. I just draw a heavy line under the last task on the last page, or start a whole new page, and then write out the main things I need to sort out. And then cycle through that part of the list, without scanning the earlier stuff at all.

This helps avoid the distractions and the sense of overwhelm. It allows me to focus on the most critical things.

Later, after I've sorted things and know where to focus and have started getting traction on that focus area, and I am starting to feel a bit calmer, then I can go back and look at the earlier stuff that I've been neglecting. And all that earlier stuff now comes into clearer focus -- it's much easier to delete irrelevant items; many tasks are already done; duplicate tasks are deleted; and it's OK to explore a little with the rest and see what emerges.

I suppose one could argue that this is already all covered by the rules of the Long List systems. I am just choosing to do a very quick scan (zero time spent) of the earlier pages. But the reason why it feels to me like a violation of the rules is I am not giving any time at all to those earlier tasks to see if they "stand out". I am deciding *a priori* that I don't want to give them any attention at all right now - I want to focus on the last page or two in the notebook. This decision is still guided by my intuition, but it's not guided by the "standing out" process.

I had some more thoughts on the original premise of this post. I started a new post for this, to prevent this one from spilling over into a second screen:

http://markforster.squarespace.com/forum/post/2725530