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Sort of a poll: What is your favorite task manager/to do app?
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Posted by jaslar
Feb 3, 2019 at 04:55 PM
A few decades ago, all my time management systems fell apart with the growing complexity of my job, so I read up on various approaches. Putting everything in the calendar just didn’t work for me, other than on a daily basis. For me, a separate task list, that allowed me to shuffle things around, and nest subtasks, was essential for me to stay on top of things. If it went in the calendar first, I lost track of the larger sweep of projects, or relative priority. And the sad truth was, if I missed a task on a particular day due to interruptions or new urgencies, it was a major pain to go back and recover everything.
But different strokes for different folks. And who knows, this truth about myself may be why I am NOT a millionaire.
Dr Andus wrote:
Alexander Deliyannis wrote:
>>“Millionaires Don’t Use To-Do Lists”
>>https://www.forbes.com/sites/kevinkruse/2015/07/10/to-do-lists-time-management/#54e613644413
>
>One problem with that article is that it suggests a causation or
>correlation where there may be none.
>
>Rather than suggesting that these people (that constitute a miniscule
>proportion of the world’s population that needs to manage their todos)
>have become super successful because they used a calendar instead of a
>todo list, an alternative explanation may be that these people had an
>extraordinary skill or resource (which they may have inherited or
>developed themselves through hard work) that made them so successful
>that in their daily lives they can delegate most of their menial todos
>to other people, which probably includes even the broad management of
>their calendars.
>
>Having said that, modern calendar software have become very
>sophisticated and are interesting tools.
>
>If you think about Google Calendar and its competitors, you are
>effectively dealing with a dynamic grid (that moves according to the
>passage of time), which you can populate with differently coloured cards
>of varying sizes, which can be freely repositioned and readjusted. It is
>a very powerful and pliable tool, with realistic constraints.
>
>It is true that every time my given todo system collapses due to some
>unforeseen event, which then becomes the top priority as the one thing
>that needs to get done by a critical deadline, I always fall back onto
>the calendar, as the main space where everything is managed (as there is
>no more time for faffing about with a todo list at one point, given that
>all the other todos had become less important for the time being).
>
>Nevertheless, when the crisis is over, I always need to get back to my
>WorkFlowy and Google Keep lists, Gantt charts, and ConnectedText
>projects, to regain an overview of my original priorities (as crises are
>usually imposed on me externally, not of my choosing).
>
>Maybe this article is thinking of todo lists too dogmatically. For me a
>todo list is not a list of todos that must get done, but a space for
>thinking about them, organising them, working them out as problems,
>archiving them, and the vast majority of them will never get done, and
>that’s fine, in fact the whole purpose of the system (prioritisation).
Posted by Graham Rhind
Feb 3, 2019 at 05:56 PM
Inevitably, as this is Forbes, their criterium for success seems to be how much money one has. It’s not mine. In my experience almost all middle managers have fallen upwards, and seem to measure their success by how little time they have (which can only be a sign of a poor organisational system). Upper managers get their positions more due to their psychopathic traits and, as they don’t have to micro-manage, they don’t need the same tools as the rest of us do. Oh how we all wish we could go into a meeting, scatter gun orders and wishes, and leave again five minutes later! I use a diary and lists. I’m not rich, but I would say I’m pretty successful, having achieved more than most people do (writing books, learning several human and computer languages, playing several musical instruments, international sport, own business, renown within my limited field blah blah blah) , and yet still having oceans of time every day to work on new projects, whilst others around me lose their heads in their panic. And being envied by those self same “successful” people for the level of efficiency I achieve, which tickles me every time I hear it. Nope, I’m not special. Just efficient. Not that Forbes would be interested ... Yep, I know the above sounds horribly conceited, no need to tell me. I’m just trying to make a point .... Alexander Deliyannis wrote:
Just found this linked from the Sorted3 website, and thought it was
>quite relevant:
>
>“Millionaires Don’t Use To-Do Lists”
>https://www.forbes.com/sites/kevinkruse/2015/07/10/to-do-lists-time-management/#54e613644413
Posted by Paul Korm
Feb 3, 2019 at 08:12 PM
I like that OmniFocus calls individual entries “actions” rather than “todos”. “Action” covers more cases: to-do, must-do, better-do, wish-I-hadn’t-done, wanna-do, etc.
I like to use calendars as a sort of “hardscape” view, ranging from possibilities to firm commitments. I have many calendars, but four that I usually use simultaneously: one for meetings and appointments, one for possible events (soft scheduling), one to record what actually happened (used for billing), and one shared with my wife for things that matter to both of us. I have a dozen or so other calendars that I turn on and off when I need them to visualize something.
Dr Andus wrote
>For me a todo list is not a list of todos that must get done, but a space for thinking about them,
organising them, working them out as problems, archiving them, and the vast majority of
them will never get done, and that’s fine, in fact the whole purpose of the system (prioritisation).
Posted by Franz Grieser
Feb 3, 2019 at 09:32 PM
Graham Rhind wrote:
>and yet still having oceans of time every day to
>work on new projects, whilst others around me lose their heads in their
>panic. And being envied by those self same “successful” people for the
>level of efficiency I achieve, which tickles me every time I hear it.
>
>Nope, I’m not special. Just efficient.
>
>Not that Forbes would be interested ...
You know I am curious. Tell us: How do you do it?
Seriously, I am not Forbes, I am interested.
Posted by satis
Feb 3, 2019 at 11:29 PM
Graham Rhind wrote:
>
>Inevitably, as this is Forbes, their criterium for success seems to be
>how much money one has. It’s not mine.
No, this is the ‘anyone can post anything’ Forbes “Contributor Network” part of Forbes. It has nothing to do with the magazine. It’s the Forbes online equivalent of The Huffington Post, and the site splits revenue with writers, which results in lots of clickbait articles, and a lot of bad analysis.