Saturday, October 25, 2003
THE ZEN GARDEN OF TRIAGE
There is so much to do and so little time to try, let alone do it all. Imagine a zen garden with a little gardener (with bi-focals and a straw hat) kneeling at a pond, feeding the gold fish. Into the garden, suddenly leap, 3 ninja each holding a telephone pressing it on the gardener to take the call. As he looks up from his goldfish, trying to concentrate, but also to decide, it begins to snow, emails, trickling down from the sky all around like ticker tape confetti, as sleigh bells jingling in the background stop long enough for a bundle of mail to be tossed from over the wall into the snow. Plumphf! The cell phone rings. The stooped zen gardener knows only Master Gardener (and his own wife) have the cell phone number. He leans towards the pond and looks deep into the eyes of an enormous goldfish, in which are reflected the glistening white radiance of a lily pad which has the fragrance of rarest perfumes imbuing the moment with.. Ring! Ring! Pluht! Pluht! Plumphf! Plumphf! Ah! Decisions. Decisions. How does he do it, so calmly in the moment.
Slow action. Incremental movement, graceful, easy, taking on the whirr of activity that has entered the peaceful garden. Swiftly standing, three kicks. Whack. Whack. Whack. 3 ninjas over the wall. They can call another day. Reaching with hands in crane position, whirling hands in circles, little emails dance away to be read another day. Knife-hand drives into mail pile sorting riff from raff, all neatly stacked like firewood for when needed. Best of all, each phone call, each email, each letter leaves a fortune cookie behind with a short and plain message, such as: "It's me Mike, calling on the River Dam project. We need to get you some documents you requested. The last day you can talk to me about this without risking interruption to the flow of the project is Next Tuesday."
Now, the gardener collects these fortunes and feeds them to the goldfish which is a magic goldfish. And, he tells the goldfish. "Digest each one, organize it, and when the dawn comes each morning only regurgitate the messages I need for that day."
They are gone. On a little rock are 3 fortunes for things to do later that day after feeding the gold fish. One of them says: "Answer the cell phone". "Hello Master Neo, this is Bill. Everything is OK. I am standing in a zen garden. It's snowing. Blossom petals have dropped upon the cypress branches. I have leapt from path to path for you. I have cleared the choking weeds, and blown mist off the grass. The rain is music, the wind in the pines brings news. Thanks to this goldfish, I can do anything.
If I only knew the name of this goldfish, I would feel complete, because using it, makes my journey so easy."
The voice on the cell phone said. "OK. You have triaged well, fighting off tasks, as if you were a kung fu master, and not merely a gardener of tasks. I'll tell you. It's name is The MasterList a software matrix in magic goldfish form. Use it well and savor the moment of every task as if you were sitting in a silent snowfall, poised for nothing, ready for everything."
There is so much to do and so little time to try, let alone do it all. Imagine a zen garden with a little gardener (with bi-focals and a straw hat) kneeling at a pond, feeding the gold fish. Into the garden, suddenly leap, 3 ninja each holding a telephone pressing it on the gardener to take the call. As he looks up from his goldfish, trying to concentrate, but also to decide, it begins to snow, emails, trickling down from the sky all around like ticker tape confetti, as sleigh bells jingling in the background stop long enough for a bundle of mail to be tossed from over the wall into the snow. Plumphf! The cell phone rings. The stooped zen gardener knows only Master Gardener (and his own wife) have the cell phone number. He leans towards the pond and looks deep into the eyes of an enormous goldfish, in which are reflected the glistening white radiance of a lily pad which has the fragrance of rarest perfumes imbuing the moment with.. Ring! Ring! Pluht! Pluht! Plumphf! Plumphf! Ah! Decisions. Decisions. How does he do it, so calmly in the moment.
Slow action. Incremental movement, graceful, easy, taking on the whirr of activity that has entered the peaceful garden. Swiftly standing, three kicks. Whack. Whack. Whack. 3 ninjas over the wall. They can call another day. Reaching with hands in crane position, whirling hands in circles, little emails dance away to be read another day. Knife-hand drives into mail pile sorting riff from raff, all neatly stacked like firewood for when needed. Best of all, each phone call, each email, each letter leaves a fortune cookie behind with a short and plain message, such as: "It's me Mike, calling on the River Dam project. We need to get you some documents you requested. The last day you can talk to me about this without risking interruption to the flow of the project is Next Tuesday."
Now, the gardener collects these fortunes and feeds them to the goldfish which is a magic goldfish. And, he tells the goldfish. "Digest each one, organize it, and when the dawn comes each morning only regurgitate the messages I need for that day."
