Project list? Yes, but HOW?

[nzamani]

Reading this thread reminds me why I have abandoned hierarchical listing of projects. The idea is worthy – that having a tree like structure will help one think logically and help you include everything, but one ends up with: [...]

I ended with it too. Partially because of those reasons.

1) A tree diagram where it’s difficult to see the most important projects from all the structure around them.

That's why i began to build a generator that did it for me. It was mostly an automatic NA- and project-list-generator. It's flaws - due to never bein finished - was, that you could neiter filter, nor sort or edit in it. you had to click onto the link to open the mindmap in the correct dir and select the node there.

2) A structure that takes time to maintain.

Depends... the most of the time it takes is the time you think about circumventing the flaws of a strict hierarchy with poor crosslinking capabilities.

3) A system where you end up adding projects and subprojects to comply with the structure rather than in accordance with what you really need to be focussed on and get done.

In my system they were the the same. That was the beauty of it.
The rest of time i spend to "maintain" the tree was useful thinking, because i did put my projects in the location of the tree that denoted its purpose. The directory was the (title of the) purpose description.
That way i allways knew why i did it.
If i could not find a suitable place, i knew i could ditch the whole project.
It was one of the nicer advancements i was proud of at that time.

If you want the benefit of thinking logically and inclusively then do mind maps, which will doubtless include hierarchical outlines, and make a list of the projects and actions generated by them - and then throw them away.

I just want to repeat, because most of you overlooked it: I did mindmaps. I decided they were lame. I ditched them. 'Nuff said.
(Reasons can be found in my previous posts.)

But i still can agree with the idea that there could be temporaray planning structures that you can throw away later, because you don't need them anymore.
I guess such structures are good for active planning, but bad for maintenance at the later states.

I have a simple list of projects divided into areas of your life. Okay, I still have a hierarchy of two levels but that has to be all, otherwise it gets burdensome.

Just yesterday i reordered my stuff. Now it's also like that. A bit more mixed up still, but basically yes.
I have 3 main directories ("base", "personal stuff", "reason of life" [they're not called that way, but that's the purpose of their projects]).
They contain around a dozen directories each. One for each "project".
I threw all my files into them the way i felt it to be right.

I said "project" with quotes, because in fact some of them contain stuff of another dozen old projects each.
I guess i decided that this would help me reduce my parallel targets.

I see it as a partial failure, because it is simpler, but also more chaotic. Ih hate chaos. So it will go. Kinda....
I'll use it just as a directory structure for my projects' related files, while managing my tasks in ThinkingStone... until it blows up too... or so...

With a simple list without all the structure and mess around it,

It's interesting how you call "throwing partially unrelated stuff in one big continer" better and the opposite a "mess", while i do the opposite.
This is no affront. Read one of my previous posts for details about the different view on "simpe/easy". I just find it interesting..

You can also of course produce a list of actions divided into contexts. You don’t need a link between these and the projects.

That's what i('ll) do with ThinkingRock now. But it's more of a tagging than a division. (Even more overview! yay!)

For each of tho aforementioned "project"-directories i created a category. They are all coloured alike if they are in the same of the 3 main categories. (ThinkingRock has no category relations).
"base" is red for "oh-oh... this is needed so my life does't crash".
"reasons i live" are blue for "that's what i dream about all the time. ".
and "personal stuff" is green, because it's the last of the 3 base colours we see.
Now i can mix colours in-between while just variating a bit from the base color.

I like it...

If the project outcomes are clear to you then they are usually not necessary. Just looking at the project title is usually enough to think of the next action when necessary.

Hmm... that's what most poeple seem to think.
But what about things you don't think of every the time you look at the project? You could do errors by forgetting something.

And even worse: That way you have to think of the realization path every time you look for the next task.
Is'n that a huge overkill just to be flexible at that point?
Or is it one of DA's basic concepts?
I have the feeling that something in-between those two extremes - depending on the situation - would be the best.
As is:
a) Don't think twice about something. Write it down the first time.
b) Don't think about something before it's nessesary. You could do it for the birds.

