Get Everything Done

Here begins a series of posts about how I manage myself, following the system I evolved over years, which I call LAPS. I haven't by any means perfected things, but it is nevertheless stable. I'm not expecting nor trying to win people over to this process, but I hope to get others conversing about how you approach the issues I tackle with your various methods. I'm hoping to get interaction from all of you.

======= Rationale =======
Long lists I got tired of following. I'd get overwhelmed by the length. Or the constant return to a sheet of paper (or device). Or I'd get lost amidst the trivia and not focus enough on the things that mattered.

No lists left me feeling lost. I would inevitably not think of things that need thinking of. Or else worry that I should be remembering things, even if there wasn't anything I needed to remember. "No System" is a version of no list that I often fell back to when I failed to keep up with a formal system.

I need a system that helps me decide what to do, at a higher level than regular task lists. I also need it operationally simple, because I have a tendency to get lost in the details of complex systems, or more likely just abandon it for something else.

What I've arrived at is operationally quite simple, but there are layers to my practice of it, so the fullness of it won't be conveyed in a couple of posts. The whole system isn't fully congealed, and maybe it's part of my nature that it's better this way. If the system ever froze, it may become stale to me.

That said, the heart of it hasn't changed much in a long time.

====== Essence ======
The system is built around keeping a Short list. To keep the list short, I raised the level of tasks kept. Instead of making a list of all the minutia, I focus on each area of my life, and decide what I want accomplished this week. This means instead of a hundred tasks, I have 10. Now there are always incidental tasks that come up, so in fact there are a few more than 10.

Within this framework, I have routines, ways of developing these larger-grained tasks, and a process for ensuring I move through all of these. But the upshot of this is not just a change in task processing; it changes what I work on, with a bias towards longer term goals.

Algorithm wise, the process resembles FV a bit (think pre-selection), and maybe AF4 a bit (think closed and open lists).

If you want more detail now, you may read about earlier iterations in my blog post "How to Pursue All Your Goals", or my forum post "Sooner or Later". Or else, I invite you to ask. Or comment on how you approach things. I just don't want to spam an essay because I would rather make it conversational.

I hope it's working for you Erin! Do share how it goes. Alsi if anybody wanys more specifics.....

I do tag items, but for other purposes. I agree that it would be hard to cycle if all these items were scattered. Regarding the sooner list, I make a list that is exactly the items I will do.

This aspect of my process is:

1. Make sure Later has all the items I might want to do.
2. Scan through that list and move the items I decided to do into Sooner.
3. Scan Sooner and make precise exactly what I want done and when.
4. Do these tasks. Generally in order, but that's not important.

My media fast is ended, so here’s my system, whose current simplicity was enabled by my fast:

==== Setup: Goals Pending Action ====
Create 3 empty lists: Goals, a list of current short term goals; Pending, a list of tasks, primarily next actions for each goal; Action, tasks to be completed today., selected from Pending.

==== Pending Task ====
To Action, add the special task “Choose tasks from Pending”. This task is to scan the Pending list, choose some tasks, and move them to Action. This task is special because it always remains in Action; it doesn’t move to Pending..

==== Goals Task ====
Add a second task “Work on Goals”. This task is to (little and often):
- Look at the goals list
- Add or refine goals (SMART, short term, one per area of importance, that you want to move on now
- Determine a next action for each goal, and put that in Pending.
- Treat “Work on Goals” as any ordinary task in the system.

===== Action Process =====
- Choose a task in Action, do the task, then delete it from Action.
- (optional) add a followup task to Pending.
- You may also add other tasks to Pending as needed, but this should be rare. Instead, tasks get added to projects, and activated by the “add a followup” step, or the “Work on Goals” process.
- Never add new tasks to directly to Action unless it’s urgent.

==== Conclusion ====
The process above is complete. The chief benefit of the system is it gets me working on more significant tasks than I had done before I had the Goals list. I have a couple additional wrinkles to share later.

I would love to entertain questions, feedback or discussion.

Good luck! One correction: while I’m sure it will be fine to have “check goals” always on the worklist, at some point you might have your goals well in hand and you don’t need to do that every day. Then I’d suggest when you are done with goals for a while, put it off to the Pending list and you can bring them back into action when you want.

One detail I think I neglected is that in practice I’m not in the system constantly. And because of that, the choice of tool shouldn’t matter much at all, only is it easy to move around, and easy to view the list. To be more explicit:

Some time after noon, I look at Pending and I pick a bunch of tasks for the next day. I work out an idea of how the day will progress, and commit to it. Then, I put the system away and just do the things I intended to do, up to the point where I need a reminder and then I look back at the Action list, clear away things already done, and resume my plan to do the additional commitments.

So you see, there’s not really much tool required, just occasionally looking and entering things.

That said, I do wonder if the scheme I use is particularly good only for me. That could very well be.

If it’s completely routine, then no. If it’s something I want to make routine (it’s my goal), then yes.