Out of Sight; Out of Mind

J

jrose1982

0
I realized today that one of the reasons I struggle with GTD (or any organization system, for that matter) is that I tend to be an "out of sight; out of mind" kind of person. The way that plays out, is that the most important things stay on my desk, while less important things get filed in an ideal location where I can forget about them until I need them.

This is, of course, getting to be a mess. I keep doing things like thinking "I'm gonna leave my notes here, so I remember where I left off tomorrow" and then something else pops up and the notes stay exactly where I left them. Or "I'm gonna leave this document there so it's handy when so-and-so calls me back to talk about it" and then they don't call me back for two weeks (while other stuff piles up on top of the document).

The organization systems that have come closest to success have been those that keep things out in the open. My calendar, for example, has two parts: Outlook (which is constantly open on my desktop) has all the details; and a paper calendar that hangs on my wall where I can see it from my chair so I can quickly see information like "What day is next Wednesday?" without breaking stride from whatever else I'm doing. I have the most-used reference material hanging on my wall and my books on shelves where I can read the spines without moving. I keep the real project records electronically. But during development, I often have hand-written notes or things I print out for convenience. I keep these things in a standing file sorter on my desk, but that fails because 1) too many projects go stagnant so things just sit there for months, 2) I have too many projects and the file sorter is not expandable, 3) I don't clean it out as often as I should.

Does anybody else find they think this way? If so, do you have a GTD system that works?
 
I used to do the same thing. I realized, though, that it's undermining my GTD - I no longer had one trusted home for my tasks, I had several. The key to successful GTD is, of course, the review and the habit of checking your lists. I would suggest putting "Check next action lists" on your calendar, and set it for every day, first thing in the morning (upon arriving to your desk). Set it also for the first thing after lunch. You have to force yourself into the habit of checking your lists. You can only have ONE trusted home for things - you can't have your lists, plus your desk surface, plus your wall, etc. Lists, lists, lists! Once checking them is your default habit, it will all click.
 
jrose1982 said:
Does anybody else find they think this way? If so, do you have a GTD system that works?
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That described me before GTD. The key is trusting that you have up to date and accurate lists. And then looking at them all the time.

So for the notes I'd be working on the notes and need to stop. I put a place mark in my action lists about where I got to, or a sticky note in the lists and file them into the paper folder for the project and that goes into my active projects folder. Worst case at weekly review I'll look at all the folders in active projects (and I have have them in paper, DEVONThink or on my computer) and realize I need to do more or clarify the action about processing those notes.

The paper I need to talk to someone about gets referenced in my lists like this: "Speak to X about Y Project-Notes in Paper Action Support folder last contact " with a context of waiting for. It it's someone I speak with a lot it will have a context of Agenda- Like things I need to talk to the vet or my husband about.

I also like to keep my paper folders of current project available and often visible. So I have them in the top draw of the under desk file cabinet. I can pull out the drawer and see them all and the space limits me. If there isn't room in that drawer for the next folder I need to put some of those projects into someday/maybe and then the files that support them move into the main filing cabinets.

I will leave the current project that has a large set up time active on my desk overnight, so for example: I might be in the middle of tracing some code and stuck on playing computer. So I may have printouts of relevant pieces of the code all arrayed on my desk so I can jump from routine to subroutine to main code and back just like it was working and see what's going on. I try to do most debugging on my machine, electronically, but sometimes I have to see the code printed to catch the subtle errors causing problems. I may leave that code stuff set out on my desk for a day or more if that is the only project that I use my desktop for as it can be a PITA to pick up all the printouts and then get them all set out again and find where I was. I'll pot a bright post-it note with where I leave off when I have to stop and do something else, like feed the sheep. That is a rare event for me, maybe once every 5-6 months.

It's ok to have reference material visible, but look at instead of having it in pile putting it in an appropriate container with a label. You do have a label maker don't you? One way I do that is I have some thin plastic containers and knitting or small sewing projects go into those containers and I label them. So when I stop working on one for a while I have a neat container but the clear plastic and the label keeps me happy that I can still see what I was doing. I've redone my entire file cabinet with proper printed labels on the folders and it makes a huge difference. The tweak I am doing now is that I am slowly moving all the tabs to be on the left side or the middle and eliminating the right tab of a 3 tab folder system. It turns out that when looking for a file the distance my eyes move to look across 3 tabs and the irregularity of the tabs and disorder bothers me. I'd like to move to all left hand tabs but can't find boxes of file folders with only one tab style. At least I can flip the right hand ones inside out and make them into left tabs. So as I toss old folders that are worn out or create new files I try to make them all left tabs and only use the middle ones when I have 2 thin folders right next to each other. It makes a huge difference in how easy it is to use my filing system so I'm more likely to put things away there.
 
curtis said:
Should the papers/notes that are placed in the physical inbox be put into any particular order, such as the most important on the top?
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No, the inbox is for unprocessed stuff. Things shouldn't live there and there is no order to it. Now I'm terrible at processing my inbox but the goal is clean it out daily to 0 and don't worry about priority because you clean it out and fully process it when you pick up an item.
 
curtis said:
Should the papers/notes that are placed in the physical inbox be put into any particular order, such as the most important on the top?
Click to expand...

No. But you MUST empty your inbox to ZERO several times between your Weekly Reviews.
 
And remember that "process" doesn't mean DO the task. In general, if you've made a judgement such as "most important", you're halfway through processing the item, so go the other half so you can take it out.

Examples:

- If you threw an ad for HealthyCrunchies into the Inbox because you want to remember to try it, you don't have to buy the cereal before you can take the ad out; you just add a note to your grocery list, or add "Try HealthyCrunchies" to your project/action lists.

- If you threw a bill in your inbox, you file it in your "Bills to pay" folder and, depending on how you manage your lists, you may or may not add a "Pay..." action to your project/action lists.

- If you threw a book that you want to read in there, you add "Read WidgetCats" to your project/actions lists, and shelve the book.

- If you threw a letter from Aunt Jane in the Inbox, create an appropriate action ("Write to Aunt Jane"? "Add Aunt Jane to Christmas card list"? "Add Aunt Jane's address from card to my Contacts"?) and, if appropriate, file the card. Of course, this assumes that you've created a filing system that will allow you to find the card--if you don't have one, you can solve the immediate issue by creating a "to be filed" folder and a "Create filing system" project.
 
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