Weekly Review Challenge (December 2014)

Barb

Barb

0
Can you believe it? The end of the year is almost upon us.

I thought we'd reflect a bit and, as usual, put some ideas in this thread for others to use going forward. But I know everyone is busy so I'm keeping it simple. Every time you do a Weekly Review, answer one of the following questions:
  • Did you learn anything this year with regard to your GTD practice that really changed things for you?
  • Have you fully implemented GTD into both your personal and professional life?
  • Looking forward, what change(s) would you like to see yourself make early next year with regard to your GTD practice?
The prize for December will be FREE month of Connect so remember to post here every time you do a review!

And December also marks the end our our GRAND PRIZE CHALLENGE: A FREE Virtual Coaching Session! Remember, you still need to be a Connect member on 12/31/14 to qualify for this fabulous prize.

Best of luck, everyone, and I wish you a the very merriest holiday season yet!
 
WR #1

I started this Weekly Review on Friday but completed it today. Since November was a bad WR month for me (I only managed to get two in) I'm counting this one towards December!

I have a stable and ubiquitous system but for the last two months the volume of stuff going on professionally has increased dramatically so finding the time and energy to focus on my Weekly Review has been tough even though I know it's important to my continued success. Since my workload isn't going to decrease the solution is to be firmer about my WR. Starting this week I will either shut my door take my laptop and go somewhere that I can get some peace and quiet!

Mike
 
Weekly Review #1

Hard to believe we are into December! Following along with Barb's questions.

The biggest take away for me this year was the Weekly Review really matters!! Once I started to do it on a regular basis my GTD practices seemed to come together.

I have fully implemented GTD into both my personal and professional lives. I find that it's easier to use in my personal life. As a Respiratory Therapist my work day is pretty much scheduled for me. So I use it to track my CEU's, license and hospital education. I'm looking for new ways to use it in my professional life.

Next year I'd really like to master the higher levels of GTD. This group is always a huge inspiration for me.

Happy Holidays to all.

Ellen
 
Weekly Review #1 for December

Starting with a confession: I haven't done a weekly review since 31 October! November went by in a second - I did manage to close out a big project though (launch my first website - quite proud of that).

Today I spent 3.5 hours just on the GET CLEAR phase.
Then another 1 hour on GET CURRENT

I didn't do the GET CREATIVE bit although I have booked in my next WR for 10 Dec so will do it then.

I noticed throughout today that I was excited to actually get on and do some work from my lists - it's great to see all the options and I'm feeling motivated. Although I've known it and done it for years, it is still amazing to me how much clarity and 'lightness' I feel after doing a good weekly review.

It's been a while since I've been active in the forum so I'm also looking forward to reconnecting with everyone here.

Thanks for hosting this challenge Barb.

Answers to questions:

1. One thing that I learned this year re my GTD practice was from moving to a paper system (I used paper for 7 months) - I really GOT that having fewer items on my 'current' action lists was more conducive to getting things done (this took me a while - I think I got sick of rewriting items). I'm back to electronic now and much more respectful of what I add to my lists :)

2. Yes - implemented in both personal and business

3. Next year I'm looking for more consistency in my GTD practice.
 
CassRussell said:
Weekly Review #1 for December

Starting with a confession: I haven't done a weekly review since 31 October! November went by in a second - I did manage to close out a big project though (launch my first website - quite proud of that).

Today I spent 3.5 hours just on the GET CLEAR phase.
Then another 1 hour on GET CURRENT

I didn't do the GET CREATIVE bit although I have booked in my next WR for 10 Dec so will do it then.

I noticed throughout today that I was excited to actually get on and do some work from my lists - it's great to see all the options and I'm feeling motivated. Although I've known it and done it for years, it is still amazing to me how much clarity and 'lightness' I feel after doing a good weekly review.

It's been a while since I've been active in the forum so I'm also looking forward to reconnecting with everyone here.

Thanks for hosting this challenge Barb.

Answers to questions:

1. One thing that I learned this year re my GTD practice was from moving to a paper system (I used paper for 7 months) - I really GOT that having fewer items on my 'current' action lists was more conducive to getting things done (this took me a while - I think I got sick of rewriting items). I'm back to electronic now and much more respectful of what I add to my lists :)

2. Yes - implemented in both personal and business

3. Next year I'm looking for more consistency in my GTD practice.
Click to expand...

Cass, I'm getting ready to temporarily switch to paper too. I find I need to do that every few years because I get numb to my lists. Paper seems to engage me in a very different way. I'm glad I'm not alone!
 
