Sort of a poll: What is your favorite task manager/to do app?

Posted by nathanb
Feb 7, 2019 at 09:05 PM

Ken wrote:
Dr Andus wrote:
>>Maybe this article is thinking of todo lists too dogmatically. For me a
>>todo list is not a list of todos that must get done, but a space for
>>thinking about them, organising them, working them out as problems,
>>archiving them, and the vast majority of them will never get done, and
>>that’s fine, in fact the whole purpose of the system (prioritisation).
> >Well said. I’ll never get everything done that needs to get done as my
>lists seem to be “evergreen”. But, I need to know what is urgent and
>needing immediate attention, and this process helps identify those
>items. And while I know some folks take joy in scheduling every minute
>of their day, it would kill me. I need as much flexibility in my day as
>possible, both to work with my natural productivity peaks and valleys
>when they hit, and to allow space for the unexpected. It is not for
>everyone, but it works for me.
> >—Ken

Really good descriptions by Ken and Dr Andus. 90% of what I put into lists never gets done because a big reason the lists exist is to dump new ‘maybes’ in there to see where they rank. Most the time, the new shiny ideas don’t look as shiny when stacked up against all the rest. My lists are constantly in motion where new things are dumped somewhere in the middle, the things rising towards the top are being scheduled and checked off, and the things sinking to the bottom being deleted or sent off to ‘someday/maybe’ purgatory.

In my colorful history of trying to keep a useful ‘digital brain’, I’ve made attempts to make a defined schedule where the day/week is scripted. I’ve found that if I want to guarantee that’s what I WON’T do, it’s by trying to schedule tasks anywhere past a relatively loose agenda for today only.

I’m starting to realize that there is a fundamental difference in mindset of those who view lists as “I’m definitely doing this, why else would I put it on a list?” and “hey this MIGHT be a good idea, lets see where it stacks up against my other intentions”. One is black and white, you are committed to do it or not. The other is a spectrum, where every item’s value is relative and constantly subject to re-ranking based on new info.

I won’t get into which mindset is better. Both are valuable and necessary in any thriving organization. I’m a project engineer, my job is to change systems. Executive’s jobs are to RUN existing systems. My focus is on expanding possibilities, their focus is on executing current reality. It absolutely makes sense that I think of lists as constantly fluid and tentative whereas others see them as hard maps of commitment. It’s important to recognize that the majority of those that move up within companies are executives. Therefore, those of us who think of lists as fluid need to recognize this can be mis-interpreted as flaky and unreliable behavior by hard-listers.