Workflow for other peoples tasks
Maybe that subject is misleading, couldn't think of a short way to say it..
I'm doing a lot of work on my house at the moment, well a lot of the work is being done by other people, which is where my question comes in.
I have a task to ask one of my tradesmen to do a piece of work for me - that's easy, like any other task as the action is on me - maybe I tag it with the tradesmans name (an agenda in gtd?) so i can filter on that and make sure i bring up all the jobs i want him to do.
So once I have asked him and i am waiting on a reply i guess that is a 'waiting for', then he replies to agree when he can do the work - then what state is my task in? first one is waiting for a reply, second is waiting for the work to be done.
Anyone have a good workflow for this? GTD in general, and Nirvana specific welcome :)
2 Posted by martin.tyler on 05 Jul, 2010 03:46 PM
Anyone got any views on this?
I have a more specific question which is part of this... In GTD/Nirvana what does a task with a 'waiting for' represent?
I guess it's only a minor detail, but I often have tasks that need to wait for something or another and I sometimes struggle to manage that well
3 Posted by Terminado on 05 Jul, 2010 04:47 PM
Martin, I don't use @Waiting very much. Whenever possible, I create an actionable task to follow-up on tasks I'm waiting for, whether delegated by me or otherwise. It lets me be proactive.
What does "waiting for" represent? I think it means anything not actionable by you.
Waiting for things to happen can be frustrating because of the lack of control, especially when we cannot move forward until the task is done. At least it's out of our heads and in a trusted system so we can defer our frustration!
4 Posted by ovi on 06 Jul, 2010 10:58 AM
I'm in the same situation Martin (by the way, can't wait to see Nirvana implement task sharing). How i do it:
a. if YES: whenever I'm talking with a certain person later (be it colleague or client) I can easily filter my tasks to bring up a quick list of all the stuff i have to talk to them about. I then ask their availability for any actionable items I need to asign to them. b. if NO: i assign a task to them in Nirvana, that says: "Ask for availability for {Name} to do Task X" and I set a reasonable deadline for a response (which is there to remind me to check back and be proactive)
b. I rename the previously assigned task to say : "Waiting for completion of Task X", and i add a deadline - based in what we agreed upon
Hope this helps!
5 Posted by Mark S on 06 Jul, 2010 05:25 PM
+0.5 @Terminado :D
In my opinion, "waiting for" means anything that is not actionable by me (that's the 0.5 I agree with).
But I don't create an actionable task to me to follow-up on, I think that's the job of the waiting list. I don't want to see reminders to follow up people permanently in my Next Actions.
Not to say either way is right or wrong but it's just what I do.
I don't use an @waiting tag but the 'Waiting' list.
To me, I don't use tags for anything else other than context and tasks in the Waiting list have no context.
In GTD terms there's no physical Next Action I can do on the task so a context is pointless, same as Time and Energy.
Bring back horrible memories of Remember The Milk and having to tag everything multiple times, ugh.
I create a task in the Waiting list with a Due Date of when I want to nag someone if they haven't got back to me, then it pops into my today list when it's due so I can nag.
If I've sent them an email requesting something then the body of the email is in the Notes section of the task for my reference.
I'm not prepared to go back and forth with someone about their availability, it's up to them to let me know when I make the request when they think they can do it.
Same as I would do if someone asked me to do something and I had no availability, common courtesy in my book.
And I 100% agree with having this in a trusted system and out of our heads, I can't have my head filled with thoughts about other people Actions.
It took me long enough to get relaxed about not having it filled with my Next Actions!
HTH
6 Posted by ovi on 06 Jul, 2010 07:40 PM
@mark
"I create a task in the Waiting list with a Due Date of when I want to nag someone if they haven't got back to me, then it pops into my today list when it's due so I can nag." - exactly what i wanted to say, maybe didn't make it clear enough.
Regarding tag use, I find it invaluable to be able to get a quick list of all the stuff I have going with a person while I have them on a Skype call for example.
A person can be a context :) . That's how I view the people I work with anyway (since i can't yet share tasks anyway). And you said it yourself that a context warrants a tag. And talking with someone is an actionable item.
And I never said I go back and forth about availability (that's the part where I think I might have been unclear) . I just ask for a deadline, be it verbally or trough asynchronous means.
7 Posted by Terminado on 07 Jul, 2010 08:08 PM
Clarification: I don't use a tag or context for "Waiting," I do use the list (when I use it).
One reason I didn't use Waiting much is because it's one more list to check. Now that we have scheduled tasks, I will start using Waiting because the system will remind me.