I love my Bullet Journal. I’ve been using it since December 2019 and it’s helped me keep my life on track. I write down my daily tasks every day in my journal and take notes during phone conversations. I also write notes about anything that happens that I don’t want to forget. It’s become an invaluable resource.
Tagged with: bullet journal, routines, task management, time management
I’ve been using a Bullet Journal since late December 2021. I played around with it for the last couple of weeks of 2021 and then started officially on January 1, 2022. On February 15, I published a pretty robust blog post about how I bullet journal. Six months later, I thought it was time for an update.
Tagged with: bullet journal, ryder carrolll, task management, time management
I find the question of what’s important carries through to every aspect of my life. It’s become a touchstone of sorts for me.
Tagged with: family, priorities, self care, stress, task management, time management
Earlier this week, I blogged about my love for my Bullet Journal. When I decided to start using this method, I did a little research on supplies and how to organize them so they’re handy for daily use. This is what I settled on. It’s working out well!
Tagged with: bullet journal, office supplies, organizing products, organizing solutions, pens, task management, time management
Here’s the concept: The Bullet Journal is a bound notebook in which you hand-write everything. It can be as simple or as complicated as you like. I prefer the minimalist concept that is closer to Ryder Carroll’s original concept (check out his website to see what I mean). If you search on Bullet Journal on YouTube, you’ll see that a lot of people create videos of gorgeous, creative spreads that seem impossible for mere mortals like me to live up to.
Tagged with: bullet journal, ryder carrolll, task management, time management
I made the switch from paper to electronic task management many years ago. As I blogged about last year, I created a Daily Task Management Trello board that was working really for me. But then I started creeping back toward paper and pen
Tagged with: bingo, motivation, productivity, task management, time management, trello
I don’t usually have a problem staying on top of my tasks and prioritizing them. Ordinarily I plow through a lot of tasks in a day and I’m generally pleased with my productivity. But right now, at this moment, I’m overwhelmed by projects and keeping track of all the tasks they entail. I feel out of control and that feeling alone is distracting. My productivity and peace of mind are suffering!
Tagged with: productivity, productivity technology, task management, to-do list, trello
Asking yourself “What do I choose to do?” rather than “What should I do?” or “What do I need to do?” can calm you and actually make your more willing to do the task at hand.
Tagged with: getting to good enough, motivation, podcast, shannon wilkinson, task management
It’s amazing what a huge role expectations can play in our perceptions of success. In the organizing industry, managing the expectations the clients have for what we can accomplish prevents them from being disappointed.
Tagged with: standolyn robertson, task list, task management, time management
I’ve long been a fan of the concept of a Power Hour. I group together a bunch of small tasks and power through the list in a short period of time. It feels great. My daily task management Trello board has supercharged it!
Tagged with: power hour, task management, time management, trello
It’s 5:30 pm on a Thursday and for the fourth day in a row, I’ve been disappointed by how few items on my task list I was able to accomplish. The problem isn’t my productivity. The problem is my task list. And it’s also my mindset.
Tagged with: ease, task list, task management, trello
My Trello Daily Task Management board has revolutionized my productivity. Here’s the nitty gritty of what it entails.
Tagged with: task management, time management, trello
Two weeks ago, I discovered the Daily Task Management Trello template and it has been a game changer for me.
Tagged with: task management, time management, trello
I do have clients who struggle with task management who prefer a paper planner. And, depending on their needs, my go-to recommendation is the Planner Pad® Organizer. It was the last paper planner I used before going electronic. The company’s been around for over 40 years and I started using it so long ago that it came with a cassette tape instructing me how to use it.
Tagged with: planner pad, task list, task management, time management
I wrote this post 5.5 years ago when I was dealing with some health challenges for family members. It came to mind recently, because my oldest brother has taken ill and has been hospitalized in southeastern Washington state for the past three weeks. I was trying to maintain my work schedule in St. Louis while checking in on him but decided about two weeks into his illness that I needed to travel to Washington to be there for him and be his advocate. In rereading the post, I felt like it had a great message. Scott is recovering from his bouts with severe pneumonia and I know I’ll keep these strategies in mind as I go back home to St. Louis and try to support him from afar.
Tagged with: kirby, self care, stress, task management, time management, worth repeating
Trello became even easier to use when my friend Shannon Wilkinson clued me into the Send to Trello bookmark shortcut for Safari. I use Safari for most of my browsing and was happy to learn that with this little tool any website I’m visiting can be turned into a Trello card and placed on a board.
Tagged with: task management, time management, trello
I’ve been noodling around with Trello for about a year now. I’m still using Evernote for keeping track of lots and lots of things but I’ve always found its user interface to be something to be tolerated, not embraced. Trello is quite the opposite—it’s lovely and provides tools to make it even lovelier.
Tagged with: task management, time management, trello
One day last week I had a long list of work- and home-related things I needed to get done. I created a list in Trello, using my Time Block board. With this board, I divide the day up into two-hour time blocks and assign tasks to accomplish in each block.
