Today’s Homemaker

[Never heard of Getting Things Done? Start at the beginning!]

So let’s recap. Right now, you should have three lists:

1. Your “stuff” list — an unorganized brainstorm list of ALL the things that you need/want to do
2. Your Project List — a master list of all projects that currently have your attention
3. Your Future Possibilities List — a master list of all projects that you are not currently working on, but would like to do sometime

Next, we are going to make a list of “Next Actions,” which I touched on a little yesterday. A Next Action is the very next thing that you need to do in a specific project. So if my project is “Return books to library,” what would my Next Action be? Two points if you said “find library books.” Three points if you said “look inside coffee table for library books.” The more specific you can be, the better.

You have a couple of options on how to do your Next Actions list. The first is, obviously, to make one list that has the Next Action for each of your projects. If you have 5 projects (I wish!), this list will have 5 things on it — the very next thing that needs to be done for each of them. Pretty simple.

If you have a lot of projects and you’re often on the go, you might want to make more than one Next Actions list. These lists can be separated into whatever way makes sense for you. Allen recommends separating them based on where the task needs to be done. For example, I have several:

• Computer (these have all of my computer-related tasks)
• Home (I need to be home to do these tasks)
• Away (I need to drive or walk somewhere to do these tasks)
• Phone (I need to have my phone to do these tasks)
• Office (I need to be in my office to do these tasks)
• Waiting (Stuff I’m waiting on other people to do before I can do anything)

For long Next Action lists, having your items separated this way can make it easier to quickly decide what you can do depending on where you are and what you have available to you. You can obviously add to this list as needed.

Alternatively, some people separate the tasks based on how long they think that it will take. For instance, they’ll have a 5 minute list, a 15 minute list, a 30 minute list, and so on. The problem I have with this is that I tend to procrastinate on the ones that take longer. But you have to decide what will work best with your lifestyle.

But what about the things that need to be done every day or once a week? Don’t worry about those for now. Keep them on that first “stuff” list that we made, and we will get to them soon. Your task for today is to make your Next Actions list (or lists.) Decide what works best for you, and go for it!

GTD day six: Recurring tasks >>