I’m a procrastinator. An expert at it, in fact. However, at work, that usually doesn’t cut it. I’ve been trying to figure out new ways to manage my to-do list, and I think I’ve come upon something that works really well for me. I was reading a blog post over at 7Breaths about someone using OneNote and Outlook 2007 to manage their life, and it’s inspired me to write about mine, primarily using Outlook 2007.
My workflow is pretty similar to Rob’s, especially with the categorization and coloring of items. This helps me skim past personal emails and appointments while I’m at work.
I make a point to block out two 30-minute blocks on my calendar for doing weekly reviews, recurring at 8:30am on Monday and Friday. 8:30am is usually early enough that I’m in the office, but not much is going on. Monday mornings I’ll skim over my calendar and create tasks for major meetings that I need to do things in advance of. Why have that blocked out on Friday morning as well, you say? Well, what if I’ve got an important meeting that I need to prepare for on Monday morning? I’d certainly prefer to find out about that before 8:30am on Monday.
I also make use of OneNote‘s flagging feature that Rob mentions, so I won’t go into that here. One thing that I also do is, as e-mails come in, I’ll make use of Outlook’s flag feature to mark them as follow-ups. After I’ve flagged them, I can get them out of my inbox and filed away in my filing structure (note: if you move a flagged email into a locally stored PST folder, it won’t show up in your to-do list. Keep flagged items somewhere stored on the server!).
(and no, neither Madden 08 or NCAA 08 are that good this year)
The to-do bar in Outlook is what really saves me. By default, all your tasks will show up there grouped by time, as well as upcoming appointments (also color-coded based on the categories applied in the calendar).
One major change I’ve done is to change the filtering on the task pane. It’s not very intuitive, so I’ll document what I’ve done here. Basically, I got tired of seeing tasks that are (in some cases) a year out (no, I’m not that organized that I have things planned out a year in advance; it’s just that I setup a recurring task to renew some professional certifications). If you right click on the "Arranged by" bar, and click on "Custom" as your filter, you’ll get a window that lets you customize your to-do task list. Click "Filter" here, and jump straight to the Advanced tab. Here’s the filters you’ll need to add to have it display like mine:
| Field | Condition | Value |
| Date Completed | does not exist | |
| Date Completed | on or after | today |
| Flag Completed Date | does not exist | |
| Flag Completed Date | on or after | today |
| Due Date | between | today and 30d |
| Due Date | on or before | today |
| Due Date | does not exist | |
| Status | not equal to | Completed |
Some of these things are probably redundant, but it worked and I didn’t feel like digging through it to find out what I didn’t need! The reason that Date Completed and Flag Completed Date have duplicate entries is because the Date Completed seems to affect only real tasks, where the Flag Completed Date items affect emails and other items you’ve flagged. The heart of it is the Due Dates — this will only show me tasks that are due in the next 30 days or that are overdue (or don’t have Due Dates applied). Finally, don’t show me things that I’ve marked complete.
This all keeps my to-do list manageable, not overwhelming, and fairly focused. One other thing of interest: in that filter window, under More Choices, you can filter based on a Category. Maybe you want to exclude things in your Personal category — that’s the place to do it.
Comments
5 responses to “Getting things done: my way”
I like the way you manage emails and especially the filtering you have set up – I’m going to spend a little time implementing that myself.
Thanks, Rob. I’m a big opponent of a one-size fits all approach, so I think everyone pulling whatever works for them into their method helps. To that end, everyone needs to share their methods, to give the rest of us ideas. 🙂
-M
Thanks for the post and the cool details.
One nuisance issue that I’ve had: If I have a ‘multi-line’ task in outlook and I flag it as a task, it will flat out each individual task. This spams my task list and makes a mess of things. Single paragraphs work well.
I’ve been playing with but cannot figure out if there is a way to:
Take a project that occupies a Onenote Page, transfer that page into a task item in Outlook. The thought is to layout the project, Send it to outlook tasks as a whole project but with the Next Action item as the primary part of the title.
As of yet: I can’t figure out how to introduce the Page as a Outlook task, any thoughts?
Thanks!
Rob
Example of real project:
[Task] Next Action: Contact Sean@email.com a sample of the exact format from the need service now function of the sec pro site.
Security Professionals:
Goals: Set up up email receipt system from website need service now button.
Next Action: Contact Sean@email.com a sample of the exact format from the site.
Considerations:
-Notification needs to be on TSP screen
-Needs to auto-fill all information to screen including requested schedule date and time
-Needs to auto-reply to client that request has been received.
-Needs to auto-reply to client to confirm that service is going to be delivered on requested date.
-Reply email needs to contain, confirmation of all data, contact us for changes, estimate that was quoted.
-Reply needs to list the additional services: lasershield, ultimate lock, high sec locks, key control, electrionic locks including the graphics images ebmedded
-Needs a link back to the ‘request service’ now button if they would like to place another order
Hey Rob – I’ve forwarded your comment on to a few people I know on the OneNote team.. Hopefully they’ll jump in and answer the question for you.
-M
Hi Marius,
I found the 7Breaths article too, via Lifehacker…and from there I found yours.
Regarding the email thing, you CAN move your messages to local (or network) PSTs, then, once moved, use the SendToOneNote AddIn to send a copy of the message to your OneNote “in tray”.
From there, Tagging, Categorisation, the now familiar Ctrl-Shft-5 and onward Outlook Task management and Flagging, as well as Section collation for associated messages, notations, files and other related data are all at your disposal, as well as, if applicable, migrating this information to Shared Notebooks for collaborative work and projects.
As a NetAdmin, I can also tell you how this email solution makes my peers happy that you are keeping your mailbox size down 🙂
Hope it helps (anyone).
David