What do I do next? I got it out of my head - now what?

OmniFocus OmniFocus for Mac
#1

GTD brain dump

My biggest problem as I try and implement the GTD method using OmniFocus is that when I sit down on my desk is not readily apparent exactly what I should do next.

I have gotten better at processing my inbox and if it’s two minutes or less actually taking care of the task. I’m less clear on how best to defer the task. Do I just move it out far enough to know that I will look at it again or do I actually try and schedule it when I think I can do it. What do I do to a task to make sure that I keep track of it and it doesn’t get lost amongst the other tasks?

In 1970 I read a small paperback book about time management and talk about establishing ABC priorities and then numbering the tasks within those priorities. This was pretty helpful at the time and I have since tried to adapt the Franklin Covey four quadrants establishing priorities.

To try and get this functionality I have created Contexts:
A - Urgent and Important
B - Not Urgent but Important
C - Urgent but Not Important
D - Not Urgent Not Important

I found I was quite productive when I utilized the Franklin Covey paper planner, one of the biggest things I liked about that is I can go to a date in the future put in the information that I would need on that date and then not be able to worry about it until the date arrived.

I like the concept of having priorities as with 1200 items on my list now rather than having a mind like water I’m worried that buried in those 1200 items there are tasks that will bite me in the butt if I don’t complete. It leaves me feeling overwhelmed. Instead of “mind like water” I have "mind that is drowning"

As an officer in the Navy I carried what was called a wheel book. It was called that because you are big wheel that you carried one. It could in your back pocket and had a top margin so I decided I would put the high-priority items that absolutely had to be done in the top ½ inch margin. I guess I wasn’t very good at prioritizing as soon I was trying to write super small to fit almost everything in the top margin.

I have been using flags to mark items that I want to review frequently so that I make sure I don’t miss something that could have negative consequences. I try and limited to the Franklin Covey-based Quadrant I Important and Urgent items. But what you do with the important but not urgent items that have not attended to could lead to constantly putting out fires.

I read with great longing the paragraph in David Allen’s book that described mind like water. Having a touch of ADD I often suffer from popcorn brain where to do items constantly pop up in my head. Even though I have a lot of my brain into OmniFocus I still seem to spend an enormous amount of time trying to figure out what to do next.

Has anyone implemented some sort of priority scheme, outside of the built-in flags? Do priorities have a place within the GTD system.

I did a brain dump and created the following Folders:

Personal Growth
Health
Relationships
Finance
Real estate
Carnegie property
Inglewood property
Career
Focused Organized
Personal
Entertainment
System Management
Home Repairs
Routines
Someday Maybe

Under each of those I created a SA XXXX project for single action items and then proceeded to create individual projects.

I don’t find the concept of contexts very valuable as with today’s technology I’m always @phone @Internet.

In addition to the ABCD’s that I have set up the Contexts I have set up are:
@Home Depot, @Cosco @Gym
@energized, @tired
@people

I need to review the review process, that I think if done correctly, would allow me to a feel a little less uneasy about tasks slipping through the cracks. What is holding me back is how to correctly defer a task. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Hopefully as I get more productive I can get that 1200 item task list down to something more manageable that I am capable of reviewing on a regular basis.

Old paradigms die-hard. I’m trying to embrace the GTD methodology but so far I don’t have quite got it. One thing I like to see from the David Allen group is an example of a well-implemented system using the GTD methodology.

Sorry for the long post but I guess what I’m longing for is a prioritized daily task list that I can just work through.

Is there any way to create a list that might contain items from several projects that I could then manually sort and then just plow through? In other task management systems I’ve implemented that through the use of tags. Is there way to use tags within OmniFocus?

GTD brain dump

My biggest problem as I try and implement the GTD method using OmniFocus is that when I sit down on my desk is not readily apparent exactly what I should do next.

I have gotten better at processing my inbox and if it’s two minutes or less actually taking care of that task. I’m less clear on how best to defer the task. Do I just move it out far enough to know that I will look at it again or do I actually try and schedule it when I think I can do it? Suggestions?

What do I do to a task to make sure that I keep track of it and it doesn’t get lost amongst the other tasks?

In 1970 I read a small paperback book about time management and talk about establishing ABC priorities and then numbering the tasks within those priorities. This was pretty helpful at the time and I have since tried to adapt the Franklin Covey four quadrants establishing priorities.

I found I was quite productive when I utilized the Franklin Covey paper planner, one of the biggest things I liked about that is I can go to a date in the future put in the information that I would need on that date and then not be able to worry about it until the date arrived.

