So, you’re now in the know of
a. How to outrun the urgent – in other words – how to prevent matters from turning into urgencies,
b. How to classify tasks into MIT’s and Routine Work,
c. How to schedule your MIT’s and Routine Work according to your chronotype – with breaks thrown in for good measure.
Good Job!
But these well-crafted schedules……how do you track them?
A lot of people prefer traditional paper-based tools, from Post-its to elegant planners when it comes to plotting their schedules. But when it comes to using only the paper medium though, you’ll see that the drawbacks far outweigh the benefits.
The Limitations of a Paper-Pencil Based Task Scheduling and Tracking System
Ask anyone how they track their schedules on a day-to-day basis, and there’s a very good chance they point to a handwritten to-do-list, in some form or the other. If you ask them what else they use, you might get a very confused look! The to-do list is their scheduling tool of choice.
There’s nothing wrong with the modest ‘paper-and-pencil’ based to-do list – so long as that’s not the tool of choice for scheduling.
Here are some critical limitations of a paper- pencil based to-do list is:
1. Most to-do lists simply have tasks listed in random order, without time slots assigned for each. We end up working on these tasks in random order and often miss out on critical tasks
2. A paper-pencil based tracking system doesn’t provide you with an alarm system. You could get completely caught up in one task and forget that another – possibly critical – one is due next
3. Move away from your desk where your list resides, and you lose sight of tasks and deadlines. Never mind the added stress that ensues if, god forbid, you forget your trusty diary or planner before leaving home, or worse, before a business trip!
4. If you are not at your desk and you receive another task that must be done later – since it’s not practical to carry your notebooks/ calendars/ post-it notes everywhere, you could forget to pencil this into your schedules when you do get back to your deck
5. To-do lists usually focus only on the days’ activities. It is easy to forget to mark in our schedules something that must be scheduled for another day. This is particularly problematic with long-term tasks that run into a few days
6. The stress of having to remember the range of tasks that we are to execute and when, in order to use a to-do list and still be effective.
A good task scheduling system must overcome these limitations.
