Some more interesting discussions in this thread, as always, and while I’ve always shied away from the quadrant approach (at least in recent years – I used it more back in the nineties when Franklin Covey was all the rage), I tried messing with contexts to set priority years ago, and it just didn’t work for me, at all. Too narrow since things can only have one context. Tags could solve this, even pseudo-tags, but I find that things change often enough that this is also more trouble than it’s worth (for me, at least). That said, I think my workflow (somewhat described above in this thread and elsewhere) inherently takes some of this into account – as much as I need, anyway – without my even fully realizing it until I sit down and think about it.
For example, I’m very focused on using due dates only for “hard landscape” tasks, but I’m also not against giving myself a hard landscape for certain things that I feel have a need. Ergo, anything with a due date becomes “Urgent” automatically. This is clearly the “Must Do” or N+A and N stuff. While the “hard landscape” approach to due dates suggests that tasks need to have consequences, there is such a thing as personal consequences in terms of meeting one’s own goals and objectives.
For instance, I have an exercise regimen that I want to stick to on a daily basis. I used to just make that a flagged task, but I found it was too easy to ignore that if I was otherwise busy. Now it has a due time of 8AM that pushes me to do it before I start my workday, rather than just feel that it can drift off the bottom. It’s a mindset, but putting that due time on there automatically puts it into the Important+Urgent category. It suddenly becomes a “Must Do” for me.
The thing I like about OmniFocus, however, is its fluidity, and this was where quadrant systems always felt too intransigent. I mean, yes, you can move things around between quadrants, but that always felt more like admitting defeat rather than reprioritizing stuff based on an actual schedule of timelines.
Life is fluid, priorities changes, both external and internal, and the ability to review and adjust things is critical to a good workflow, IMHO (the same lessons I’ve been learning about budgeting over the years too, but that’s another story :) ).
For example, as much as my morning routine is in the “Must Do” category, if something more important came up, that could easily be pushed off. I might adjust the due date to later in the day, or I might decide that it really does need to be skipped today and simply move it to tomorrow. Adjusting the due time on it feels like a more conscious decision (to me) to plan my time than simply moving it around between contexts, or otherwise figuring out how to deal with it in a more nebulous way.
Or, to put it in a job context, I’m working on a report that’s due today at 4:00. That’s clearly a “Must Do” N+A type of task. Then the client sends me an email and says that a security breach has come up and needs to be investigated right away. Do I keep working on the report? Of course not, I reprioritize. The report is still N+A, but just not for today any more.
So to line it up with the past couple of posts, my take on the categories would be more like this:
Must Do: Flagged, Due Date
Should Do: Flagged
Could Do: Available, Unflagged
In all cases, defer dates are assigned as appropriate for things that are further out. For example, my taxes are already in OmniFocus for next spring with due dates all set up, but obviously I’m not in a position to even LOOK at them until at least March, so the first action in that project is flagged and deferred until March 1st.
The beauty of flags and due dates in the OmniFocus approach as well is that longer-term tasks can flow from Could, to Should, to Must very easily, and even somewhat automatically. Take taxes, for instance… My first action might be “Collect T4 slips” (our equivalent of a U.S. W2), with the following parameters:
Due: March 15th
Defer: February 1st
Unflagged
Context: Desk
On February 1st, that task becomes a “could do.” It’s now available in my Desk context if I’m looking for stuff to do. I can do it, but I don’t really need to yet. If I do nothing at all about it until March 14th, then suddenly it will go from Could to Must, but usually I’ve seen it and addressed it long before it gets to that point.
The key to this aspect of making things work is the Review process. As I’ve said elsewhere, that really is the secret sauce that makes the system work. I go through a detailed review every Monday morning, looking at all of my relevant remaining tasks to determine what needs to be done. Again, life and priorities change, and while I may think I have all the time in the world to do my taxes in March, I may be buried in the middle of five projects by the time March rolls around and tearing my hair out. Dates will get shifted around during the review process to account for this.
So in the example above, when February 1st hit, I’d see my “Collect T4s” task and make a decision on what to do about it. If it’s still in the “Could” category, I leave it alone. If I know that February and March are going to be crazy, I move it to the “Should” category, giving it a flag and maybe adjusting the defer date (to reflect the day that I actually plan to deal with it). As I move closer to the deadline, I’m going to keep seeing it in the weekly reviews, and will likely flag it at some point regardless to give myself more lead time, moving it into a Should/Must sort of split. My main working context shows only flagged items, but sorts by due date, so anything with any due date whatsoever ends up at the top. These are inherently and always higher priority than anything without a due date (the pure “Should” stuff).
A word on Reviews as well… OmniFocus’ Review system is second to none, and a key to that process is setting Review cycles and “Next Review” dates. As I’ve said, my taxes project is already in OmniFocus, lurking there to come up for Review in February. Since it’s only October right now, however, it doesn’t come up in my weekly reviews. There’s no point to keep looking at it every week as it’s not relevant right now. Similarly, I have projects I review regularly, but they don’t change often enough to warrant a weekly review, so they’re set to be reviewed every 2, 4, or 8 weeks. They don’t disappear off my list in the long term, but I don’t need to keep looking at the same lists of tasks every week and going “Yup, still the same. Nothing different to do here.” This is especially true for those single-action lists and projects that already include routine and recurring flagged tasks.
One thing that I haven’t really addressed in my system, mind you, is “Important” vs “Urgent.” The “Should Do” kind of covers that, but not directly. The fact is that what’s important but not urgent for me is usually really obvious, and I prioritize those again by flags (“Should Do”), or by sorting – most of my “Important” projects and single-action-lists are higher in my project hierarchy, so their flagged tasks sort above the lesser important ones. Again, this is something I’ve inherently done without giving it much thought to a “Four Quadrants” approach, and it works quite well for me.