I like the concept of having priorities as with 650 items on my list now rather than having a mind like water I’m worried that buried in those 650 items there are tasks that will bite me in the butt if I don’t complete It leaves me feeling overwhelmed.

As an officer in the Navy I carried what was called a wheel book. It was called that because you are big wheel that you carried one. It could in your back pocket and had a top margin so I decided I would put the high-priority items that absolutely had to be done in the top ½ inch margin. I guess I wasn’t very good at prioritizing as soon I was trying to write super small to fit almost everything in the top margin.

I have been using flags to mark items that I want to review frequently so that I make sure I don’t miss something that could have negative consequences. I try to limit the flags to the Franklin Covey-based Quadrant I Important and Urgent items. But what you do with the important but not urgent items that have not attended to could lead to constantly putting out fires.

I read with great longing the paragraph in David Allen’s book that described mind like water. Having a touch of ADD I often suffer from popcorn brain where “To Do” items constantly pop up in my head. Even though I have them out of my brain and into OmniFocus I still seem to spend an enormous amount of time trying to figure out what to do next.

Has anyone implemented some sort of priority scheme, outside of the built-in flags? Do priorities have a place within the GTD system.

I did a brain dump and created the following Folders:

Personal Growth
Health
Relationships
Finance
Real estate
Carnegie property
Inglewood property
Career
Focused Organized
Personal
Entertainment
System Management
Home Repairs
Routines
Someday Maybe

Under each of those I created a SA XXXX project for single action items and then proceeded to create individual projects.

I don’t find the concept of contexts very valuable as with today’s technology I’m always @phone @Internet.

The Contexts I have set up are:
@Home Depot, @Cosco @Gym
@energized, @tired
@people

I need to review the review process, that I think if done correctly, would allow me to a feel a little less uneasy about tasks slipping through the cracks.

Hopefully as I get more productive I can get that 650 item task list down to something more manageable that I am capable of reviewing on a regular basis.

Old paradigms die-hard. I’m trying to embrace the GTD methodology but so far I don’t have quite got it. One thing I like to see from the David Allen group is an example of a well-implemented system using the GTD methodology.

Sorry for the long post but I guess what I’m longing for is a prioritized daily task list that I can just work through.

Is there any way to create a list that might contain items from several projects that I could then manually sort and then just plow through? In other task management systems I’ve implemented that through the use of tags. Is there way to use tags within OmniFocus?

2 Likes
#2

Hey Steve,

I’m no OF veteran, but I can definitely offer you a bit of advice here.

Regarding the desire to review things more frequently, you have the ability to set a desired review period for each project within the inspector. Making use of that option and the review perspective in the side bar should make sure things are getting the attention they deserve. On the note of using flags, at least for me, I generally reserve flags for extremely critical items. Hopefully that helps a little bit there.

As for figuring out what to do today, and where to start, that is a bit more complex. I want to mention a few things up front, and I completely understand your struggle. I had a hard time grasping Omnifocus for a long time, and could not for the life of me have it work the way I wanted. I did some searching and reading on material from David Sparks, he has some great videos out there that really helped. Most importantly of all, the part that really sealed the deal for me, upgrading to Omnifocus Pro.

The day I paid to upgrade and started working with perspectives, everything I had seen and read from David Sparks and the community clicked. I immediately saw the power of the Omnifocus and it has been invaluable to me since.

One of the struggles I had before, was that I was using the Forecast perspective wrong. I was trying to use it to see what I had to do today and it only showed me items that were deferred until today or due today. That task I deferred until yesterday and forgot to do was completely missing.

Custom perspectives changed all of that. I now have a perspective called “Today” that I reference regularly. It shows me all of the tasks that are available to me today, regardless of their project or context. This includes that task I forgot yesterday that is missing in my forecast.

Another great example of custom perspectives that I struggled with before is my office tasks. I often have tasks that I have to do in the office, but aren’t related to work at all. Now I have an “Office” perspective that shows me only tasks that can be done in the office, and when I’m there, I use this, and see only what I need to see.

I recall reading or hearing a line by David Sparks that roughly equated to, “If you can’t find what you need to see immediately in Omnifocus, you should have a custom perspective.” I now completely understand this and can’t go without it.

