Excluding project lists from your task manager

[svsmailus]

I’ve recently returned to David Allen’s GTD process. As ever, these things make you look at your workflow and think things through.

My understanding is that you develop your tasks from your project lists. These tasks are actionable. This would mean that having the projects themselves in your task manager is unhelpful as you only really need to see the next actions. Does anyone do this? Are there pros and cons in doing this? I’m assuming you would keep your project list in some form of text document?

On the surface of it it seems to make sense as the projects themselves are not actionable. Having them somewhere else allows you to write and maintain notes on them which would not work well in a task manager.

Interestingly, no task manager I know of works like this. They all expect you to use projects.

[Bmosbacker]

For what it is worth, I was an early adopter of GTD, having attended a training with David Allen. I’ve also used both OF and Reminders extensively.

I want my projects listed with the associated tasks in my task manager. It is helpful to have projects and the associated app rather than needing to move back and forth between different apps. I link my project notes to the corresponding project and/ or tasks in my task manager. This creates a fluid workflow.

[Helios]

I keep my project list and planning separate from my task manager. I approach my work in a hierarchy like this: Goals > Projects > Tasks. For a long time, I tried different methods and software to have everything in the same place, but I gave up when nothing worked as well as I would like.

My current setup is:

• Goals and Projects in the same place because these are inextricably linked in my mind; I need to work on projects to achieve goals. I suppose I could have an isolated task in support of a goal, but that’s not the usual case for me.
• Tasks are in another place.

And here is the part that I used to feel shameful to admit: the tasks aren’t even organized by project anymore! I used to create a folder or area in my task-management software to correspond to each project I was working on, but over time, I realized all that did was add extra administration. These days, my task system only has five areas:

1. Today
2. This Week
3. This Month
4. This Quarter
5. Someday

I execute a series of daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly processes to review and plan my work for those time periods, which serves as the checks and balance system to ensure I am keeping sight of the big picture goals, but also creating the reminders (tasks) to do the granular work necessary to advance the projects. I move tasks into the different buckets as needed as part of my planning process, and then I almost exclusively work from Today.

At home, I use Apple Notes for goals and projects and Reminders for tasks. At work, we’re a Windows shop, so I use Microsoft Loop for goals and projects and To Do for tasks.

[pantulis]

@svsmailus

Interestingly, no task manager I know of works like this. They all expect you to use projects.

I memory serves, in Omnifocus Projects are full-fledged entities and they can be paused, hidden, assigned tasks, comments… they are not just containers or categories of tasks.

If your task manager didn’t have Projects, how would you correlate similar tasks and plan all the necessary steps to achieve a given result? If it’s another tool, you are duplicating cognitive work in your system.

[svsmailus]

Thanks guys, super helpful.

I’m similar to @Helios on this.

@pantulis Omnifocus is very feature rich, but the projects cannot be separated from the tasks.

At the moment, I’m experimenting with having a totally separate projects list outside of my task manager. I don’t follow Allen’s GTD exactly. I like Carl Pullein’s time based focus. Therefore, my lists are as follow:

• Today
• This Week
• Next Week
• This Month
• Next Month
• Next Quarter
• On Hold/Someday
• Routines

My project list is just a list. I go through and add the next action to one of the above lists. I may tag them with context.

[timstringer]

@pantulis

I memory serves, in Omnifocus Projects are full-fledged entities and they can be paused, hidden, assigned tasks, comments… they are not just containers or categories of tasks.

There are three types of OmniFocus projects: Parallel, Sequential and Single Actions. Projects can have a status of Active, On Hold, Completed or Dropped.

Parallel and Sequential projects are intended for projects with a defined outcome. I name these based on the outcome (e.g. “ Ready for Trip to Spain”); these projects contain discrete actions that provide a path to this defined outcome (that’s why I include the emoji). On a related note, if these projects don’t contain any actions, they’re either done or stalled.