They are gone. On a little rock are 3 fortunes for things to do later that day after feeding the gold fish. One of them says: "Answer the cell phone". "Hello Master Neo, this is Bill. Everything is OK. I am standing in a zen garden. It's snowing. Blossom petals have dropped upon the cypress branches. I have leapt from path to path for you. I have cleared the choking weeds, and blown mist off the grass. The rain is music, the wind in the pines brings news. Thanks to this goldfish, I can do anything.
If I only knew the name of this goldfish, I would feel complete, because using it, makes my journey so easy."
The voice on the cell phone said. "OK. You have triaged well, fighting off tasks, as if you were a kung fu master, and not merely a gardener of tasks. I'll tell you. It's name is The MasterList a software matrix in magic goldfish form. Use it well and savor the moment of every task as if you were sitting in a silent snowfall, poised for nothing, ready for everything."
Thursday, October 23, 2003
3 WAYS TO PRIORITIZE.
Most people feel they need some kind of a system to prioritize their daily projects list. Here are 3 ways to handle prioritization and whittle that list down to the bare essentials.
1. TAKE THE LONG-RANGE VIEW. Assign the task to a future date. Don't do it now. Do it "just in time", later. There are various systems to accomplish this. The calendar comes to mind. It was probably invented several thousand years ago just for this purpose. Why celebrate the 4th of July in May?! Just put it on the calendar where it belongs. The same principle applies to tasks. Not every task that comes down the pike needs to be done today. There's a wooden tray you can buy that physically divides the next few coming months into slots, with 31 veneer-thin dividers per month. So, if you get a piece of correspondence in and you don't want to read it today, you put it in the slot for next Tuesday, or even beyond. Then, when Tuesday comes you look at what's piled up in the slot, throw out what has become irrelevant, do what you must, and re-slot the rest later. (Hey, wait a minute! Isn't that what The MasterList does in software format? ... More on that later.) Anyone who knows anyone who ever had the original Franklin Day Planner (TM) in paper format knows that taking the long-range view and organizing a future spread of tasks over a future spread of time was part of the secret of that system, too.
2. ASSIGN CODES TO TASKS TO DIFFERENTIATE THEM IN YOUR LIST. Whether you have Outlook or use a paper list, or some other computer system, it makes sense to be able to separate CALLS from CORRESPONDENCE WRITING from RESEARCH. Task Codes are designed to help you visually differentiate between various tasks by assigning them as "types". Doesn't it make sense if you are looking at your list of 100 Outlook tasks to be able to line up all your CALLS together, by front-loading your text with the task code "CALLS". And, if you are doing this on paper, wouldn't it make sense to put all your calls together on a call sheet of paper and all your research to-dos on a separate research list? (Hey! Doesn't The MasterList do that? Yes it does and it also allows you to see the research and the calls together at the same "project" separate from any other project with a single click. The right software, like The MasterList, can show you a lot of useful views so that you really don't have one list; you have many perspectives, depending on what you need. )
3. COLOR CODING.
Highlight your urgent tasks in RED. Make your long range tasks that need to be attended to immediately when they come up GREEN. Don't put any colors on short and long range tasks that are middling or indifferent in priority, but "kinda needta be done ifya got th time".
There are many systems with which you can implement at least one of the above techniques to prioritize your daily project list. But, there is only one system that pulls it altogether, with all 3 techniques all the time. That system is The MasterList System.
No matter what system you use, remember it's important to prioritize. And, the best way to do that is to have a system. There's no getting around that. Once you have a system in place, you can begin to pare that impossible to-do list down to a manageable set of short-term action items that properly segregates tasks you can't or don't need to do now by placing them down-range in your to-do time-line, appropriately task coding them, or color coding them for priority.
Or, get a system that does all 3. 3 in 1 prioritization, with flexible software that allows you to slice and dice across all your projects and to-dos to get "just" the perspective you need to organize your to-dos, your to-do "lists" and your thinking about all that you have to do. Like The MasterList.
Most people feel they need some kind of a system to prioritize their daily projects list. Here are 3 ways to handle prioritization and whittle that list down to the bare essentials.
1. TAKE THE LONG-RANGE VIEW. Assign the task to a future date. Don't do it now. Do it "just in time", later. There are various systems to accomplish this. The calendar comes to mind. It was probably invented several thousand years ago just for this purpose. Why celebrate the 4th of July in May?! Just put it on the calendar where it belongs. The same principle applies to tasks. Not every task that comes down the pike needs to be done today. There's a wooden tray you can buy that physically divides the next few coming months into slots, with 31 veneer-thin dividers per month. So, if you get a piece of correspondence in and you don't want to read it today, you put it in the slot for next Tuesday, or even beyond. Then, when Tuesday comes you look at what's piled up in the slot, throw out what has become irrelevant, do what you must, and re-slot the rest later. (Hey, wait a minute! Isn't that what The MasterList does in software format? ... More on that later.) Anyone who knows anyone who ever had the original Franklin Day Planner (TM) in paper format knows that taking the long-range view and organizing a future spread of tasks over a future spread of time was part of the secret of that system, too.