As for the defer dates, they replaced the old start dates. I would go into the base of your projects and push a lot of stuff out, and also consider switching some of these to sequential projects. Small example, getting my hair cut. I know I can’t get my haircut until Saturday, so that task gets deferred until Saturday. One another note, it’s also set to defer another 3 weeks after completed so it automatically pops back up 3 weeks from the Saturday I get it cut. At the same time in a vote for sequential tasks, say I’m returning something to Amazon. The task to drop the package off at UPS shouldn’t show up until I’ve completed the task to print off the return label at the office.

I’ve rambled on enough at this point, and I hope at least some of what I said was remotely helpful. If you’re hesitant about the price to upgrade, Omnigroup will let you get a trial of the Pro version to test out the feature set. Definitely check out David Sparks as well, he just did a recent post on MacSparky.com about his perspectives in Omnifocus 2.

Regards and best of luck,
Kyle G. Farrand

P.S. These custom perspectives do carry over to the iOS versions of Omnifocus, except for ones done using the Project Hierarchy.

4 Likes
#3

Hi

I really identify with @SteveU and was inspired by the response from @KGFarrand.

Kyle, are you able to post the settings you use for the perspectives you mention in your post, it would help kick start me towards making progress.

Regards

#4

Some inspiration for you @SteveU, and @iwaddo:

Searching on the web, you can find many other posts related to @SteveU’s use case, but I hope these above will give you some hints on you want to achieve ;)

3 Likes
#5

Thank you, I will take a look.

As you say there is loads of material around, but the issue raised by SteveU was particularly of interest.

I’ve also recently purchased Creating Flow With OmniFocus, Mastering Productivity By Kourosh Dini - which I’ve made a start on.

1 Like
#6

That’s a great source of information. I like it a lot :D

#7

Hello @SteveU,

First and foremost – I noticed that you defended our country while serving in the Navy. Thank you very much for helping to keep all of us free.

I’ll give my perspective on some of the questions you bring up – feel free to take what you like, discard what you don’t, and ask questions if you have them. I apologize for the length of my answers in advance.

What do I do to a task to make sure I keep track of it and it doesn’t get lost amongst the other tasks?

For high value tasks which require immediate attention, I’d follow both your and KGFarrand’s thoughts and Flag it. This immediately highlights the task and gives it a different color.

I’d also recommend setting a schedule to Review all of your projects/tasks – this is probably the best line of defense to prevent a task from falling through the cracks.

Instead of “Mind like water” I have “Mind like drowning”

On a tactical level, it helps to sift through the tasks while bearing the standard GTD rules – the two minute rule (it sounds like you are doing well in this arena), delegating the task, and deferring it until later. In terms of OmniFocus, it is important to catalogue your tasks with some sort of organization strategy using Projects and/or Contexts. Otherwise, your Inbox piles up with a lot of tasks and you become numb to acting on the tasks coming in.

On a strategic level, an important aspect of GTD is to coming to grips with what you have to do and the time that you have to do it. My recommendation is to have a realistic assessment of what you are capable of doing, and politely (but firmly) saying “no” to other tasks that you simply don’t have time for. Over time, you will start having an intuitive sense of how much you can accomplish and which tasks may have to wait for another day.

In time, my guess is that some of those 1200 tasks will start becoming stale – they lie fallow or aren’t specific enough for you to take action on. That’s okay. If they hang around too long, it is worthwhile to review the tasks and see if you should drop some of them, defer them to another person, put them into “Someday/Maybe” etc.

Another trick might be to change the settings in OmniFocus where your deferred tasks do not show up until the specified Defer Date (or Start Date in OF1). I’d definitely recommend giving this a try, especially on some tasks/projects where an occasional slip may not have immediate consequences until you become comfortable with the arrangement. This may also help address the feeling that you are drowning.

What is holding me back is how to correctly defer a task. Does anyone have any suggestions?

There is a good news/bad news answer to this question – there is no “correct” way to do it except for what you feel is the best. Some of GTD requires a bit of experimentation on what works best for you and what doesn’t. It will help to engage your teammates/customers in this conversation so everyone has a sense of buy in. If everyone realizes that you are trying to set realistic dates/scheduling, hopefully you have a little flexibility until you find your comfort zone.

Do priorities have a place in the GTD System?

Yes, although they probably aren’t as well defined as they are in other systems. GTD assumes that once you have your tasks catalogued that you will have an intuitive sense of which tasks need to be done first.

If you want to use the Quadrant system, I can imagine setting things up in one of three ways:

  • Create a Quadrant I, Quadrant II, etc. as a separate Project and assign tasks from other project/contexts into the Quadrants
  • Within each Project, create a Q1, Q2, etc. sub-Project and assign tasks as appropriate
  • Create Quadrant I, Quadrant II, etc. as a Context

Is there any way to create a list that might contain items from several projects that I could then manually sort and then just plow through?

