As it works out there are really only a couple ways of looking at this and I believe David Allen (Getting Things Done) has pretty well summed up what you need to do.
- Collect
- Process
- Organize
- Review
- DO
I'll next look at some tools that can be used for doing all this stuff.
RememberTheMilk has a Getting Started site that gives a great overview of the features. I use this for maintaining a todo list for everything that is associated with my race registration business and personal activities. I use GMail as my personal email service. There is a great add-in for FireFox and GMail that adds RTM as a side window. This is an add-on from RTM and works well.
RTM has an INBOX to collect all your tasks. You can put items into the inbox using a number of methods. Entering a task into a form on the website is one way. The entry gives you options to enter due dates, repeating options, tags, location (more on this), url. It also shows you information on postponed, notes and sharing options.
One of the novel features is the geotagging of your tasks. Giving a task a location (even to tie it to a GoogleMap location) gives you yet another way to coordinate your work and plan your work.
Tagging of tasks allows you to tie a task to multiple projects or multiple categories. RTM gives you a way to build queries and set a query up as a tab within your RTM environment. Every time I see a new piece of software that is not currently allowing open beta, I enter a task to check on an invitation. I categorize the software into software and type. I set a task for two weeks out and check on my invite when that comes up if I don't ge the invite before that. I then set a task for testing the software and writing a blog entry. I have a query for software that shows all the open items I have out there. That query is a tab that I can open at any time to see what is open.
Any tab can be subscribed to as an RSS feed.
These tasks can be shared between people. Someone else can mail a task into your inbox and you can share a task with someone else who is a subscriber to RTM services. A team of workers could use these features very effectively.
Another very exciting set of options involve linking new services such as Twitter and Jott to RTM. I'll talk more about those services in another blog entry. Twitter is a microblogging platform. It allows you to send up to 140 characters to either everybody, to your known friends or direct to a private address. This last one is how you send a new item to RTM. Jott is very similar except that you do it with your phone by talking an entry. I use Jott extensively.
My next entry till be about Twitter and Jott and what they can do for you.