I use OmniFocus for small projects, typically completed within a few months. A large project (e.g. one to build a new home, start a new company or complete a university degree) would be managed using multiple, discrete projects (e.g., “ Architect Hired”, “ Business License Obtained,” and “ Thesis Advisor Confirmed”). I perform bigger-picture and longer-scale planning outside of OmniFocus and use OmniFocus to manage the more immediate, tangible actions.

I refer to Single Actions projects as “Single Action Lists” as they’re not projects from a GTD perspective. They’re a list of actions that typically relate to an area of life or work but don’t contribute to a specific outcome. For example, I have a Single Action List called “ Friends & Family” that houses actions such as “Call Robert to touch base”.

On a side note, I also use Reminders for things like shopping lists. OmniFocus may contain an action such as “Show at Home Depot” and I’d pull up reminders when I’m at the store to remind me what to purchase. I like that Reminders lists can be shared, making it easy for multiple people to add, complete and review what’s on the list.

I hope this helps!

[geoffaire]

There are different approaches.

I use OmniFocus and like having both in the same solution. The use of perspectives allows me to slice and dice the information to my hearts content. I can see lists that only show active projects, I have a list that only shows next available actions.

By having both projects and action together, I can plan ahead and add multiple actions at a time to a project if I wish, with the use of defer dates and/or using parallel or sequential project types this means I only see relevant tasks when I go looking for them with the right view.

I would see the approach you’re proposing as more disjointed and maybe a little shorter term, but that may just be because I don’t see how you actually plan.

[DrJJWMac]

@svsmailus

Interestingly, no task manager I know of works like this. They all expect you to use projects.

The better perspective is this: No task manager operates as a “one shop” grocery list application. They all anticipate that users want to categorize their tasks in different “stores” (projects).

@svsmailus

Does anyone do this? Are there pros and cons in doing this? I’m assuming you would keep your project list in some form of text document?

I manage tasks in OmniFocus. I have perspectives that filter tasks that I have designated as Do Now versus Bills versus Teach versus … I see few if any details of the projects in these perspectives. I manage projects in a separate application (Curio) on a Kanban board approach. I see no details of the tasks, only the projects. I benefit significantly from the fact that OmniFocus allows me to assemble tasks into distinct projects, thereby allowing me to link a project (in Curio) to its project (collection of tasks) in OmniFocus.

–
JJW

[svsmailus]

@geoffaire I think the benefit for me in separating the projects from the tasks is being able to focus on the tasks on a daily basis and leaving the projects to my weekly review.

@DrJJWMac Are you not duplicating by having projects in Omnifocus and Curio?

[DrJJWMac]

@svsmailus

Are you not duplicating by having projects in Omnifocus and Curio?

Yes. I do not care. Alternatively said, I would not function well any other way. OmniFocus is not a project management application. But it groups tasks by projects. Curio could be a task management app … with some significant overhead and discomfort.

You may be confusing the fact that each application has the same project with the reason that each application must have the same project. Curio must have the project because this is where projects are better managed. OmniFocus must have the project because this is how users are generally “expected” to categorize the tasks associated to the project.

To be clear, my single action “projects” are not duplicated in Curio. I do not have a “Bills” or a “Home Chores” or a “Personal Appointments” project in Curio, only in OmniFocus. But I have a project in Curio called “Course NN Exam 3” that is hyperlinked to a project in OmniFocus by the same name. I keep all tasks in OmniFocus. I move the project in the Curio Kanban from lane “On Deck” to “In Orbit” to “Landing”.

I do a regular review of the project Kanban in Curio. I do a daily review of tasks as called upon by OmniFocus.

For some (outdated) insights, visit the forums at Zengobi and search for kanban.

–
JJW

[cornchip]

In OmniFocus, I have a perspective for any work mode when I don’t want to see the projects. I find it works for anything that benefits from being batched up. Not so much for messy/thinking projects, which are a lot of them. Some devices have more hidden-projects perspectives pinned than others.

