GTD context tags

[leslieking]

Hello,
These are the context tags I come up for my GTD system:

Place:
@home, @office, @errands, @anywhere (catchall)

Tool:
@computer, @phone, @email

Time:
@urgent

Person:
@boss, @colleague, @friend, @doctor

My questions are:

1. Can the tag @work be considered a place as well or not?

2. Is there a catchall tag you use for people (like in the case of places @anywhere) ?
I'm not a native English speaker so I'm not sure what would work for people, @anyone or @anybody? (In this category go teacher, plumber, etc.. people I don't want to create separate contexts.)

Any suggestion is appreciated.

 

[René Lie]

Is there a catchall tag you use for people (like in the case of places @anywhere) ?

I use the contexts "anywhere" for things that can be done anywhere. "Catchall" sounds to me more like "not clarified"...

 

[leslieking]

Thank you. You're right. I appreciate your time. As I mentioned, I'm not a native speaker and I used the right wording.
I'm wondering if there is something similar for people because creating a separate tag for everyone would be too much I think.

 

[bishblaize]

For people who do a lot of work in the same location (eg people working from home) I'm increasingly of the view that contexts represent little more than moods - ie what do you feel like doing now? Excel? Word? Emails? Phone calls? Many people can do pretty much any of their NAs at any time, with the odd exception.

Under these circumstances, @anywhere isn't really something that makes sense. For me, pretty much all my NAs are @anywhere, which means that it isn't a context worth having. It would apply to every NA, so it wouldn't act as a filter to limit down my options and help me pick one.

Of course, different roles can be very different. If you have multiple work locations for example then your contexts might be very hard-edged, in which case an @anywhere context could definitely make sense.

 

[Angelique Bouwman]

1. Can the tag @work be considered a place as well or not?
For me it is as i have a physical office that is located outside of my home. I do work at physical locations other than my office (@clients) so it can be....i do have stuff i can only do at the office, so for me it is a context....use it if it helps you filter and there is stuff that can be on there that you can't do in other places (or don't want to see e.g. when you're at home). @work might also mean in work-modus aka when you're working opposite of 'at home relaxing, or not working'.....?
helpfull?

2. Is there a catchall tag you use for people (like in the case of places @anywhere) ?
I'm not a native English speaker so I'm not sure what would work for people, @anyone or @anybody? (In this category go teacher, plumber, etc.. people I don't want to create separate contexts.)
I asume this is because there is not soo much you'd like to talk to with these ppl that you'd like to give them a whole list? I can think of two solutions...
a go teachter might be someone you see once a week, i'd just put stuff i'd want to talk to that person about in my calender....if it's one or two items.....if you have a few ppl you occasionally see that don't deserve a context, but you don't want to text/sms/app them, i'd maybe use the context 'when i see ... in person' and than in the list add the name in capitals and the action with that...like so
PLUMBER - ask about......blablaba

so i think anything goes, when it makes sense...use enough contexts to make sense of it all but as little as you can get away with....a quote from my master-trainer Arjan Broere....I find this a helpful rule...

 

[Gardener]

Are you assuming that each action will have a Place, Tool, AND possibly Time and Person tag? Or that you will choose the single tag that is most useful? I'm voting for "single tag", but the answer is probably relevant to the answers to your questions.

For example, I would probably only have @office if there are work actions that can only be done in the office--so it would pretty rarely be used. Work actions that can be done in the office OR at home would just have @work--or, really, probably some narrower tag.

What do I mean by narrower tag? For me, the purpose of a context is to divide the actions "enough". If I have too many actions in a context, I'll divide the context. If I don't, I won't.

So if I have sixty actions for the garden, and a total of twelve actions for all other hobbies, then I might have contexts:

@soil prep
@irrigmaint
@weedandclear
@plant
@generalgarden
@hobbies

Similarly, if I have a dozen actions that are associated with Fred, and six actions associated with random other people:

@Fred
@people

I realize that this may not be at all responsive to your questions.

 

[dtj]

Maybe consider energy states, like @braindead

I add @shortlist for stuff akin to priority. Like an informal sprint designator.

I have @investigate and @research, that are sorta different modalities and energy/time needs for me. @investigate is like papers or webpages that I read for learning purposes, whereas @research is a little wider ranging, less fully formed, and probably less targeted. An @research can have a few @investigate items under it.