December WR #1

Hi all, I've taken a break from posting to this particular topic for a bit. Nice to see that it is still going strong!

This week's weekly review was mostly focused on cleaning up and clearing out some of my next action lists. I recently separated my work and personal systems (which I documented elsewhere on Connect). I thought this might make things cumbersome for me but instead it seems to be having the opposite effect. So far the combined system seems easier to use... So perhaps having a boundary between work and personal items might be just the slight bit of additional structure that I needed.

Here are my answers for the questions Barb asked:

#1
The big thing I learned this year is how to begin to apply GTD to managing an organization, instead of just using it for my own individual management. I don't know if there is a "right way" to do this. I just jumped in and somehow convinced my boss to let me give it a try. We're not really using GTD in every area of the organization (not even close!) but it's helped in the areas where we have used it.

#2
While I am definitely using GTD in both my work and personal life (don't know how I would survive without it), I have to admit the phrase "fully implemented" doesn't fit. :-) I still have some work to do before things are running as smoothly as I would like.

#3
Like many others out there, my work and personal life are both super busy and I don't do as good of a job as I would like in terms keeping up with daily processing (electronic or paper). So keeping up with daily processing/organizing is something I would like to do more consistently in 2015. Another area where I would like to improve: Reviewing my next action lists more frequently so that they stay short and don't get stale.
 
WR #1
This was another fairly quick, tactical weekly review. I'm making good use of the two-minute rule and the Someday/Maybe list! I intend to do a deeper dive later in the month (between Christmas and New Year) to do my usual year-end review and planning for 2015, but for now, it's really all about clearing the decks of all but the essential stuff and giving myself a break! It actually feels really liberating to only concentrate on a few things. I don't know whether it's because of this approach, but Christmas has felt effortless so far this year. Gift ideas (some captured throughout the year) have been inspired, in many cases I've just gone ahead and ordered stuff instead of capturing the next action on a list, and I'm really focused on enjoying myself this holiday season.

There is part of me that wants to go down the rabbit trail of navel-gazing, but I know it's just not the right time. I know I'll get to it once Christmas is over, and that's the appropriate, best time for me to do it. It makes me think that, perhaps, I might want to do a high-level organisation for the new year in which I arrange certain activities and projects for when it's easiest to accomplish them. Working with the natural rhythms the way a farmer would... (I know Oogie has to do this in her line of work!)

Another thing contributing to my lack of stress right now is that I'm firmly back in a paper system, using pens and planners and notebooks that appeal to me. No stress over syncing or tagging; really old school stuff. Going as simple as I can and still feel in control. Not right for everyone, but I can tell by how I feel that it's right for me right now.
 
Just finished WR #1 for the month.

As part of the year end stuff we are making a concerted effort to clear out and clean up and declutter the house. In that spirit I moved a bunch of someday/maybe projects off into separate lists outside my GTD system. When I have time to do one of those things I'll pick it from the list rather than wade trough all the someday/maybe projects every week. Even when I have them set for review at different times it still is a lot of stuff to say nope not yet to each week.

Most stuff is chunking away though.

Barb said:
  • Did you learn anything this year with regard to your GTD practice that really changed things for you?
  • Have you fully implement GTD into both your personal and professional life?
  • Looking forward, what change(s) would you like to see yourself make early next year with regard to your GTD practice?
Click to expand...

My personal and professional life are one and the same. My biggest issue is the lack of clear lines between them which is leading to constant work and not much life balance. So I want to think about how to use GTD practices to implement some limits on work so I can get back to some of my soul renewing hobbies I have let go this year.
 
Oogiem said:
I moved a bunch of someday/maybe projects off into separate lists outside my GTD system.
Click to expand...

I have done the same, or almost. Same philosophy, but what did is a marked all those as "low priority" Someday which means I get them automatically sorted to the bottom and with a special (turquoise) color marker on the left. This makes them easy enough to ignore during my weekly review. I review my low priority Someday only a couple of times a year.

Oogiem said:
My personal and professional life are one and the same. My biggest issue is the lack of clear lines between them which is leading to constant work and not much life balance.
Click to expand...

