How do you get things done?
Do you have a system?
Is it time-based (spend 8 hours a day working) or task-based (get your top 3 things done each day)?
Context: I need to make some changes. New stresses are forcing me to optimize.
Any tips (or links) will help. Thanks
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None of these tactical hacks or approaches tend to work for me personally. For me, it never gets easy. It's a personal hard and daily struggle. You have to put in the effort daily to make small positive habits. Some positive habits may have a knock-on effect. For example, if I manage to get myself to read a book for 30 minutes in the morning, I often end up having a far more productive day.
I'm not sure if it's simply starting the day correctly or whether it's the teachings from the book are aiding my productivity, though articulating the reason doesn't change the result!
Books may not work for you necessarily, but the point is it's a hard daily grind, and making small positive habits, especially as part of a morning routine can really help.
Ensure changes are slow and gradual, since too much change in such a short amount of time will cause your mind to rebel.
I like the overall principle of this. Conquering the morning. Thanks Kyle!
Consider putting items on your to-do list that are not worded to finish but even just to start. Somethings are to big to finish in a day, but no task is to big to start today. For example “start user login feature” instead of “build user login”
This is great. And I know it works because I've used it in other areas. But forgot to apply it here. Thanks Justin!
I'm rooting for fundamentals, simplicity, and discipline for this. Few things I always do to make sure I'm in an ideal state to get things done:
Hope that helps!
I like that combination. Time and tasks. I think that's what I'll end up with. Thanks Wilbert!
Task based at the moment. I use Jira to track my work. Every task in my list needs to get done, so I usually decide which task to do based on the time I have at the moment.
Nice Yaro. Haven't tried Jira yet. I track some stuff in Trello. Will have to take a look. Thanks!
I have two customers I am working for, a side project and some other small projects, so I need to get things done. In the evening I revisit/write my todos for the next day (urgent/customer things first) so I know what to do.
During the next day I just go with the flow. Sometimes I feel like tackling that one important/enormous task in the morning, sometimes in the afternoon. What has really helped me is to use https://tomato-timer.com to really focus on working 25 minutes and do a break for 5 minutes. Also placing my phone not on my desk helps me a lot to concentrate. I work a lot, but I always try to listen to my body how it feels. On some days doing 2 hours in the morning and in the afternoon are fine on other days hustling 10 hours is fine as well. And I always place my work hours through out the day to have time to go for a walk after lunch and such. It is really hard to work if you don't nourish your mind...
Love this. Thanks for the tactical stuff too.
I'm leaning more towards what you said about focusing on the "one important/enormous task"
It's good to hear that's working for you.
My system to getting things done is objective-based it is similar to what you call task-based but offers a slight nuance.
The only way for me to do something and apply myself is to be rewarded is to think about the reward.
With a task-based system I will finish the tasks at hand to tick it off my list but if I hit a roadblock I may wing it to "just finish it off".
Whereas with an objective-based system the tasks have a meaning, a purpose.
For example, if my objective is to impress Rosie when she comes over to my house for the first time.
A list of tasks will unravel from that objective like cleaning the house and while I am deep into action I know why.
If the stain on the couch is a little bit hard to come off the thought of her beautiful smile will give me a boost of motivation to remove that stain
I've never thought about this before. Will try! Thanks so much. 🙏
I described my approach in the article: https://ismart.life/articles/planning_goal_project_task
I built this app to get things done https://www.thescatterbrain.app
I hope it can help you all too
After trying many tools for many years and looking for the holy grail in them, today i am simply trying to work with methods. It no longer matters to me whether it is software, paper or "just" a workflow. I would say the main point is individual fit and a consistent and regular use. I have currently ended up with this setup:
(And if i had to choose one of them, it would be the Kanban :-)
Very tactical. Thanks Jan!
I have lots of email-related work. Using Gmelius (gmelius.com) with its task-based boards inside Gmail.
Thanks for the tool recommendation. Never heard of it 👍
We using any.do
Very clean
Thanks