 

[James M]

Also remember that you can change your contexts later if they aren't working for you!

I started off with an @computer context in my work system. Quickly became pointless as I spend a significant chunk of my day on the computer. So I now have @email @[specialst computer system] etc.

I'd encourage you to think about the literal contexts you have in your life. And also take note of any time you resist a next action in (for instance) the @office context. By this I mean, when you're scanning down your @work list because you're at work, are there any actions on that list that you resist? Then question why that might be - and whether it's because it's actually for you to do in a different context than the one you're in at the moment. Just an idea.

 

[bcmyers2112]

Hi, @zoltankr. I know you're not a native English speaker. I'm guessing when you use the word "can," you're asking whether something is a best practice rather than whether you're permitted to try it. Still, I think it's worth saying: you can try anything you want. GTD is a system of recommendations originated by one person (albeit one person who subsequently built a company full of people who agree on these best practices, and who ultimately unleashed a bit of a movement that led a lot of people to adopt said practices). It's not a set of laws nor a chemical formula that can blow up on you if you "do it wrong." Different things work for different people. If you try something and it doesn't work, you can move on and try something else. It won't be a disaster.

But you did ask some specific questions, and I have some specific thoughts to offer:

1. Can the tag @work be considered a place as well or not?

I don't see why not. Although I'm not sure what you see as the difference between @work and @office.

2. Is there a catchall tag you use for people (like in the case of places @anywhere) ?

Yep. The GTD book recommends a context of @agendas. Basically, the recommendation is to create a next action in your @agendas list for a specific person, and then list the discussion items in the note section (assuming your list manager is digital).

You could certainly create contexts for specific people, as you've done, and then create individual next actions for each discussion item related to that person. I would recommend limiting that to a few people you talk to on the regular, though (like @boss or @Spouse/life partner). If you try to create separate contexts for too many people, it might get unwieldy.

 

[bcmyers2112]

For people who do a lot of work in the same location (eg people working from home) I'm increasingly of the view that contexts represent little more than moods - ie what do you feel like doing now? Excel? Word? Emails? Phone calls? Many people can do pretty much any of their NAs at any time, with the odd exception.

I've been mainly a remote worker for several years now. I've seen many people express the opinion you have. I'm not gonna say any of you are wrong, but I still find the idea of a context as a person, place or tool needed to get work done to be useful. In fact, my contexts look pretty close to what's recommended in the GTD book.

I'm in sales, and the fact is @calls is still a useful context. There are certain times of day I can't make calls. There are certain places I can make calls (in my home office, at the company office, in my car when I'm stopped in between client visits, etc.) and certain places I can't (maybe some people can make calls and buy groceries at the same time, but I would just drop my phone or accidentally bump into someone else with my cart).

Errands are still errands for me. I have separate contexts for my work laptop, personal computer, and plain old computer actions that I can do from any computer. But ultimately even when I am home there are times when it doesn't make sense to unhook from an @home action (like housecleaning tasks) to sign onto my work laptop and do something that requires that tool. I still need an agendas list because there are times when a person is available to me (by phone, by video conference, etc) and times they are not.

When I read posts where people declare that in the age of remote work, person/place/tool contexts are no longer relevant... well, that's not my experience. But... to each their own. I'm not trying to argue that I'm right and someone else is wrong. I'm just offering a my own way of looking at it.

 

[Murray]

GTD book recommends a context of @agendas. Basically, the recommendation is to create a next action in your @agendas list for a specific person, and then list the discussion items in the note section (assuming your list manager is digital).

That's what I did. Except inside my @Agendas list I create a separate action for each agenda item. Then, if you start each next action with the person's name your list manager can alphabetically sort everything so I can see all my "SUSANNE - " actions together (that's my line manager.) I have seen both methods recommended in official GTD resources, and they have both worked well for me.

Then another option to play with is to consider separating your @Agenga list into two or more lists. So first I split mine into 'personal' and 'professional'. And then later on I further split 'personal' by creating a new agendas list I call "appointments and customer service"... Eg: my doctor, my naturopath, the real estate agent we rent our place through, the motorcycle repairs and accessories place, etc.

 

[bishblaize]

I've been mainly a remote worker for several years now. I've seen many people express the opinion you have. I'm not gonna say any of you are wrong, but I still find the idea of a context as a person, place or tool needed to get work done to be useful. In fact, my contexts look pretty close to what's recommended in the GTD book.

