Keeping separate personal work systems

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shelzmike

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I have studied GTD for awhile and understand the major tenets; however, have failed in the past to keep up for various reasons. Mainly due to being overanalytical and making it too complicated. However, I have recently gotten a significant promotion and am now the Lead Site IT analyst for a multinational company, of which I am responsible for the infrastructure of 19 (and counting) sites globally. Needless to day, I need to get GTD working out of necessity.

So, one problem I am facing is that everything I have read about GTD discusses have ONE system for all, and rightfully so. This makes the most sense. However, I am at an impasse with this as it is all but impossible to integrate. You see, the company I work for is a F500 chemical company and we have 20,000+ hacking attempts every day for espionage or terroristic purposes...needless to say our IT systems are HIGHLY secured and controlled. I have no option of integrating or syncing my work email, systems, etc. With my personal email, system, etc. I cannot use my work laptop for personal work and vice versa. I also have 2 phones..one for personal (android) and 1 for work (iPhone).

So you can see my conundrum. However, I will say the way I work is separated as well. At work, I use the traditional business suite, Outlook 2013, OneNote, MS Project, etc. Personally, I primarily use Google's Inbox (which I love) and although I haven't set up my GTD system for persona on I had been using Google Keep for my context llists, which has worked OK, though I need to create a better workflow.

So, any advice for this situation. Sure it Is an extra system but I am a high energy person and feel like, once I get it setup, I would trust it and be productive.

Any help and relatable anecdotes would be helpful. Thanks!

Mike
 
So, just keep them separate. There is nothing wrong nor any major problem with that. In your situation you just have to.

I suppose the only thing you need to do "extra" (besides remembering and mastering two sets of apps etc) is carry a few private todo reminders with you to work (e.g a few personal phone calls to make during the day) and vice versa (e.g. a few overseas work calls to make late in the evening or when you wake up).
 
My systems are essentially separate as well. I just find it easier and I don't want all my private information stored and kept by my employer.

I use Outlook Tasks at work and Evernote for personal. Even when I first set up GTD on paper I always maintained at least two project lists (Work and Personal) and two Next Action Lists (Work and Personal). I think this depends very much on the way you work and how long your lists are. If you search the forums you will find other discussions on separating work and personal, particularly where there is high security.
 
2 ideas

Keep separate systems, no worries. I know at least one person managed 2 GTD systems one for secured classified data and one personal.

Or go with paper that you can carry back and forth
 
Although GTD says to have one system, the main lesson from it it that you have different areas of responsibility that are responsible for your head feeling full and all stuff in those areas must be collected, and must be maintained.
If you have one system where all processes are equal that becomes a bit easier, but you can use at work the tools of your employer and for personal use your own tasks lists and tools.

Just make sure that even when you are at work, make sure that you can collect personal stuff and that you can see your errands at lunch time and so on. Make sure that when at home you can collect some reminder about a meeting or so on that you can act upon on the next day.
Both systems must be reliable and be with you so you can collect and use your contexts accordingly.
 
I appreciate the feedback and it validates what I was thinking all along. I think that since I generally try to have as hard of a line between work and home (and have LOADS of projects at each context) that this only makes the most sense for me. I was debating on whether or not to even have an @HOME category in my work actions and @WORK in my home lists. Still haven't decided for sure yet; however, I believe I will add them and see how I actually use them for now.

And telling an I.T. pro to use {gasp} paper is blasphemous! :) In all seriousness though, I am very comfortable with my devices and feel it might actually work for me this time! Thanks again!

Mike
 
shelzmike said:
I appreciate the feedback and it validates what I was thinking all along. I think that since I generally try to have as hard of a line between work and home (and have LOADS of projects at each context) that this only makes the most sense for me. I was debating on whether or not to even have an @HOME category in my work actions and @WORK in my home lists. Still haven't decided for sure yet; however, I believe I will add them and see how I actually use them for now.

And telling an I.T. pro to use {gasp} paper is blasphemous! :) In all seriousness though, I am very comfortable with my devices and feel it might actually work for me this time! Thanks again!

Mike
Click to expand...

Hey shelzmike -

I maintain two digital systems (my handwriting has been described as "self encrypting") - personal in ipad / Omni (personal onenote for reference) and professional in Outlook / iphone (onenote for reference). I don't have an @ home in my work system, nor do I have an @ work in my personal system. Since both are portable, I just periodically look at my ipad at work, and my iphone at home.

Heather
 
Hrlakat said:
my handwriting has been described as "self encrypting")
Click to expand...
ROFL I LOVE this, I think mine is as well and I even print because my cursive is so bad I can't even read it myself later.
 
My company also locks things down significantly and forces me to keep things separate. The problem with that is, my time is not separate. I work from home 50% of the time. And I also work evenings and weekends at times. I tend to squeeze in personal tasks when I can around work task, and vice versa. So, I may work till 8:00 PM tonight. But I have an hour open at 3:00 PM, so I'll run some personal errands.

But I can't easily get to my personal stuff from my work PC and vice versa.

I fear, doing it all on paper is the only answer.
 
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