Of all the day planners that I’ve tried to use, the resounding gong in my head while using them was “this doesn’t make sense with my brain!” I don’t think in bi-column pictures of my week, nor do I think in little squares of a month. Every single day planner that I’ve found even to this day (I haven’t seen them all) doesn’t make sense with my brain. What I described yesterday, however, does (pictured below).
Do what makes the most sense for you
If it doesn’t really make sense to you then you probably aren’t going to use it. If you brain works well with digital things, do that. If you need to write stuff down like my friend Amanda said in the comments, do that. If you love Moleskines, but look at their agendas and think “this isn’t going to work” don’t bother spending the money. Similarly, if you’re using something and thinking “I’ll try a new agenda next year, I just bought this one” you should just chuck it right now and find something that will actually work. The $20 it might cost for a new one will be worth it when you actually start properly managing your ever-increasing pile of tasks for the next 11.5 months. So go peruse Chapters/Indigo or check out this list I’ve made at Etsy of a bunch of “not your normal” agenda/day planners.
You probably wont find one thing that will have everything you need
I used to hate this. I wanted my Magic App that did everything. Even the GTD system is a productivity system, but not a calendar. It will help you get things done but not know when your appointments are. If you rarely have appointments, then that’s fine. If you decide to go all paper, you’ll likely only find something that does scheduling or you’ll have to look into ActionMethod paper goods and use a separate calendar to track your few appointments. Or you can find DIY stuff online to help you make your own GTD system if that’s what you want (like the hipster PDA, the offline time management software book, the DIY Planner and SuperFocus).
What will I use for scheduling? What will I use to help me Get Things Done?
These are your next questions. Connected with that is the analog/digital question. By now I imagine you probably have a good idea of what you want. In case you’re not sure, here are some pros and cons.
Pros of digital:
- If you have different devices, your stuff can be synced with all of them and your info is always there
- You have one less thing to remember to bring
- Great if you travel a lot or don’t work primarily from an office or a static location.
- The threat of losing your Most Trusted Work Partner doesn’t exist (it’s in The Blessed Cloud!)
Cons of digital:
- You may not feel very comfortable using your smart phone or device.
- If it will take you a lot longer to enter anything because you feel you’re slow on your device
- You love the feeling of writing things down/ stroking the thing off your list doesn’t feel the same as checking a box digitally
Let’s get digital
I’ve already shared some examples of paper goods you can use. You can also make your own like I did. Here are some digital tools that you can consider:
Google Apps
If you’re a Gmail user, you likely already know about this. I use Google Apps every day in my personal life and at work since my work uses Google apps for our corporate email. We share documents, calendars, use Google Hangouts, make forms, budget finances etc ALL. THE. TIME. using Google. I used the Google Wedding Planning templates to plan my wedding when my then fiancé lived in Quebec City. Here are more ways you can use Google.
iCal/Outlook Calendar
You can sync a google calendar to your iCal or Outlook, or just use your iCal/Outlook on your devices. Simple enough, though I personally have finally accepted the fact I hate iCal and don’t use it at all (I use Agenda App on my iPhone/iPad with my Google Cal synced and use the browser to access GCal when I want to)
OmniFocus
I asked my brother who blogs about productivity and other tech stuff at Hack/Make to comment on OmniFocus, which I know is popular with tech geeks. He says it’s a power-user tool, which is why I don’t use it. It kind of scares me. He explains further, “It takes a decent amount of understanding both GTD and the app, but once you’re Intermediate to Advanced, you can do A LOT with the app.” If you’re just beginning, start with something less complex or you might get frustrated with the app before you get the system to work for you.
Evernote
Evernote is good for a lot of things. By simply making a new Notebook in Evernote you can store your to-do lists and other productivity stuff, ready to be accessed anywhere. Evernote has a Productivity Embassador that gives some instructions and tips on using Evernote this way. You can also checkout the Evernote message board for more ideas/info.
iOS/OSX Reminder App (Use the alerts!)
If you’re looking for a simple To-Do app, this is about as simple as it gets. It’s already on your Mac if you have the most recent operating system and already on your iOS5 device. You can have multiple lists and that’s about as complex as it gets. I use this because I desperately cannot remember things on time, so if I need a reminder, this is my go-to.
Asana
My friend Ian who is a Financial Planner left a comment yesterday saying “I’ve found Asana works really well as a project organizer. I GTD with asana way better than I did with Evernote. Of course Evernote is still my go to for all my reference material. The greatest part about asana is you can share workspaces with other people, ie. family workspace with spouse, ministry workspace with ministry partners. It takes a bit of searching to get it working well for GTD but overall the mobility and ease of use won me over. Check it out at http://www.asana.com”
Have you tried any of these methods? How much success did you find? Were there things that weren’t quite right with them? What do you need to change with your current system? Leave a comment here with your thoughts.