The only problem is that i seem to have a very hard time knowing when i's nessesary to plan.
I know, i know. DA says "just as much to get it out of the head". But to me it's out of the head when i know that it will work that way. And how can i now that without knowing the steps?

Any ideas?

More and more I am realising that this forum is so often about analysing complexity where complexity is not really needed.
You seem to you have gone for maximum complexity to start with.

Reason (for me): Previous paragraph.

I generally like complexity. It's beautiful to me, like the thousands of tiny details of old architecture and art.

Reading this post, I sound patronisng, don't I? But I am trying to help. I suppose I've sort of been there myself.

Nah. You sound intelligent and helpful. Who would run you down for that?

 

[nzamani]

One of the major goals of GTD as I understand it is to decide in advance which things to NOT do, so that you can give the things you *are* doing your full attention.

I allways interpreted that "NOT" as "NOT NOW" (but certanly later). So i added of course all stuff to the NA list, to choose what to do now, instead fo pre-selecting by making just some projects active and pending.

There LJM opened my eyen a bit.

I will certanly keep much more stuff out. But don't expect me to thing of them as "maybe". With that many projects i have no time for "maybe". And those projects are important for me. "Maybe" doing them would be like "maybe" living. It's possible but zombies smell ugly. Project zombies too. )
So "maybe stuff gets the "this is my life" thumb up, or the "this is not my life" thumb down.
Now i can still keep stuff out of focus for "NOW", so this would work i guess.

 

[nzamani]

One question I'm asking is whether you in fact are more optimized later, or whether you just have that illusion?

Every time when i had everything in order, i had those incredibly effective days. It could be better if my old software had supported overview in a better way.

But tha actual cool moments were, when i did tons of tasks form all projects at one day. Intervowen bit all to do at that specific place (category). At the end of tho day i came home and could cross dozens of tasks off my list.

It was like a wonderful dream...
Until i became sloppy with updating my projects and started to distrust the plans.
The reason was a combination of my huge sleeping problems that make me literally stupid during the day (20-30+ iq points i guess. when i've slept well i'm at 120-130 depending on the test.), and therefore an overwhelmement by the organization of so much stuff and the execution of my tasks.
...leading to even more sleeping problems. :-

I've done software development for 10+ years in addition to my writing career, so this isn't strictly an issue of type of work.

The link is perfectionism. I goes well with programming and excessive pre-planning. (At least with liking them both.)

The thing that puzzles me is it doesn't sound like, with your current system, that you have it *exactly* your way, nor have you accepted the complexity you're imposing upon yourself. Put another way: Are you really solving a legitimate problem, or are you fallng prey to creeping featurism?

You are absolutely right that i don't really have it my way. There is simply so application copletely suiting my way. ThinkingRock is close to my GTD-way. So It's probably ok for now. But to be happy i'd have to be done with my own application. (Where i had to stop in the backend programming phase, after the sky fell on my head.

But who says i haven't accepted the complexity? I think it needs to be that complex to work that effective and good.
But now the catch: Most of the rules must be automated for it to be effective. If you do it manually, you die in the fire of the overacceleration, like i did.
The best example is the point i started this thread with: In the optimal action finishing procedure, there is only one action that's not automatable and one optional setting.
The action of marking the finished action done, and the optional setting of the relation to other actions to tweak next step resolving.
Everything else could be written in a programming language function in less than 5 minutes, and work forever, giving you the bonus of structures in your project list for free.

Maybe i expected me to be an idiot as fast as a computer, or i expected to be able to quickly set up such a system. But i sow see that i certanly could not work that way (=without first having the automation avaliable).

 

[nzamani]

For what it's worth, my "active projects" list has ONLY projects which I plan to move forward on in the next three weeks or so. Anything else gets moved to my Someday/Maybe list (or, in your example, the "pending" list, a distinction I think is a matter of terminology more than function. So, what happens when you rethink your existing workflow in light of this understanding?

In that light and in the light of the above answer to your other post,
i think i can get a workable system going.

