How many outcomes (a.k.a. projects) are you tracking in your effectiveness system of lists? As of today, I am tracking 88 active outcomes in my system. If you have been using your system for more than a month, you probably have lots, too.
Tracking many outcomes makes it harder to do your daily and weekly refreshes; there is so much more to review. And they can make your system seem overwhelming. You might notice a growing resistance to keep using and benefiting from your system as it grows.
Here are three things to do and one thing NOT to do to better manage your outcomes.
DO
- Move to you back burner list any outcome that you have not acted upon for several weeks and likely will not act upon in the next week. See How Do You Spell Relief? for more insight.
- Remove any completed outcomes. Delete them or, if you prefer, move them into an archive.
- Group your outcomes by different areas in your work and home life. Grouping helps you work on related ideas together. You also use grouping to get a feel for how you are balancing your life. Example: I group my outcomes into these realms: Business Development, Work for Clients, Administration, Sales, Home, and Personal.
DO NOT
- Remove or refuse to record any active, unfinished outcome that you are even a bit committed to deliver. It is far better to have a longer list of outcomes or doables (tasks) than to leave anything off your lists. Why? Because you’ll try to keep track in your head anything that is not on your lists. In your head is not the place to store these things. See Effectiveness Habit #1: Get it Out of Your Head.
To your continued success,
Mike