[svsmailus]

@cornchip

I have a perspective for any work mode when I don’t want to see the projects.

How do you hide the projects to get a list of tasks only?

[Helios]

@svsmailus

@geoffaire I think the benefit for me in separating the projects from the tasks is being able to focus on the tasks on a daily basis and leaving the projects to my weekly review.

This decoupling is important to my workflow. For me, planning and executing require two very different mindsets, and I’ve found that I’m more successful with enforcing a separation between them. Admittedly, it’s taken me some time to trust myself; when I first started this setup, I would see that I had a task queued up for the day and think, “Hmm, I should review the project associated with this task,” and then I would get sidetracked and spend even more time planning instead of doing. But I’ve trained myself to stick to what’s in front of me–that if I scheduled something for that day or week, there was a reason behind it and I should follow through–knowing that I’m reviewing the higher-level needs on a weekly, monthly, and quarterly basis.

[cornchip]

@svsmailus

How do you hide the projects to get a list of tasks only?

Set it to flexible, and then don’t display project in the viewing columns, either in the default or in custom fluid.

[geoffaire]

And that’s fine, but I can do that in Omnifocus if I want to.

If I’m reviewing and releasing a new document (about 50 steps currently) I can open the project for it and invoke the focus mode on that then work my way through it (or anyone of about 20 different taskpaper templates I have)

If I’m in a Shallow Work mode and ticking off Admin tasks, I can go to my Shallow Work perspective and batter through them.

If I think of something I need to remember to do, I can invoke the OF quick entry box with a keyboard shortcut and throw it in my inbox, barely breaking my stride.

I can effectively tailor what I see to my current goal… work (doing) perspectives, project views, Planning perspectives, personal (non work), or reviews (daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, annual) quickly and easily and focus on that.

I don’t see the need to logically segregate things into different apps, there’s no cognitive load for me with it all being in the same place, and I only ever have to do something once.

And best of all, while I’m doing my various reviews, I can just add a task, change a due date or drop something right there and then and anything which is connected to it is updated to reflect the change.

YMMV, it’s why there are literally hundreds of Apps and web services out there, it’s why some people write down their daily goals/tasks on a card and stand it on their desk. Each to their own.

Don’t get me wrong, I have days when I’m in the trenches and I write stuff due soon down on a legal pad along with anything else which falls into my lap that day, and that’s how that day gets managed. But at the end of the day, I re-open Omnifocus and update it so I can plan the following day.

[DrJJWMac]

@geoffaire

I don’t see the need to logically segregate things into different apps, there’s no cognitive load for me with it all being in the same place, and I only ever have to do something once.

I see an advantage, and perhaps even a need for my work style, by being able to view top down on projects completely sans their tasks. Especially when I can do this with my current set of courses that I teach.

Or this with a particular area of responsibility.

OmniFocus does not cut it in any way to give me these visually informative views.

Basically, I need to argue to myself about the value of moving projects to different levels of status (lanes) or focus (icons on each project). I do this in Curio. When action is required according to settings on the project in Curio, I go to the project in OmniFocus and set a flag on the next tasks. I found that, when I started in OmniFocus, I was running myself ragged debating about the value of this task versus that task …

In OmniFocus: Should I write this report for that project or write this report for that other project? Let me see. One report should take 10 min, the other 11 min. But the other task is in a project that is more important. Or was it. But then I have to submit the second report, but the first report is just for internal consumption. Wait, maybe … and three hours later I am still stuck.

Versus In Curio: Project A is 75% completed with moderate need in the To Land column and Project B is not yet started, with low need, in the On Deck column. I am getting my landing done now. Go write the report!

–
JJW

[OogieM]

@svsmailus

My understanding is that you develop your tasks from your project lists. These tasks are actionable. This would mean that having the projects themselves in your task manager is unhelpful as you only really need to see the next actions. Does anyone do this? Are there pros and cons in doing this? I’m assuming you would keep your project list in some form of text document?

