Associating Next Actions in @ contexts with their parent projects

[jkgrossi]

Although I am trying to go as "Plain Vanilla" as I can, I admit to giving in a bit on this one. I found a little program called LinkPak for my Palm. (www.silverware.com) It includes four small programs that look just like the normal Palm apps, but adds a link button. When everything is set up, I can tap the "link" button when in any project and see s list of the NA's that are related (or memos or contacts, but I don't do that very much). It helps me to ensure every project has an NA, as well, so I can quickly view where I am at with each project. (No association with the company.)

In agreement with what Frank Buck said, I keep my project notes in a memo linked to a Project title in the ToDo list (you can use PsLink for this as well, works great!), because I want to be able to work with the information separately, in its own document. Also I get a little nervous about losing notes when they are in the notes section of a ToDo - strange I know, but its just me.

FWIW,
Gordon

My only fear with stuff like that is that it's taking something relatively simple (which is by design, BTW) and making it more complicated than it needs to be. Kinda defeats the purpose, IMHO.

 

[tuneczar]

Finishing NAs = Less Stress

This has been a helpful thread for a GTD Newbie (me!)...

I realize now that I just need to be specific with my NAs, and thorough with each Weekly Review...then the Projects will sort of take care of themselves; since I'm identifying what each Project needs for a NA...then I'll "just do it" when in the right context...

Doah. Just call me Homer-GTD-Simpson!

~Thanks all for the great comments,
TC

 

[jkgrossi]

This has been a helpful thread for a GTD Newbie (me!)...

I realize now that I just need to be specific with my NAs, and thorough with each Weekly Review...then the Projects will sort of take care of themselves; since I'm identifying what each Project needs for a NA...then I'll "just do it" when in the right context...

Doah. Just call me Homer-GTD-Simpson!

~Thanks all for the great comments,
TC

Don't be too hard on yourself; I've been at this for the better part of 4 years, and I *still* have "ah ha!" moments almost daily in working this system.

The best piece of advice for anyone using the GTD system is to be diligent with your weekly reviews. If need be, and especially at first, do your reviews more frequently than weekly. Believe me, it's the "Lynch Pin" to the entire system. Without it, this system will die on you faster than you can say GTD.

 

[tjrandell]

This is a very helpful thread for me. I think I am a little off on some of the basic tenets of GTD and need to go back and re-read. Thank you to everyone for the good feedback and spirited discussion. I am stressing too much about the "how" to do GTD and not spending enough time just jumping in an living with it before trying to tailor it to my style.

 

[greyman]

This is a very helpful thread for me. I think I am a little off on some of the basic tenets of GTD and need to go back and re-read. Thank you to everyone for the good feedback and spirited discussion. I am stressing too much about the "how" to do GTD and not spending enough time just jumping in an living with it before trying to tailor it to my style.

Yes, indeed. If you develop good understanding of basics tenets of GTD, and follow them rigorously, your system will work, even if it will not be perfect from technology point of view.

Example: I understood from GTD, that it is good to have Waiting Fors. Lot of my WF's are related to emails, so I wanted to be smart and marked with special label all those emails, which contained waiting fors. But it didn't worked too well, since sometimes I had to jump into the email body and quickly scan it to figure out, what exactly I am wainting for from that person. Now I do it the strict GTD way - every time I sent out email which generates WF, I jump to my text file with *one global* WF list and quickly enter current date, name of the person and one short sentence describing what exactly I want from him/her. That made a huge improvement for me.

greyman
http://quirkyalone.blogspot.com