Act! and SideAct with GTD

A

Anonymous

Guest
I have been using Act! and SideAct for several years because my business is very client oriented -- ie most of my projects and actions are related to services I provide to my clients (investments, financial planning, insurance, etc.). I have never been able to use Outlook as effectively in that scenario (although I tried for about a year before switching to Act!). I use SideAct to keep track of my projects and actions lists, and import them into the Act! calendar when time-sensitive. I have read other threads about the limits of Act! vs. Outlook's features using GTD. I think my method is a bit limited, but I have never been happy using Outlook for client-based projects.

My question is this: Can Outlook and Act! be used simultaneously and easily integrated so client-based activities are in Act! and other activities in Outlook? I can't seem to find a seamless way to integrate these two programs. Alternatively, is there a GTD model for Act! similar to the one used in Outlook?

Thanks for any observations from those of you who are very client-centered in your use of GTD.
 
M

mochant

Guest
Look into Outlook Business Contact Manager

You might want to look into the Outlook Business Contact Manager - an add-on for Outlook 2003. It's very ACT-like and can import your ACT! data. Unfortunately, the only way to get it (currently) is to buy Office 2003 in the Professional or Small Business editions. It's not available as a separate purchase (dumb idea IMO).

Chapura syncs BCM information to your Palm with their KeySuite apps for the Palm OS (one-way only Outlook overwrites handheld) or PocketMirror Professional conduit set (full two-way synchronization).

HTH,
Marc
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
ACT and GTD

I have been an ACT user for about 10 years and have tried to integrate GTD into ACT. First, Outlook Business Contact manager is not that great of a product. Not flexible, does not sync to any PDA, and it is a 170 MB program. IMO very sloy program and not ready for prime time. If your an ACT user, you will be fustrated like me.

I use the Group feature for everything. Within each group, I use the @ Waiting For, etc. the way that David does it. Works pretty well for me. I also input everything into ACT. Any questions, let me know.
 
A

Ali_Issa

Registered
My comments

Regarding the Contact Manager for Office 2003: I tried that product and it is great as it does use a lot of ACT! good features and it sure is a good rival when it come to a Client-Oriented contact manager. There is a problem though with using it on a laptop as it is a resource hog and it will keep using more and more RAM and CPU as time goes by and the reason because it keep searching your contact list and attach incoming emails to them as it should. There is a recommendation on running a MS Business Server to reliefe your laptop or Desktop from doing that.

Also keep in mind, the reason I switched from ACT! to Outlook was the problem with ACT! not being able to associate incoming emails to related contacts. That is an issue that I brought up on ACT! support forum and was told it is not an out-of-box feature. My business is 99% email and it is essential.
 
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