There are two potential ways to do this in OmniFocus. The first way is to assign tasks a Context. You can then sort on the appropriate Context and take actions as appropriate. I use this maneuver a lot to plow through my phone calls and e-mail correspondance in one sitting.

Another way to handle this is to use Perspectives – the built in Forecast Perspective is very helpful. If you want or need more fine tuning, you can create a customized Perspective that highlights the specific criteria you have in mind. To build off previous answers, perhaps you could create a Perspective that holds all Quadrant I and II tasks that have a due date within the next 3 days, sorted by Flagged tasks appearing before other tasks.

Even though I have a lot of my brain into OmniFocus I still seem to spend an enormous amount of time trying to figure out what to do next.

My suggestion would be to start somewhere, even if that isn’t necessarily the most effective spot. Handling all of these tasks will be an iterative process. Over time, you will start developing a sense of what works for you and what doesn’t. The most important thing is to keep moving – if you focus too much on aspects of GTD/OmniFocus, you’ll be spending more time on refining things than actually completing tasks.

I hope this helps!

1 Like
#8

I like to step outside of OmniFocus 2’s complexity and put it down on pen and paper. Grab a sheet of paper and a pen. Sometimes, I’ll use a full page. Other times, I’ll use a half sheet.

I look at the Forecast perspective and look at the next four to seven days. I look for anything that is due write those down at the top of the page.

Then I look at a perspective that shows all available next actions. You can create a custom perspective that is sorted by project or context. Then pick three to five tasks from that perspective.

I quit OmniFocus and never look at it until the end of the day. I work exclusively off of the page. That’s my agenda for today.

First, I work on all due tasks because serious consequences can happen if I don’t finish those tasks first. A deadline is passed or an opportunity is missed that can seriously affect my job status or personal well being. The due tasks are the highest priority tasks that must be done first.

After I finish the due tasks, I can start working on those tasks that I consider important and want to work on today or in the next couple of days.

I cross off the tasks on my sheet of paper as I finish. If I need to capture something, I use the other side of the paper to capture new projects or tasks.

At the end of the day, I launch OmniFocus and check off the tasks that I crossed off. Then I add the new projects and tasks into OmniFocus.

Before I leave the office, I move any remaining due tasks on to a new sheet of paper. Then I go back through my available tasks and select three to five new tasks to replace the ones I have crossed off. This gives me a head start for the next day. I don’t have to sit down and plan the next morning. I already have my agenda for tomorrow.

I use OmniFocus to keep all of my stuff but I work off of my sheet of paper or index card. This helps keep me focused. Otherwise, I end up wasting time scrolling through OmniFocus trying to find something that “feels right” to do.

2 Likes
#9

Thanks for your reply. I need to find that perspective that allows me to focus.

Can you post a screenshot of some of your prospectives.

Thanks Again,

Steve

#10

I am trying make Omnifocus work and not revert back to using paper as a crutch. I have tried many other systems and I, for better or worse I am going to stick with OmniFocus until I find a way to make it work.

I hate the fact that even after all of this time when I sit down to work I do not have the thing that I should be working on right in front of me.

#11

The sort of short/quick list making you’re describing is one of the things we had in mind when we created the built-in Flagged perspective - is that at all helpful?

#12

One way is to set due dates on tasks that really need to be done by a certain day. When you visit the Forecast perspective, you will see numbers appearing on a particular day. Work on those due tasks first.

You can also flag tasks that interests you. Flag a handful of tasks that you would like to do this week. When you have finished your due tasks, visit the Flagged perspective to see tasks that you selected and work on those.

At the end of the day or week, go back to the Projects or Contexts perspective to flag some more tasks.

Summary:

  1. Set due dates on tasks that need to be done on or before a certain date. Something like “pay the water bill - due May 1” or “buy wife an anniversary present - Due May 5”. These are tasks that need to be done on or before the due date. Otherwise undesirable consequences can happen.

  2. Flag a handful of tasks in the Projects or Contexts perspective.

  3. Work on due tasks.

  4. Work on flagged tasks.

Think of OmniFocus as a big bucket list - things that you would like to do. But you have a limited amount of time and energy to accomplish them. Do the important stuff first (due tasks) and then work on flagged tasks afterwards. Review the Forecast to see upcoming due tasks and refresh the Flagged perspective by flagging or unflagging tasks as needed.