Where/how to place semi-calendar items

D

DaveR

Registered
Has anyone found a good way to place "semi-calendar" items in your system?

What I mean by "semi-calendar" items is actions that don't HAVE to be done on a certain day, but should be done in a reasonable time frame or problems could arrive.

Examples from my own system:

*A mailing I have to coordinate sometime before June 20.
*A report that I must submit by August 1, but I don't have to wait until then to submit it.
*Flowers for my assistant for working on a big project that we finished last Thursday.

None of these items have a real calendar date that I have to do them. However, they all have what I might call intuitive deadlines.

What I often do is assign them my own calendar date to complete them. For instance with the above example, I have in my calendar to plan to coordinate the mailing today. Now it doesn't have to be done today. No one will lose any sleep if I wait until tomorrow.

I guess what I am struggling with, is my current solution feels like the old-fashioned "to-do" list where what I don't do today can be moved to tomorrow's "to-do" list.

Any suggestions?
 
TesTeq

TesTeq

Registered
50/50 solution.

DaveR;67714 said:
Has anyone found a good way to place "semi-calendar" items in your system?
Click to expand...

At first I wanted make it into a joke: "put half of the item on one of your @context lists and the second half in the calendar". But then I thought that this joke was not a joke at all. So:
1. If it is a multi step Project - put it on the Projects list with a deadline.
2. Put a Next Action on the @context list.
3. Put a reminder in your Calendar some days before the deadline.
 
Oogiem

Oogiem

Registered
DaveR;67714 said:
my current solution feels like the old-fashioned "to-do" list where what I don't do today can be moved to tomorrow's "to-do" list.

Any suggestions?
Click to expand...

I think that's correct. Put the actions in the appropriate contexts. That's the beauty of GTD it's not a get done today list but a get done when you can and have the appropriate tools or are in the right place list. A lot of things on my list don't get done in a single day.

I'd just add them to the regular contexts and work from there.
 
E

empty inbox

Registered
The items you are describing do not belong on a calendar. I would use a Tickler instead. Decide when you next want to be reminded about the action and place it in that day. The calendar is for items that must be done on a certain day.

This is assuming of course that these items are not current projects which have N.A.'s. In that case they should be in your projects list and N.A. list.
 
G

graphicdetails

Registered
I use a Palm with Datebook6, so this is the way that I handle it.

In your two examples, you DO have a deadline. The first one was June 20 and the 2nd was August 1. If there is a deadline, I put it on the calendar on that specific date. However, in Datebook you can set an "advance" of 1-99 days, which means that if you set the advance feature to 10 days, then 10 days before that date the system adds a reminder with the amount of days left until the due date. This reminder "floats" from day to day counting down the time left.

For example - on your calendar for June 20 you have "Mailing Due".
On June 10 you will see on your calendar "(10) Mailing Due".
On June 11 you will see "(09) Mailing Due"

This is the best way for me to handle them because none of my NA's are related to time at all. Any time-specific items I need to have on the calendar. I've tried different methods in the NA list, but I just couldn't find any way better than letting the calendar remind me of the date sensitive items.

You could use a similar method if you don't use electronic tools. Perhaps you could put a tickler reminder 10 days before, then 5 days before, then 3 days before, or whatever works best for you.
 
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