2. ASSIGN CODES TO TASKS TO DIFFERENTIATE THEM IN YOUR LIST. Whether you have Outlook or use a paper list, or some other computer system, it makes sense to be able to separate CALLS from CORRESPONDENCE WRITING from RESEARCH. Task Codes are designed to help you visually differentiate between various tasks by assigning them as "types". Doesn't it make sense if you are looking at your list of 100 Outlook tasks to be able to line up all your CALLS together, by front-loading your text with the task code "CALLS". And, if you are doing this on paper, wouldn't it make sense to put all your calls together on a call sheet of paper and all your research to-dos on a separate research list? (Hey! Doesn't The MasterList do that? Yes it does and it also allows you to see the research and the calls together at the same "project" separate from any other project with a single click. The right software, like The MasterList, can show you a lot of useful views so that you really don't have one list; you have many perspectives, depending on what you need. )
3. COLOR CODING.
Highlight your urgent tasks in RED. Make your long range tasks that need to be attended to immediately when they come up GREEN. Don't put any colors on short and long range tasks that are middling or indifferent in priority, but "kinda needta be done ifya got th time".
There are many systems with which you can implement at least one of the above techniques to prioritize your daily project list. But, there is only one system that pulls it altogether, with all 3 techniques all the time. That system is The MasterList System.
No matter what system you use, remember it's important to prioritize. And, the best way to do that is to have a system. There's no getting around that. Once you have a system in place, you can begin to pare that impossible to-do list down to a manageable set of short-term action items that properly segregates tasks you can't or don't need to do now by placing them down-range in your to-do time-line, appropriately task coding them, or color coding them for priority.
Or, get a system that does all 3. 3 in 1 prioritization, with flexible software that allows you to slice and dice across all your projects and to-dos to get "just" the perspective you need to organize your to-dos, your to-do "lists" and your thinking about all that you have to do. Like The MasterList.
Thursday, October 16, 2003
COUNT CARDS. TAKE 5 TO MAKE YOUR DAY.
Wouldn't it make your day if you had just enough to do and no more? If all the challenges that arose were a perfect fit for your capacity to handle them and not so much as put a crack in the retention wall of your capacity?
Who can do that? Aren't we supposed to be overwhelmed? Isn't that the basic idea?
Who can possibly get on top of it all? Well you can begin with The MasterList. Think of MasterList as a deck of cards with 52 suits and 7 cards per suit. How do you think the card counters would do with that kind of complexity in a game of blackjack in Vegas? Imagine that each of the suits is one of your projects and each of the cards is a task that you have created for that project. That's 364 tasks. Or, 1 a day for about a year.
Now that you've defined your task load. Imagine doing it all in one day. Oops! 364 tasks is too much for one day. One week? Same problem, 52 tasks is a helluva lot. Now, let's play 364 card pickup! Is that what your average day or week seems like?
Here's how The MasterList handles all this. The cards are organized in the order in which they need to be played. Cards which need to be drawn next week are scheduled for next week. Next month's tasks are scheduled for next month, sometimes for precisely the right time. Then, on any particular day, when you strike the MY DAY button in The MasterList, you draw only the right mix of tasks which you yourself scheduled for that day. Best of all they're organized by suit (project) which means that you can see the ones that go together at any time. Take that Outlook! (Oh, by the way, The MasterList links with Outlook and manages Outlook from inside The MasterList.)
If there are too many, you simply BLAST the ones that don't seem right for today and RESEQUENCE THEM IN THE DECK OF TASKS to precisely when you think you will need to get back to them. This is better than card counting, because even though you never know the exact sequence of your deck of 364 tasks, you can be 100% sure in the short term that the tasks you are drawing for today are all winners. Because YOU FIXED THE DECK.
What's amazing about The MasterList is that it has no limits. It's a relational database and you can define 3,640 tasks for yourself, or even 36,400 if you can conceive that many. And, all of them can be organized just as simply, even if you have thousands of projects, not just 52. By the time, you reach 3,640 you will probably have grown so much into the habit of using The MasterList to win the battle of getting things done, that you will want to build a team around it and get the network version.
It's that simple. Like Dave Brubeck wrote Take 5! Breeze, not wheeze through your day with a STACKED DECK. 5 minutes to clear out your My Day List on The MasterList everyday. Make Your Day!
Wouldn't it make your day if you had just enough to do and no more? If all the challenges that arose were a perfect fit for your capacity to handle them and not so much as put a crack in the retention wall of your capacity?
Who can do that? Aren't we supposed to be overwhelmed? Isn't that the basic idea?