I'm in sales, and the fact is @calls is still a useful context. There are certain times of day I can't make calls. There are certain places I can make calls (in my home office, at the company office, in my car when I'm stopped in between client visits, etc.) and certain places I can't (maybe some people can make calls and buy groceries at the same time, but I would just drop my phone or accidentally bump into someone else with my cart).

Errands are still errands for me. I have separate contexts for my work laptop, personal computer, and plain old computer actions that I can do from any computer. But ultimately even when I am home there are times when it doesn't make sense to unhook from an @home action (like housecleaning tasks) to sign onto my work laptop and do something that requires that tool. I still need an agendas list because there are times when a person is available to me (by phone, by video conference, etc) and times they are not.

When I read posts where people declare that in the age of remote work, person/place/tool contexts are no longer relevant... well, that's not my experience. But... to each their own. I'm not trying to argue that I'm right and someone else is wrong. I'm just offering a my own way of looking at it.

I'm not saying that contexts are no longer relevent, not sure why you think that. I still use contexts and can't imagine not doing so. Rather that the rationale for how we apply contexts is different these days to how it was explained in the original material.

 

[bcmyers2112]

I'm not saying that contexts are no longer relevent, not sure why you think that. I still use contexts and can't imagine not doing so. Rather that the rationale for how we apply contexts is different these days to how it was explained in the original material.

Yeah, I get that. Maybe I'm not communicating as well as I'd hoped. What I'm getting from you is that you feel the concept of a context as a person, place or tool doesn't necessarily fit the use case of a remote worker. Like I said, I've been a fully remote worker for years and my context list looks pretty much like the ones recommended in the book with just a couple of minor tweaks. There are only certain times and situations during which I can make @calls. If I'm running @errands, I'm not @home. Sometimes when I'm working on things in my @home list, it doesn't make sense to try to unhook in between them to log into my laptop to do @computer-work stuff. So, the person, place or tool concept of contexts still works for me.

This isn't an either-or. It's not an argument. Or at least it's not my intention to engage in one. You have an approach that suits you, I have a different one that suits me. My hope was simply to offer another way of looking at things to further the discussion. The more ideas that get tossed around, the more we can all learn from each other.

I hope that clears things up as far as where I am coming from.

 

[bishblaize]

Yeah, I get that. Maybe I'm not communicating as well as I'd hoped. What I'm getting from you is that you feel the concept of a context as a person, place or tool doesn't necessarily fit the use case of a remote worker. Like I said, I've been a fully remote worker for years and my context list looks pretty much like the ones recommended in the book with just a couple of minor tweaks. There are only certain times and situations during which I can make @calls. If I'm running @errands, I'm not @home. Sometimes when I'm working on things in my @home list, it doesn't make sense to try to unhook in between them to log into my laptop to do @computer-work stuff. So, the person, place or tool concept of contexts still works for me.

This isn't an either-or. It's not an argument. Or at least it's not my intention to engage in one. You have an approach that suits you, I have a different one that suits me. My hope was simply to offer another way of looking at things to further the discussion. The more ideas that get tossed around, the more we can all learn from each other.

I hope that clears things up as far as where I am coming from.

I understand what you're saying, I just don't see what bearing it has on what my original point. The point I made was that, for people working in one location, there's little value in a location-based context like @anywhere.

I also pointed out that if you have a job that has you in different places - as yours appears to - then a location-based context like @anywhere could certainly make sense.

I certainly never said agendas or tool based contexts don't work for people working from home. Most of my contexts are tool based.

 

[bcmyers2112]

I understand what you're saying, I just don't see what bearing it has on what my original point. The point I made was that, for people working in one location, there's little value in a location-based context like @anywhere.

I also pointed out that if you have a job that has you in different places - as yours appears to - then a location-based context like @anywhere could certainly make sense.

I certainly never said agendas or tool based contexts don't work for people working from home. Most of my contexts are tool based.

All right, if I misunderstood you, my apologies. We're having what amounts to a conversation. Communication isn't an exact science. Sometimes people misunderstand each other.

I think the place where I misunderstood you is when you wrote, "For people who do a lot of work in the same location (eg people working from home) I'm increasingly of the view that contexts represent little more than moods - ie what do you feel like doing now?" When you said contexts -- plural -- and said they "represent little more than moods," I thought you were questioning the value of all person/place/tool contexts for remote workers.

