You know that sinking feeling, that you were supposed to have looked at something or done something or responded to someone or followed up on an email but just don’t know as the evidence is buried somewhere in the 1000+ messages in your inbox??
Well, I had looked at Getting Things Done or GTD as a sanity restoring methodology for managing my Inbox (and most of my life) and there are quite a few tools out there that either integrate deeply into Outlook as an add-in or run beside it to help you do this.
Cheap though that I am, I created a way to do this using the native functionality provided in Outlook 2010 without any programming or coding. Interested? Okay here it goes…
Primer
Before we get to the tool, let us look at what we are trying to accomplish here and my GTD borrowed or GTD Lite philosophy.
Essentially, you want a clean Inbox, having taken care of all your messages. To do this, set aside for yourself intervals during the day when you will process your Inbox. While you are processing your Inbox, for each message ask yourself,
1. Is this something that needs immediate action?
2. Is this something that gets discarded?
3. Is this something that I need to work on but not until later?
4. Is this something that I can delegate to someone?
For each option above you will take a specific course of action that I describe below, processing each of your messages until your Inbox is clean! Sounds simple eh? So what actions do we take and how do we do this?
Some prep work
Categories
Let us first prepare our categories. To do this, first click on any email message, then drop-down the “Categorize” button on the ribbon (upper right hand side maybe for you?) and choose “All Categories”. Now click on the New button and create the following categories, one at a time:
a. @Computer
b. @Calls
c. @Waiting For
d. @Errands
@Computer will be assigned to all tasks that you need to be at your computer to complete,
@Calls will be assigned to all tasks that you need to make phone calls to accomplish,
@Waiting For will be assigned to tasks that have been delegated to someone, and
@Errands will be assigned to tasks that you need to accomplish when you are out and about.
… so far so good?
Folders
Next we will create a folder for all messages that are processed out of Inbox. Right-Click on the root folder (Mailbox) and click on “New Folder…”. Name this folder: Processed.
Quick Steps
Now let’s create some macro wizardry in Outlook that are “Quick Steps”. Click on an email message and in the Home tab ribbon, in the middle you will see the “Quick Steps” region. Click on the “Create New” thunderbolt button to create your first quick step.
Name this “CREATE WORK TASK @COMPUTER” and in this quick step, you will do the following
a) Categorize message [@Computer]
b) Mark complete
c) Create a task with attachment
d) Move to folder [Processed]
Similarly create the next quick step and call it, “DELEGATE AND CREATE WORK TASK @WAITING FOR”. In here, clone the “CREATE WORK TASK @COMPUTER” step above and insert the following action between steps c and d above
Insert: Forward
Next, modify or create the quick step called, “DONE” and specify the following as its actions.
a) Mark complete
b) Mark as read
c) Move to folder [Processed]
… almost there …
Let us know prepare your task view so that you are focused on the tasks that you need to tackle today. I like to view my tasks for today. You can additionally create additional views for weekly reviews and such. I also like to do this customization to my “To Do Bar” to the right of the screen.
Right-click on the “Arrange By” in the To Do Bar to the right and click on “View Settings”.
Now do the following in using the buttons shown on the dialog box.
· Group by - categories, ascending
· Sort by – start date ascending, priority descending
· Filter
o Status - not equal to - Completed
o Categories - contains - @Computer or @Calls or @Waiting For or @Errands
o Start Date - on or before - Today
Now you are all set to use the system.
When a new message arrives do the following for the scenarios we identified earlier.
1. Is this something that needs immediate action?
Well…. Do it and get it out of the way by clicking on the “DONE” quick step.
2. Is this something that gets discarded?
: - ) delete it.
3. Is this something that I need to work on but not until later?
Click on the quick step, CREATE WORK TASK @COMPUTER and assign a start date (and priority) to it.
4. Is this something that I can delegate to someone?
Click on the quick step, DELEGATE AND CREATE WORK TASK @WAITING FOR and assign a start date of when you expect your delegate to complete the task (and priority) to it. Also complete the forwarded message to your delegate and send it.
Now, you just need to make sure that you examine your task list and complete it each day.
I hurried through this and had wanted to put in screen shots, etc. I hope that this helps bring back some more sanity to your life.
Take care.
