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I thought I would take some time and define my daily process and some of my productivity tips. I have always been pretty efficient, but am always looking for ways to improve.
I start my day by catching up on e-mail. I subscribe to some RedHat Emerging Technology Project lists (such as FreeIPA and et-mgmt-tools). I generally will skim those messages first as they relate to the InfrasBox project. I then move my spam into the junk folder.
My next step is to open Flock and skim my RSS feeds. I click on the articles that interest me and read them. I generally don't follow the links in the articles as that consumes quite a bit of time. If I don't know what something is I'll search and skim the WikiPedia article and/or info page. I will often bookmark something that is of interest.
Both my e-mail and bookmarks are in a somewhat obsessive/extreme folder structure and I am able to locate just about any e-mail or bookmark in less then 30 seconds. I have found that I have a very category/hierarchy oriented mindset.
Another e-mail tip I have is that I almost never save messages from a list. They are all archived (at least the ones I subscribe to). A lot of information I will never refer to again anyway. For example bug reports/triage etc. Its very interesting and topical for a short period of time, then becomes old news. I don't really have any hard and fast criteria for saving list messages, as I do it so rarely.
So that covers e-mail/rss (new information).
The above process usually takes me about 2 hours on a daily basis. The e-mail portion is generally completed while I commute (I take mass transit).
Any e-mails which require action I add to a task list.
I then work through those tasks. If I am interrupted I will either complete the task (if its less then 10 minutes) or will add it to my task list.
I am reviewing the GTD approach and looking at my current process and seeing how I stack up. So far I have the collect and organize steps down quite well. I am also able to accomplish a lot efficiently enough that my customers haven't complained about lack of progress. :)
Hopefully this post will help you become more productive. :)
I start my day by catching up on e-mail. I subscribe to some RedHat Emerging Technology Project lists (such as FreeIPA and et-mgmt-tools). I generally will skim those messages first as they relate to the InfrasBox project. I then move my spam into the junk folder.
My next step is to open Flock and skim my RSS feeds. I click on the articles that interest me and read them. I generally don't follow the links in the articles as that consumes quite a bit of time. If I don't know what something is I'll search and skim the WikiPedia article and/or info page. I will often bookmark something that is of interest.
Both my e-mail and bookmarks are in a somewhat obsessive/extreme folder structure and I am able to locate just about any e-mail or bookmark in less then 30 seconds. I have found that I have a very category/hierarchy oriented mindset.
Another e-mail tip I have is that I almost never save messages from a list. They are all archived (at least the ones I subscribe to). A lot of information I will never refer to again anyway. For example bug reports/triage etc. Its very interesting and topical for a short period of time, then becomes old news. I don't really have any hard and fast criteria for saving list messages, as I do it so rarely.
So that covers e-mail/rss (new information).
The above process usually takes me about 2 hours on a daily basis. The e-mail portion is generally completed while I commute (I take mass transit).
Any e-mails which require action I add to a task list.
I then work through those tasks. If I am interrupted I will either complete the task (if its less then 10 minutes) or will add it to my task list.
I am reviewing the GTD approach and looking at my current process and seeing how I stack up. So far I have the collect and organize steps down quite well. I am also able to accomplish a lot efficiently enough that my customers haven't complained about lack of progress. :)
Hopefully this post will help you become more productive. :)