This even makes me somewhat enthusiastic, in addition to the enthusiasm for actually finding a working desktop pc software built afthe the principles of GTD.
(Now if only l could fork ThinkingRock and Conky in some free days and melt them with my own ideas to something optimal... aaah, the dreams...

 

[nzamani]

As a general rule, I avoid having more than one next action per (project,context) tuple. If I have to call Bob and Steve about a project, I pick one call and put it on the list. After I talk to Bob, I can decide if I still need to talk to Steve and add another NA to my list.

I can't.
Let's say we have 3 projects with 3 calls a 5 min each (expected time), and i put one of every project on my 50 tasks to do list in the "on the phone" context.
Next let's say i update my lists every week.
Now guess when i'll do the other 6 calls?
Correct. Next week.
Even in the case that really hurts me.

Why?
Because with so many other important stuff i can't go now and look at those 3 projects. I clean my context (replace all occurences of "category" in my previous posts with "context". i did not know the correct term.), and then i advance to the next one.

Would it be more effective to do more calls? In my eyes only if i don't have to go trough the projects, finding them.
Would you disagree with that? And if yes, then why?

BTW: I never managed to go to every project right after i did a task belonging to it. This was of course because of the overhead. So i moved it to the weekly routing, wich was a bad idea because it caused too much dissonance and continued to allow the weekly delay in the advancement of the projects.

Future actions you might want to take on a project, [...], belong in your project support materials and not on your Next Actions list.

I never added stuff i could not do right now (if i did nothing else atm.) to my NA-list. I just allowed to add all next actions of a project because of the overhead of going back to it.

Now with them automated in ThinkingRock i don't even have a way to add more than one action per context, wich in that case is good, because it adds the overview and automates the action sequencing.

You seem to be looking for a way to use the technology to replace all requirement for decision-making on your part.

That's a wrong assumption. But i can understand that i could look tike that.

I guess you're talking about ituitive descision making.
Because i'm looking fo a technology that lets me - in a way - automate repetitive tasks (=workflows) in a way that i can either blindly execute them it the flow they come up on the list, or intutively pick the one i like the most (aka. think is best right now).

The important part is that in case i blindly execute them i *must* have defined that flow myself, before i began. Workflow definition, workflow execution. With the benefits of having workflow templates and templates based on other templates, and finally using a template, changing one, two things, and enabling it as an active workflow (project, kinda).

Ok, this method is not optimal. Now i know that. Therefore i think of a hybrid.
If you thought of more than the next action, but them in the future part of your workflow. If not go on intutively. And if it's important (like in big team projects), plan everything in advance.

Does that sound "healtier"?

I just haven't found that the technological structures you mention help me enough in decision-making to justify the added overhead of maintaining them.

Like the folks (at least in germany) say: "The computer helps you simplify the work that you wouldn't have without him."
Right?

 

[kewms]

I will certanly keep much more stuff out. But don't expect me to thing of them as "maybe". With that many projects i have no time for "maybe". And those projects are important for me. "Maybe" doing them would be like "maybe" living. It's possible but zombies smell ugly. Project zombies too. )
So "maybe stuff gets the "this is my life" thumb up, or the "this is not my life" thumb down.
Now i can still keep stuff out of focus for "NOW", so this would work i guess.

It doesn't matter what you call these "not now" tasks. It only matters that you identify them and make conscious decisions about them.

Katherine

 

[wordsofwonder]

Next let's say i update my lists every week.
Now guess when i'll do the other 6 calls? Correct. Next week. Even in the case that really hurts me.

If your system is operating in a way that you only update your lists every week, it's no surprise to me that you're having problems managing stuff. That problem, by the way, is why I moved from a computer to paper.

When I complete a Next Action, it doesn't take me more than 15 seconds or so to check it off the list and add the next NA to the list. I do a Weekly Review weekly, but that's not the only time I'm looking at my Next Action lists.

Would it be more effective to do more calls? In my eyes only if i don't have to go trough the projects, finding them.
Would you disagree with that? And if yes, then why?