I don’t read it that way at all. Projects are comprised of tasks. There are one off singleton tasks but in general you start with a project then define the tasks. So I always start with a project first, then I add tasks as necessary or if I really for sure know the steps I’ll add more, some with gates as in can’t be started until the one before is done and some parallel if the order of doing doesn’t matter.

I also have found I do MUCH better with basically everything in one big imperfect app. So not only my project list (which is just a list of the notes that are my project plans) but also my tasks and nearly all computer based project support material all in one place. So all my notes etc are either in the project note or linked into it. I use Obsidian for everything now. Used to use a combination of Omnifocus and DEVONThink for tasks and project planning. Obsidian is faster, easier to change, easier to adapt to different kinds of projects and overall just flows better for me.

PS Another advantage which I didn’t think to add until I saw

@DrJJWMac

being able to view top down on projects completely sans their tasks.

I actually do that in Obsidian too, using the kanban plugin with now, next and later columns. My “cards” are actually links to the project note and do not show any tasks. So I can flip back and forth easily without the clutter of tasks for each project. I also have a view that slices my tasks by context.

[iPersuade]

@pantulis

If your task manager didn’t have Projects, how would you correlate similar tasks and plan all the necessary steps to achieve a given result? If it’s another tool, you are duplicating cognitive work in your system.

Under strict GTD you don’t really correlate that way. You have a project list where you just list all your projects. You have project support materials, which include the project plans (checklists, brainstorming, etc.), and then the actionable things you need to do go on your next actions list. Plans filter down to next actions. Next actions can be done without considering any broader context at the time you are performing the action.

Can you combine all these things in one tool and be (for lack of a better term) GTD compliant? Absolutely. But the way GTD works you don’t need to correlate in that way. You plan your projects, and from there, all next actions are equally actionable discrete tasks.

The grouping, in the GTD world, of tasks comes by using contexts. @Calls for example, is a context for all next actions that are calls.

[iPersuade]

I used to work this way; I used OmniFocus for a long, long, long time. I went back to having a separation of tasks from projects because my OmniFocus just became too unwieldy. I had a proliferation of projects. I spent tons of time adding action after action after action for each of those projects. Then I’d have to create perspectives to pare down the list to things I needed to look at. I got so overwhelmed, my system just broke down.

By separating project plans and my project list from my tasks, I have a task list that is actually manageable. Proof is in the pudding to me, I’ve accomplished so many of my goals that had been languishing. Tasks don’t incubate for such a long time on my task manager as they were in OmniFocus. I’m actually getting things done.

This in no way is a fault of OmniFocus. It is a fabulous tool, and I keep my license current. The way that I was using it was faulty. But for me the fault was incentivized by marrying project plans and task management.

The key to David Allen’s system is it truly is quite flexible. You don’t like contexts? Okay, just have one next actions list and a calendar. You want projects and next actions together? Okay, that’s fine. GTD even offers set up guides for OmniFocus, Outlook, Apple’s stock apps, and maybe others. Those guides offer suggestions on best practices on how to use the tools efficiently with GTD. For example, the omnifocus guide tells you not to add contexts (now tags) until you are ready to make the actions actionable. That probably would have helped me, but I didn’t like having half processed tasks in my database.

Anyway, follow the principles and use the tools that enable you to most effectively (and enjoyably) execute on those principles.

[markivm]

GTD recommends a text file and I suppose your thinking is along that line. On this forum, you’ll find everyone recommends tools. I use Things 3 for personal & OmniFocus 4 (OF4) for work.

Coming back to your question,  Reminders has smart lists which can give you the view you seek. Similarly, Things 3 has the Today View & OF4 has perspectives which you can customize to your needs.

I don’t need to see the projects but there are those odd tasks we don’t know what they mean until we see the name of the project in context

Anyway, it’s a journey you must take to find out what works for you. Good luck.