Autofocus Time Management System.

From Jim Estill's blog, I was introduced to Mark Forster's Autofocus, a new task management system.

It's a fairly simple system as these things go (thank goodness), so there's not quite as much need to drink magic Kool-aid as, say, GTD. While at a superficial level it looks like just an ever-growing todo list in a notebook, and without explicit prioritization at that(!), the again fairly simple approach to "processing" that todo list in Autofocus takes full advantage of some interesting but subtle cognitive and behavioral quirks.

For example, strictly rational people will freak at the idea of "pick an item that jumps out at you" as the next action. But I can't tell you how many times I knew what the most logical thing I should do next was, but I "didn't feel like it", or otherwise got stuck and procrastinated. Acknowledging the more intuitive aspect makes it more likely you'll get on with something rather than web surfing.

As another example, processing is done on the basis of notebook pages. By virtue of how pages are created (i.e. you just keep adding new items to the end of the last page), the items on any page are more than likely unrelated to some degree, with the actual page boundary being essentially arbitrary. So it seems counter-intuitive to use that as a unit to process. But the fact that there is a mix of things makes it more likely you'll find one that you would want to work on.

The idea that you just have to work on something to cross it off, but not necessarily complete it (in that case, write it down again at the end of your notebook) again helps minimize the dread you may be facing at starting a task. And the page-oriented order that items are reviewed, how to go back and forth between pages, what's needed before items can be "dismissed", etc. all go a long way towards ensuring you do get the important things done, not the least bit because of the guilt that most people would associate with not finding a single thing on a page to do. :-)

I'd echo Jim's impression that it seems to be promising in terms of getting over procrastination and in particular getting "stuck". I think I'll give it a shot for a few days and see how it goes.

Comments

[stevel]

will be interested to hear how it goes

[Mark Roseman]

Perhaps a bad time for a trial period, as I haven't had a lot of new things to add, and have generally been working on just a few larger tasks. Beyond the usual benefit of having a centralized todo list (common to many approaches) nothing new to report. That may change closer to when we move.

[Time management system]

I got to know autofocus time management system one week ago. I think the system is very good for someone with short attention span like me. BTW, checkvist.com, an online outliner, seems to a perfect tool for this system.

[silagra]

But I can't tell you how many times I knew what the most logical thing I should do next was, but I "didn't feel like it", or otherwise got stuck and procrastinated