Jamie Elis said:
I would like to be able to link back to the Project after completing an action to view the remaining actions that I have identified on the project, to see which ones I have completed and access any specifics I might need that I may have noted. But most useful to me in improving the efficiency of processing would be to have the capability of quickly viewing a brief outline of the n/as associated with project to see if I have included a possible action already in my list (or even done it).
Wow, yes, those 2 capabilities would be helpful. At this point I can barely imagine
not being able to do those things. So yes, I think you need a tool that will do more of the work for you.
On your other thread you describe more specifics about your processing. It sounds formidable, though I still don't understand completely. I think you definitely need some of the functionality of Life Balance, but first, is processing a big part of what you do? For example, I envision some people for whom processing is much of their jobs, like customer service, administrative assistants, project managers, event planners, etc. It sounds like you have to spend a lot of time processing a lot of inputs, much more than I do. Life Balance is not known for being the leanest and meanest when it comes to entering data. This is true of outlines in general; it can be harder to enter an item into the appropriate place in an outline than to just add it to a list. However, with separate projects and action lists you have even more reviewing and maintenance overhead later. . .At first I was thinking maybe Life Balance wouldn't be ideal for, say, entering 50 actions every day, but then again, who would have time to do that many actions? I'm still not sure about your particular needs, but it seems like using Life Balance would be much easier than what you have to do now.
Jamie Elis said:
I have been thinking that I should try LifeBlance or something else, but I don't know how to tell if I would reap enough benefit to make it worthwhile to invest the time adapting to something new at this point. Since I am not highly familiar with the logic and terminology used in this type of software, I would anticipate a lot of time in the learning phase. The printed "instructions" are over 50 pages!
Yes, I know there is always overhead to learn a new tool. I remember having a couple small hurdles during my 30-day trial with Life Balance, mainly because 1) I was still trying to do things manually instead of letting the software do it for me; and 2) I hadn't gotten the hang of contexts, assigning an action to the place I need to see it and be reminded of it, not necessarily the place I do it.
I would not worry too much about the logic or terminology. Having experience with GTD will make much of the logic seem very natural: projects and actions. (You can ignore "effort" and "balance" if you wish, which are not concepts included in GTD.) The main terminology difference is that LB uses "Places" instead of GTD's "contexts." Of course a LB "Place" can be anything you want it to be, whether physical place, energy level, or time available, or combination thereof.
If you try LB, I would recommend choosing 30 days to try it out when your workload and stress are not too high. I would start testing LB with a subset of projects while maintaining your current familiar system. Also, just follow the most basic instructions that come with the software. With the current Advice Book, just read pp 1-3 & 11-14 to get started.
I think I still feel I need to know a bit more specifics about your situation before I could guess whether Life Balance will work well for you. About how many projects do you want to manage? Are any like each other? How much of a project can be pre-planned? Do other people have to use your project outlines or just you?