I know you attempted to clarify when you wrote, "Rather that the rationale for how we apply contexts is different these days to how it was explained in the original material." In my mind, connecting that with the prior statement I quoted, it sounded to me as though you were questioning the rationale for any "traditional" contexts.

I'm not quoting you to prove "you said it wrong!" I'm not trying to back you into a rhetorical corner, argue with you, or prove a point. I'm just asking you to understand that I'm not being deliberately obtuse or trying to argue with you. I'm actually trying to understand you. It's tough to read tone from words on a computer screen. I'm getting the feeling you might -- MIGHT -- be showing some irritation here. If that's the case, I'm just hoping you'll take my word for it that I'm actually trying to arrive at an understanding here.

So... to your point about @anywhere. Well, at the moment I'm unemployed. So... most everything I need to do aside from @errands I can presumably do from my house, right? But... losing my job didn't turn me agoraphobic fortunately. I do leave on occasion. To me, @anywhere could still represent things that I can literally do... well, anywhere.

That being said, I've always gone back-and-forth on @anywhere. I just don't know how many things there are in my life that I would truly want to do no matter where I am that wouldn't be caught in another contexts (@calls, for example).

So, again, I'm not trying to argue with you. Like I said, this isn't an either-or. It's just that I have a different point of view. I could see a rationale for the "house-bound" worker to use @anywhere. I could see a rationale not to. You pays your money and you takes your choice.

 

[Blanka Dibtr]

As many others said above - you can do anything you want and what works for you in your system.
My experience makes me say that every next action should only be found in one category - where it has to happen.
If you have multiple tags, you must be able to filter your list by tag - otherwise it does not make use of the tags.
The "anywhere" tag sounds like a catchall category, but as I hardly ever am "anywhere" but always "somewhere" - this list did not work for me at the end. The same goes for computer and at home - I work on computer at home, so I have to be aware that the whole computer list fits my home list....
You have to work it out for yourself - and be ready to change it when you need to!

 

[Gardener]

For me, the primary purpose of tags is, "I don't want to look at a list this long; divide it somehow." It's NICE if the division actually makes the work easier to do, but I suspect that if my tags were, "Task Group 1", "Task Group 2", "Task Group 3", they'd do me almost as much good as meaningful tags.

This suddenly reminds me of the fact that sometimes I need to read an endless stream of text, where the writer hasn't put in any paragraphs. Just going through it and adding a blank line every five or six sentences, irrespective of context, makes it much easier to read.

So for my brain, at least, divisions have value, simply by being divisions.

 

[jwsamuel]

I have totally given up on the idea of contexts as indicators of the action, place or tool. Instead, I have established contexts as an indicator of the purpose or focus. My contexts are:

@work - anything related to what I do for money
@home - things I have to do around the house
@personal - things I do for me
@errands - things I have to get when I am out

Rather than use a context like @calls, I instead use the word "Call" as the first word of the next action and place that action in the context that fits the purpose. Likewise, @computer is meaningless to me because I use my computer for work, home and personal uses.

 

[Murray]

I have totally given up on the idea of contexts as indicators of the action, place or tool. Instead, I have established contexts as an indicator of the purpose or focus. My contexts are:

@work - anything related to what I do for money
@home - things I have to do around the house
@personal - things I do for me
@errands - things I have to get when I am out

Not that I have any issue with the way you are using contexts, but your definitions of @home and @errands appear to me to be indicators of the place you need to be in, to be able to do those actions. So for now, you haven't totally given up on that idea, from what I can see.

I agree that your @work and @personal are a departure from the traditional contexts given in the GTD book. But as David Allen and folks on this forum have made clear, it's up to each of us to build and hone a system that works for us.

 

[René Lie]

Even though I may be somewhat a "GTD purist", I can see that the original suggested contexts may blur into each other...
I like keeping personal and work separated inside the same list manager (Asana), but then my "Office" lists becomes sort of a "catch-all". So I have divided my "Office" list into sections, which consists of calls, email, computer (general stuff) and some software specific sections.

In general, althoug email CAN be done on a smartphone, I still like to have an @Computer list for such things, as I see a smartphone as a device I use mainly for "consumption" and not "production".

As @Murray says, everyone should tailor theis lists to their own needs. As long as your list manager helps you get things done and keep stuff of your mind, attracts (and not repels) you, and that you know that you can trust it, you're good!