I am not sure what DA says about this, but I think it is helpful to picture and formulate a "goal/outcome" or "desired level of accomplishment" for every AoR (or at least for each major area group such as Business and Private etc) and then make sure (using my gut) that I really consider these aspirations and attain a reasonable balance. Even if I do not manage to achieve what I had intended, I still find it useful to compare the actual outcome with the intended outcome and figure out why there is a difference, and whether I did something good or bad, in other words see if there is a lesson to learn.
 
Folke said:
picture and formulate a "goal/outcome" or "desired level of accomplishment" for every AoR (or at least for each major area group such as Business and Private etc) and then make sure (using my gut) that I really consider these aspirations and attain a reasonable balance.
Click to expand...
As a goal that is great, but farming is such that given the opportunity you can fill all available hours with work and that sort of goal cannot ever be achieved. For example: Are the sheep happy? Can I make them happy by doing X? Will they be happy then? Happy is not objective, there is always room for improvement in how you handle your livestock so you can never call a project done. It's really hard when you know you can never achieve "done" because you can always improve. So you get into a circle of trying to improve and since you can;'t finish you stay in that work environment forever.
 
December WR #1

Completed my review over two days as I'm traveling again (this time for fun!). When I get home, I'm going on my "weekend sabbatical" where I plan to do a year-end review and work on 2015 goals plus noodle through some of the higher levels (horizons).

Wrt the challenge questions -
  • Did you learn anything this year with regard to your GTD practice that really changed things for you?
Like your tools. I LOVE omnifocus, and I've done a good job of keeping up the WR's with it on my ipad.

Keep your head clear, even if stuff has to go on the someday/maybe lists. I was able to get a lot of backlog jitters out of my head, which has helped me stay peaceful wrt the amount of stuff that I need to clear. A few things even got done without my doing them - thank you Universe!
  • Have you fully implement GTD into both your personal and professional life? - NO! I need to get my work GTD set up working - that will be my focus last two weeks of the year on my next trip overseas. Fingers crossed that things aren't manic so I can make some headway here.
The problem I'm having with work is that I don't really like the system. I have to use outlook for work, and I do have it set up to sync tasks with my iphone's reminders. Can't use omnifocus on my work iphone, so what's a girl to do? I might just have to get an iphone 6 to enjoy my weekly review, since I like to do the WRs on my I-device (and I don't have a work ipad).
  • Looking forward, what change(s) would you like to see yourself make early next year with regard to your GTD practice?
Be more ruthless about using my someday/maybe list. I have over 700 next action items in omni, and I feel like I could do a better job of moving things between SM and active to make sure I don't go numb to my lists. I do a pretty good job of reviewing my lists, but I don't always feel like I'm making a dent in the lists or in my backlog. I know I am (I use the completed perspective a lot), but it doesn't feel like I am.
 
WR #1 for December

I started this Saturday and finished it today. I don't mind spreading it over two days, but don't like going beyond that. But it's done!

The thing I learned most about my GTD practice this year is not to get cocky. I've been at this a very long time, but my system got stale and I became a bit lost there for a while. So I will be doing more with paper lists for a bit--it makes me look at things differently.

Keep those reviews coming, everyone!
 
Barb said:
WR #1 for December

not to get cocky.
Click to expand...

Love that Barb!

I've just completed WR#2. Was much easier this week and even though I did it quickly, I was committed to doing it thanks to this challenge.
 
December WR #2

Completed it today after my "weekend sabbatical", where I spent some focused time developing a new treasure map for 30k/40k horizons (is that now levels 3 & 4?). Also made a little headway on my backlog - I filled a tall recycle bin this week - who-hoo - and made a bunch of new project support folders to hold the rest.

One thing I learned about my GTD system is that I was mixing actionable items (action support stuff) with my inbox stuff. This dawned on my when I was re-listening to the first road to black belt webinar (organize), so I fixed that this week by clearing the backlog that was filling up the inbox! Now I'm down to two action support trays along with my inbox (the second AS tray used to be my out tray - will recapture that soon!).

Number of action items now over 800! with over 130 active projects. Looked back in November where artsinaction made a visual of each of her projects mapped to area of focus - I think that's the next task that I need to do, to move into 2015 with a more balanced project list.

Have a great week!
Heather
 
#2 for December

Frenetic pace for me this time of year--always! Parties and gifts and friends and family--OH MY!

One thing I have really learned and relearned over the years, and I'm sorry but I don't know who at DAC to attribute this quote to, but this helps me: "Sometimes you have to slow down in order to speed up". PROCESSING things fully, thinking through outcomes and actions, makes life so much easier. It is so easy to rush this and I usually do!