Tagged with: task management, time management, trello
Tagged with: evernote, productivity, task management, technology
Trello consists of boards (you can have many boards) that contain a series of lists, organized in columns. The lists contain notes. That simple format is extremely flexible.
Tagged with: task management, time management, trello
I’ve written before about the benefits of emptying my inbox every day. Inbox Zero feels like an unachievable—or perhaps even undesirable—goal to some. But I know from my experience that when I can empty my inbox each day I am more on top of my work life. And that makes me not only more productive, but happier.
Tagged with: email, habits, inbox zero, task management, time management, todoist
Todoist, which I use primarily on my computer but can also use on a mobile app on my phone or iPad (it syncs automatically), has a simple elegance about it. It allows me to enter tasks and subtasks and assign them projects, effortlessly set deadlines and reminders, and attach notes to the tasks.
Tagged with: task management, time management, todoist
I don’t know what I’d without a task list. I’d probably go crazy worrying about forgetting to do stuff.
Over the years of honing my own task lists and also working with clients on their task lists, I’ve come to believe in one important truth If you want to create an effective list—and by that I mean a task list that you actually cross items off of—you need to do this:
Tagged with: task list, task management, time management, to-do list
I’m thrilled to have a two whole days at my desk this week (today and tomorrow) and a light client load next week. It’s after 3 pm and while I have created some order, not a whole lot else has been accomplished. I’m particularly distractible today—I’m finding myself bouncing from small task to small task and website to website. I have a task list, but I’m not exactly plowing through it.
When this happens, I know that it’s time to pull out my secret weapon: My timer. I know from experience that when I set my timer for just a few minutes—as little as five minutes—I get stuff done. I like playing beat the clock, and knowing the clock is ticking in the background tends to keep me focused.
Tagged with: task management, time management, timer
Do you keep a task list? I’m surprised by the number of people I meet who don’t. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that my memory isn’t what it used to be, but I think I’d be lost without my task list. And certainly I’d be less productive.
Tagged with: mark forster, productivity, task management, time management, to-do list
I’ve finally embraced Evernote and it’s become an indispensable part of my work and life. Every now and then I think about writing another blog post about how I use Evernote and I get overwhelmed at the thought of it. So my plan is to highlight one feature at a time, as the mood strikes me. Today I’m going to focus on the Reminders feature of Evernote, which I absolutely love.
Tagged with: evernote, productivity, task management, technology
My client schedule is light this week and I had high hopes for getting a lot done. I dusted off my important tasks so they were front and center along the urgent stuff. Yet, the last couple of days got away from me. Part of the problem is my obsession with Hamilton and the distraction of the coming election.
Tagged with: mark forster, productivity, task list, task management
It’s so easy to focus on urgent tasks, rather than important ones, isn’t it? Every day I create a list of tasks I want to accomplish that day. (When I’m on my game, I do it the night before.) I try to keep the list short so I have a fighting chance of actually accomplishing all of them.
Tagged with: productivity, task list, task management, time management
For the last month or so, I’ve been using a template I created on the fabulous form-making making website, Transpose, to manage my daily tasks kanban style.
Tagged with: personal kanban, productivity, task list, task management, time management, transpose
I love creating forms and have been making them for years. I used to use Word, then I moved to Excel. But now I have a much easier way to create forms: Transpose.
Tagged with: forms, productivity, systems, task management, time management, transpose
A year ago, Springpad, the online digital organizing system I’d been using, went belly up. Fortunately, all the notes and notebooks I’d created in Springpad were transferred to Evernote, a similar, less graphical product. But I was sad.
Tagged with: evernote, productivity, task management, technology
Back in 2011, I created a Bingo board to hep me get non-urgent tasks done on a regular basis. I blogged about it four or five times and today have selected one of the most useful of those posts to repeat to spread the word about the value of building fun into your task list.
Tagged with: bingo, jacquelyn kittredge, motivation, productivity, task management, worth repeating
When I was in my twenties, I had a mind like a steel trap. Oh, the things I could keep in there and recall in a nanosecond! It made me a valuable employee; my ability to keep details straight and handle logistics well allowed me to work on some great projects. (For example, I organized—and attended—small conference in Africa with participants from all over the world. I put it together from my office in Washington, D.C., and this was before the internet.)
Now that I’m in my fifties, my memory is a shadow of its former self. But I’m lucky: in the intervening three decades, technology has emerged that helps me compensate. There’s no need to store things in my brain. I can write everything down and access it instantly using the app of my choice. That frees my brain for more important things.
Tagged with: apps, calendars, lifehacker, memory, productivity, task list, task management, technology
Back in 2010, I discovered personal kanban , a system of visual task management that I used for awhile. In a nutshell, I divided a large whiteboard into three sections, Backlog, Doing, and Done. Then I’d use Post-It® notes to write down individual tasks and move them through the process.
Tagged with: habits, personal kanban, productivity, routines, task management, time management
Since my schedule lightened up a couple of years ago, I’ve lived with relatively little stress. I work hard, which is occasionally stressful, but it’s good stress, since I love my clients and my work. Everything else has been on a pretty even keel. I know that I’m very fortunate.