I think my response to your question is another question: Supposing that you have 15 free minutes to make phone calls, is it better to make six phone calls relating to one project, or to make one phone call for each of six projects and move them all forward? The answer depends on the relative urgency of the projects in question, and so I think the answer to your question depends as well.

BTW: I never managed to go to every project right after i did a task belonging to it. This was of course because of the overhead. So i moved it to the weekly routing, wich was a bad idea because it caused too much dissonance and continued to allow the weekly delay in the advancement of the projects.

Indeed...that's the result I'd expect, and that is (in my estimation) a good reason to reduce the overhead in your system. That's why I've refactored my system several times, first to remove the explicit project>NA links in favor of making the NAs clear enough that I know what they go with, and then by moving from PDA to paper.

For me, simpler is better, because complexity in my system gives me an excuse to procrastinate.

With the benefits of having workflow templates and templates based on other templates, and finally using a template, changing one, two things, and enabling it as an active workflow (project, kinda).

If that's the way you work, and it works for you, I'd say go for it. For me, I don't see that adding "workflow" structures and such adds anything to my work. For me, saying to myself "I just called Joe about the project, and now I need to sit down and e-mail Bob to summarize where we are" and then writing "E-mail Bob to summarize XYZ project" on my @Calls list, is sufficient "workflow".

And if it's important (like in big team projects), plan everything in advance.

Does that sound "healtier"?

If it works for you, and it eliminates the friction points that are making you resist your existing system, then I'd say go for it.

Like the folks (at least in germany) say: "The computer helps you simplify the work that you wouldn't have without him."
Right?

Indeed.

-- Tammy

 

[unstuffed]

The rest of time i spend to "maintain" the tree was useful thinking, because i did put my projects in the location of the tree that denoted its purpose. The directory was the (title of the) purpose description.
That way i allways knew why i did it.
If i could not find a suitable place, i knew i could ditch the whole project.
It was one of the nicer advancements i was proud of at that time.

It's good that you're doing things that you can be proud of. But this explicit structure, based on a hierarchy that you perceive, may not be necessary to keep the projects moving.

It's interesting how you call "throwing partially unrelated stuff in one big continer" better and the opposite a "mess", while i do the opposite.
This is no affront. Read one of my previous posts for details about the different view on "simpe/easy". I just find it interesting..

Think of it in these terms: a heapsort is generally faster than a bubble sort, even though the bubble sort seems to have more order. Those who choose a bubble sort over a heap sort, thinking that it's less chaotic, will be less efficient.

Does that help? ;-)

I generally like complexity. It's beautiful to me, like the thousands of tiny details of old architecture and art.

Yes, architecture is beautiful. The shells on the beach are beautiful. And beauty, in the sense of elegance and 'rightness', often goes with function. Dolphins, for example, have skin that's textured rather than smooth, to allow them to fly through the water: as far as I remember, they make use of the cavitation bubbles generated by their skin surface to reduce water drag. Now that's beautiful. But remember that this sort of functional complexity can be very simple mathematically.

My concern is that you're imposing unnecessary structure on your system, and that's hindering your work. If your system won't alow you to do a quick mini-review in 5 or 10 minutes, then it's too complex. All the navigating you do, for example, is time that you don't need to spend.

Perhaps I'm not clear on your structure, although I've read your posts. If that's true, please correct me wherever I've gone wrong.

 

[unstuffed]

One final word

On the topic of 'things to not do now': I keep a Someday/Maybe list and a Pending list. The SM list holds things that I haven't committed to, and the Pending list holds things that I have committed to, but won't be working on this week (for whatever reason). I choose to restrict the number of things in my Current Projects list so that I have a reasonable chance of getting to all of them within the next week.

I also do a mini-review at the end of the day, to generate some more NAs for the projects I'm working on. I may also decide to move a project or two from Current to Pending, or from Pending to Current, depending on various factors.

 

[Cpu_Modern]

Does that make sense?

Have you read an Ayn Rand novel lately? Cool post.

 

[GTDWorks]

Quote from GTD Page 41

I keep thnking of this quote as I read through this lengthy post:

"Everything should be made a simple as possible, but not simpler." Albert Einstein