For me, the way to get out of "squirrel brain" is to do a Weekly Review. I completed mine last night and feel able to hit the ground running today!
 
WR # 2 for the month done.

Lots of cleaning up of various things. I moved a bunch of someday/maybe projects that are related to hobby areas off to a separate file, more like a list, so I can only review them when I finish the one I am working on and want to start a new hobby project in that area. That alone cleaned up hundreds of on-hold projects in weaving, sewing, quilting, writing and knitting areas. I still have to tackle the on-going learning and scrapbook areas but ran out of steam deciding what project to focus on and what ones to truly say not yet to.

Prioritized some of the system clean-up I need to do on my computer. First and most important task is renaming all the files that I need to keep so they are using filenames that are allowed for all 3 major operating systems. This is proving to be a bigger task than I expected as the automatic naming tools I have can't handle the reformatting I am doing. I can only do about 20 minutes of that work before I start making mistakes. At this rate I'll be lucky if I finish by February!

I've also started the planning for a major project of upgrading all my machines to latest version of the operating system and upgrading all my applications to current revisions as well. I've been on a revision freeze for all my tools while doing LambTracker development. I am coming up on a point in time without major new LambTracker tasks to finish so I need to take a month or so and clean and upgrade everything. I have also decided that I really can't start that until after I have all this years' tax papers collected and off to the accountant so the project probably won't really start until late January. Right now I'm gathering information and getting the software downloaded or CDs on order that I will need. I am also removing old software packages I never use. It's amazing how much debris can accumulate on a computer over just one year! I got this new machine in 2013 and redid everything then.
 
Weekly Review #2

As I begin to finish out the year. I'm reflecting on what I accomplished last year and what I'd like to accomplish this upcoming year. I reviewed all of my projects to see where I stand and whether I can complete any before the end of the year.

I started to put together projects the will need to be completed next year and clean up any loose ends.

Now it's time to finish up my Christmas projects and have some fun.
 
Weekly Review #3

I haven't had time to post but I have done some sort of weekly review each week this month. Today's was definitely the best. Yesterday was the first time in a month that I got my email inbox to zero. Finally. I have been trying for weeks but just could not do it. So this was the first review in a couple of weeks that I felt able to take the time to actually go through each of my NA lists and review all of my projects as well as my ActionSupport and WaitingForSupport. It feels good. Crazy way too much stuff to do, but good!

I love Christmas and the holidays - I always have. It doesn't stress me out at all. I buy gifts throughout the year and only have a couple of things left to finish up in that respect now. We are having people over so I will have to clean and figure out what I'm feeding them, but even those tasks are usually fun for me - maybe because I usually do not clean or cook enough. ;-)

I am looking forward to a few quiet days at work over the next couple of weeks. I would like to knock off a large chunk of my next actions. I currently have a long list of large and small next actions and would like to check some off as done. I also usually take one day to do an annual review. I know I need to do that this year to rebalance. It has been a busy year with many high level projects that affect all the regular work I do in varying and competing ways. In addition, the regular work was particularly abundant this year. To top that off, I have reduced staff levels to try to accomplish it. So taking a step back to look at priorities and redistribute workload is something I have planned to do and am looking forward to.
 
WR # 1 for December (# 42 of 2014)

I have been feeling like December has completely gotten away from me. My last review was on November 30[SUP]th[/SUP]. In between then and now I did take a week's vacation and I kind of feel like I’ve been paying for it ever since.

Looking back, I’ve really only missed one weekly review since I wasn't planning to do one while away but somehow it feels a lot worse than that!

Keeping my In Box in control has been my saving grace but the review this week is critical to feeling good about the holidays. Now that it's done and I've looked ahead through January, I know what I want to focus on through the end of the year. A much better way to end the week!
 
WR #3

I'm still a bit behind the curve on the holidays, but made real progress this week on many fronts. My biggest accomplishment for this week was finishing my CEs for a 3-year professional recertification cycle! As soon as I finished the educational stuff, I took an extra hour or so and entered everything into the required database, paid my fee for recertifying, and submitted it. WHAT a huge relief! I'm proud that I left no part of the project hanging on and now can mark it "Complete".

As Julie Ireland once said: Don't leave residue! Residue could be leaving a couple of dishes in the sink, not putting something away, or leaving one last step in a project undone. This remains a big improvement opportunity to me, so "leave no residue" will be a 2015 mantra.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top