Who can possibly get on top of it all? Well you can begin with The MasterList. Think of MasterList as a deck of cards with 52 suits and 7 cards per suit. How do you think the card counters would do with that kind of complexity in a game of blackjack in Vegas? Imagine that each of the suits is one of your projects and each of the cards is a task that you have created for that project. That's 364 tasks. Or, 1 a day for about a year.
Now that you've defined your task load. Imagine doing it all in one day. Oops! 364 tasks is too much for one day. One week? Same problem, 52 tasks is a helluva lot. Now, let's play 364 card pickup! Is that what your average day or week seems like?
Here's how The MasterList handles all this. The cards are organized in the order in which they need to be played. Cards which need to be drawn next week are scheduled for next week. Next month's tasks are scheduled for next month, sometimes for precisely the right time. Then, on any particular day, when you strike the MY DAY button in The MasterList, you draw only the right mix of tasks which you yourself scheduled for that day. Best of all they're organized by suit (project) which means that you can see the ones that go together at any time. Take that Outlook! (Oh, by the way, The MasterList links with Outlook and manages Outlook from inside The MasterList.)
If there are too many, you simply BLAST the ones that don't seem right for today and RESEQUENCE THEM IN THE DECK OF TASKS to precisely when you think you will need to get back to them. This is better than card counting, because even though you never know the exact sequence of your deck of 364 tasks, you can be 100% sure in the short term that the tasks you are drawing for today are all winners. Because YOU FIXED THE DECK.
What's amazing about The MasterList is that it has no limits. It's a relational database and you can define 3,640 tasks for yourself, or even 36,400 if you can conceive that many. And, all of them can be organized just as simply, even if you have thousands of projects, not just 52. By the time, you reach 3,640 you will probably have grown so much into the habit of using The MasterList to win the battle of getting things done, that you will want to build a team around it and get the network version.
It's that simple. Like Dave Brubeck wrote Take 5! Breeze, not wheeze through your day with a STACKED DECK. 5 minutes to clear out your My Day List on The MasterList everyday. Make Your Day!
Tuesday, October 14, 2003
YES. DISCIPLINE IS INVOLVED.
Getting your act together requires discipline. The MasterList is a software tool for getting your professional act together. It's as easy as pie and using it will straighten out most of your moment to moment managerial issues as right as rain, but we never said that success with The MasterList came without the price of self-discipline.
Analogies abound. Diets. It's easy to skip dessert after one meal. But can you do it every time? Exercise. Going to the gym once for a 1 hour session? Easy. Every day? That's another matter. New Year's Resolutions. Ditto. Self-help and time-management techniques from books and seminars? See New Year's Resolutions, above.
So, you ask "What's the Point. If I can't stick with a discipline, why start The MasterList. I will never master anything in my professional or personal to-do environment because, even if getting started is easy, I'm pretty sure I won't be able to stick with a software program that requires any kind of dedication to getting it done".
Good question. Better Question: "What makes The MasterList so different. Why not pick ANY to-do organizer or task management program, or even Outlook, out of a hat, and just stick with it. Isn't that discipline? And wouldn't it work?"
Yes, it would. But it's easier with The MasterList. The MasterList is like a game in which all the elements are gliding around and you are playing with them. Those other programs are like rolling 400 pound balls up hill. Big difference.
The MasterList. Easy to use. But, requires some discipline. Isn't it worth it?
For more about The MasterList, or to order a demo copy, visit The MasterList. Have a great week!
Getting your act together requires discipline. The MasterList is a software tool for getting your professional act together. It's as easy as pie and using it will straighten out most of your moment to moment managerial issues as right as rain, but we never said that success with The MasterList came without the price of self-discipline.
Analogies abound. Diets. It's easy to skip dessert after one meal. But can you do it every time? Exercise. Going to the gym once for a 1 hour session? Easy. Every day? That's another matter. New Year's Resolutions. Ditto. Self-help and time-management techniques from books and seminars? See New Year's Resolutions, above.
So, you ask "What's the Point. If I can't stick with a discipline, why start The MasterList. I will never master anything in my professional or personal to-do environment because, even if getting started is easy, I'm pretty sure I won't be able to stick with a software program that requires any kind of dedication to getting it done".
Good question. Better Question: "What makes The MasterList so different. Why not pick ANY to-do organizer or task management program, or even Outlook, out of a hat, and just stick with it. Isn't that discipline? And wouldn't it work?"
Yes, it would. But it's easier with The MasterList. The MasterList is like a game in which all the elements are gliding around and you are playing with them. Those other programs are like rolling 400 pound balls up hill. Big difference.
The MasterList. Easy to use. But, requires some discipline. Isn't it worth it?
For more about The MasterList, or to order a demo copy, visit The MasterList. Have a great week!
Sunday, October 12, 2003
This is a test of a trial blog about The MasterList with Blogger.
