As developers we are dealing with many tasks every week. We need a system to organize ourselves.
Goals
After completing this card you should have:
- A to-do list that you maintain every day. Many of us use
Holly
Show archive.org snapshot
, but a
todo.txton your desktop or any other tool is fine, too. - A habit of tracking any incoming task. We can never forget a task that a colleague or customer gives us.
- A habit of splitting any kind of task or project into actionable first steps.
- A habit of fully completing tasks to clear your plate for new tasks. We cannot have an ever-growing list of "nearly done" tasks.
- A system to process incoming e-mail. It's not OK to scroll through hundreds of e-mails in your inbox every morning, trying to figure out what to do today.
- A Google Calendar Show archive.org snapshot with notifications on your desktop and/or phone.
- A habit of skimming over large bodies of text before intensively reading their most relevant pieces
- Considered reducing distractions by disabling notifications.
Getting things done
Watch the following two video summaries of David Allen's book Getting Things Done:
- Selbstorganisation 1: Schaffe ein System als Grundlage 🇩🇪 Show archive.org snapshot
- Selbstorganisation 2: Perfekt organisiert mit der GTD Methode 🇩🇪 Show archive.org snapshot
- Related: So schaffst Du mehr als andere (Ivy-Lee-Methode) 🇩🇪 Show archive.org snapshot
Note
For work it's often sufficient to have a single TODO list.
Minimizing distractions
- Read an article about context switching Show archive.org snapshot
- Read an article about flow
- Watch Merlin Mann's Inbox Zero talk Show archive.org snapshot .
- Consider whether you want to disable desktop notifications for your e-mails.
- Consider whether you want to disable desktop notifications for your Slack messages.
Reading efficiently
Practice
Start using the tools you learned, e.g. track the tasks you're given by your mentor in lists and calendar.
Posted by Henning Koch to makandra Curriculum (2015-07-09 06:42)