Cue Rockwell

[kickaha]

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm usually doing a dozen things, frantically. I hate it. I come from a family of chronic procrastinators, and despite my best efforts, I can't seem to shake the malady. The more I try to focus on one thing at a time, the more I find other tasks backing up. Techniques such as the quite awesome GTD have helped, but in the end, I'm still bouncing between umpteen distractions (like, say, LJ?)

So, like any good engineer, I decided that I had to first measure what I wanted to change. I tried keeping a paper log of what I was doing, but it is too easy to 'miss' little things like... oh... checking LJ for 60 seconds, or reading a slashdot article that is just *too cool* for 'just a minute'... which leads to 15 minutes of googling for related articles.

So, like any good technophile, I decided to let the computer do the dirty work.

I researched a few time tracking programs, but they all seem to want to be part of a larger invoice/billing procedure - fine for billable hours folks, not right for me. I found a couple that let you manually change over the project you're working on, but that falls into the same trap as above "Oh, I won't change it for just a *quick peek* at slashdot..." I found one that tracks the current active window, which is cool, but how can it tell if that browser window is LJ or work related?

Solution - use both. I run two apps - one that I manually change between projects, and one that tracks my app/window use. The manual one is for blocking out what task I'm working on, and the automatic one is to keep me honest.

So far, it's working pretty well.

Comments

[franktheavenger.livejournal.com]

Why would you want to stay honest? :p

What do you plan to do with this log? Eliminate distractions? I (personally) think you just need to prioritize better. It can't ALL be the most important thing...and if they are all that important, you shouldn't be doing them all yourself.

[kickaha.livejournal.com]

Eliminating distractions (or at least lessening time spent on them) is certainly part of it, but yes, it's more about optimizing my time by prioritization. I can't say whether or not I'm spending the correct balance of time on the prioritized tasks, if I don't know how much time I'm actually spending on them, can I? :)

If task A is twice as important as task B, but I'm spending equal time on them, then I probably need to move more time from B to A. Right now, I have no idea how much time I'm spending on things, so this is the first step.

[franktheavenger.livejournal.com]

Don't forget the time you spend tracking how much time you spend. :p

[kickaha.livejournal.com]

That's the beauty of auto-tracking. ;) One I do nothing for, the other takes about 2 seconds when switching tasks.

[meiow.livejournal.com]

Say, do you have the GTD software? My company makes it. :D

[kickaha.livejournal.com]

'The' GTD software?? Nooooo. :)

I use a nice little app combo for the Mac called kinklessGTD that integrates with iCal, Mail, Address Book, files, etc etc etc...

Was ist dis 'software' you speak of, fraulein?

[meiow.livejournal.com]

Ah! I forgot you were on a Mac. :) Ours is for MS Outlook, and is the only one officially endorsed by the GTD fella:
http://gtdsupport.netcentrics.com/

[kickaha.livejournal.com]

Outlook? Ewwwwwwww.... ;)

I have a couple of people who might be interested in this though, thanks.

One asked me if I knew of any GTD software, and when I told him my setup, he exclaimed "Augh! Why is it that all the GTD software is for the Mac?!?" I just grinned.