Tagged with: kirby, self care, stress, task management, time management
I was so excited at the beginning of this year to partner with Springpad, the digital organizing assistant, to create some custom Springpad notebooks. When they first approached me in November 2013, I started trying out the service to see if it was something I wanted to be involved with. From the beginning, I loved it. It was the first electronic task management system that ever worked for me.
Tagged with: evernote, springpad, task management, technology, teuxdeux
The other day I found myself with a work day with no appointments in it all. Nothing to structure the day into chunks. I had a task list, but I found the lack of structure made it a little hard for me to focus on what I needed to get done.
Tagged with: springpad, task list, task management, time management
I’ve been using the free website and app Springpad for a few months now and if you’ve been reading my blog you know that I’m quite a fan. It’s helped me eliminate random notes and scraps of paper and, for the first time, I’m using an electronic task list successfully.
Tagged with: aby garvey, productivity, springpad, task management
For the last three months, I’ve been using (and enjoying) Springpad, the personal-organizer app. I’ve accessed it daily, either from my desktop, iPad or iPhone (often all three in the course of day). I wanted to share here how I’m using it and why I like it so much.
Tagged with: family history research, genealogy, springpad, task management
As part of its Operation Organization campaign this month, Springpad is partnering with an elite list of organization professionals to launch exclusive, customized Springpad notebooks that include ideas, information and recommendations from these experts. You can find all of the notebooks at organize.springpad.com.
Tagged with: genealogy, habits, springpad, task management
I tend to struggle a bit with task management. I know that managing tasks electronically makes a lot of sense for me. I’ve had an electronic calendar for years and love that I always have the means to make an appointment (in the form of my iPhone and before that iPod Touch and before that Palm) in my purse or pocket.
Tagged with: springpad, task management
Over the years, I’ve written 47(!) blog posts that mention Mark Forster, my favorite time-management guy. Mark really enjoys thinking about things like time management and productivity. I’ve been a fan ever since I read his book Do It Tomorrow and Other Secrets of Time Management seven years ago.
Tagged with: books, mark forster, productivity, task management, time management
I’m a bit obsessed with trying to find a great way to stay on top of my tasks. I find that when I’m a task-management groove, life is good. But when a system stops working for me and I get into task-management limbo, I feel out of control and tense.
Tagged with: bingo, mark forster, task list, task management, time management, workflowy, wunderlist
I know that somewhere around here I have a list—actually I think it’s more than one list—of potential blog post subjects. The idea is that if I sit down to blog without knowing what I want to blog about, I consult the list, where I capture ideas as they come to me, and voila a blog post presents itself.
Tagged with: bingo, charlie gilkey, julie morgenstern, mark forster, shannon wilkinson, simpleology, task list, task management, time management, workflowy, wunderlist
A year ago today, I first blogged about To-Do List Bingo. I created a bingo board after reading a blog post about social media bingo from my friend, Jacquelyn Kittredge of e-bakery.
Tagged with: bingo, jacquelyn kittredge, motivation, productivity, task management
If you’ve been reading my blog awhile, you know that I’m a big fan of Mark Forster, one of the most creative time-management gurus out there.
Tagged with: final version, mark forster, task list, task management, time management
Every now and then I write here that my time management guru, Mark Forster has created a new task-management system and that it’s awesome. In fact, last April I wrote a love letter to DWM, which at the time was his latest system. And then just two months ago, I wrote about a new tweak to Autofocus, which has been my favorite of his systems.
Tagged with: autofocus, mark forster, productivity, task management, time management
I’ve been a follower of time-management expert Mark Forster for years now. When he develops a new time-management system, I sit up and take notice.
Tagged with: autofocus, mark forster, task list, task management, time management, to-do list
For several years I’ve been using the various task management techniques created by Mark Forster. The most recent has been DWM. But life and work got sort of crazy and I spent a few weeks doing nothing but putting out fires. I ignored my task list in my DWM planner. These task lists are calendar based, so I needed to figure out how best to get back in the saddle.
Tagged with: mark forster, personal kanban, productivity, task management, time management
Mark Forster is my time management guru. As I’ve blogged about before, I loved his book, Do It Tomorrow and Other Secrets of Time Management
Tagged with: autofocus, balance, control, desk, empowerment, focus, goals, mark forster, priorities, productivity, task management, time management, to-do list
I’ve written quite a bit about Autofocus, the task-management system invented by my favorite time-management guru, Mark Forster. The original Autofocus debuted on January 5, 2009. I was an eager beta tester and became an enthusiastic user.
Tagged with: autofocus, mark forster, productivity, task management, time management
I’ve written in some detail about time-management guru Mark Forster’s new task-management system, called Autofocus. I’m a giant fan.
Tagged with: autofocus, mark forster, task management, time management, to-do list
Last week was one of those weeks I wasn’t at my desk much and when I was I had to be focused on urgent items. I’m not sure I actually looked at my to-do list all week, except to add to it.
Tagged with: autofocus, mark forster, procrastination, productivity, task management, time management