There are so many different opinions out there on how to write, track and organise your tasks. For me, it has been a really useful exercise to bring all of this together. This is my attempt to clear up some of the fog that gets created by all the different ideas out there. Many of these ideas are presented with such certainty of their importance, they become hard to resist. So, task management – what do you actually need to know?
What I am not going to do is propose some slick and sophisticated organisational system or talk about any kind of specific app that you need to use. I am going much more basic than that. What do you actually need to know about a task? If you ever plan to get anything done, what does your task management system actually need to tell you about the tasks in it?
I have distilled all the ideas on this down to a list of 6 core things. And, in order of importance here is the list. I say, in order of importance, that’s a little arbitrary and the lower down the list you get, there’s not really much in it.
- What the task is
- When does it need to be done
- When it can be done
- When you want to do it
- What it relates to
- How important it is (this one could be much higher up and I will explain why a little later on)
What the task is
Obviously this is essential. The task needs to tell you what you have to do to complete it. This all comes down to how we write our tasks. The classic example is the task ‘Call Dave’. This is useless. We all know about 10 people called Dave. And we have no idea what we are calling Dave about. So, you need to know what a task is to do it. You need to write it well.
When does it need to be done?
You need to know about any kind of externally imposed deadline or day on which something needs to be done. On the one hand, you have a deadline. The task must be done by this date, but it can be done any when before that. Some tasks need to be done at a specific time, for example, you need to put the bin out on Monday morning. Everything else below on the 6 part list sits under this. Any kind of firm, externally imposed date for the task’s completion will trump all of the other considerations.
When it can be done
Many of the ideas on task management sit here. For example, if you think about it, anything you might track that relates to the old GTD context system (person, place or thing) sits in this. Any measurement of time required or energy required sits here as well. If you need to be in the office to do something, you cannot do it if you are working from home. If you need 2 hours for a task, you cannot do it if you have 15 minutes before a meeting. All of this things are part of knowing when a task CAN be done.
When you want to do it
Most of us will not plan to do tasks only based on the deadline or context anymore. We plan when we want to do something and then schedule it for that date and time. It doesn’t need to be done then, but this when we want to do it.
What the task relates to
Most of our tasks sit within a broader project or category/life bucket. Knowing therefore what a task relates to is incredibly helpful for things like planning and task batching and also for tracking progress on those bigger things. If a task falls within a project, it’s good to know this. If a task is part of our personal admin or managing our home, it is good to know this.
How important it is
I put this at the bottom as this is the only consideration that is relative. All those listed above are independent considerations but with this, you need to decide its importance, relative to all the other tasks you have. For example, you might consider shredding an old utility bill to be an unimportant task. BUT, if it is the only one you have, then it is your most important and highest priority task.
There are a few ways of thinking about this here and you might choose to employ any of them or all of them.
The ‘objective’ relative importance
You could evaluate a task’s importance in relation to every single other task you have. This is the most common approach here. Generally we don’t think of it in any kind of detailed analysis on a task by task basis. We tend to have a more intuitive sense of what matters to us and what are the important parts of our work and then have a more generalised standard by whihc we evaluate our tasks. But, none of these things are objective. They are all relative. If our role changes, or our life circumstances change, then our priorities will change and with this, tasks that were critical to us become less so.
The ‘specific’ relative importance
Next, you could decide importance but only in relation to the other tasks in the area or project that the task sits. Lastly, you could consider it only in relation to the tasks you have planned to do within a specific time frame. Carl Pullein’s ‘two objectives‘ would be an example of this. From all the tasks scheduled for a day, he selects two to be his must do, most important tasks.
Technically, as a task’s importance is only relative to all the other tasks, these priorities should be regularly changing (as you complete tasks and add new ones, the relative importance of everything else will change), but most of won’t bother with this.
How to track all this in practice
Here is the point, you can create some kind of actual maker for each of these things. But, you do not always need to. For example, most of my tasks, I know just by reading them roughly how much time and and energy it will take. At least, I have a good enough idea to aid my planning. I do not therefore need to actually create a label, tag or property in order to track this on every task. Remember also, most tasks can now be attacked no matter what context you are in. Technology makes this possible. Those that can’t, it’s so rare, you normally can see when and what you need for them, just by reading the task. Therefore, tracking these things is less critical.
As I have reviewed all this I came to the following conclusion. I need to know all of these 6 things about a task. So for task management, what do you actually need to know? What it is, when it needs to be be done, when it can be done, when I want to do it, what it relates to and how important it is. But, the only things I need to actually specifically track and record are what the task is, when it needs to be done and when I want to do it. Those are essential.
When it can be done, I don’t need to track as most tasks be can done anywhen and when they cannot, what I need to know about them in this regard is obvious to me. What it relates to, I do track. It is very helpful to do this but strictly speaking it isn’t essential. The same is true for how important it is.
But, I sit loose to this as this, ultimately, is a subjective, relative value judgement. Humility means I must accept that my judgement here may be wrong.
