I'm finally willing to concede that my primitive method of list making and keeping stuff in my head is no longer sufficient for managing my work tasks. Looking for simple ideas people use to track their tasks and deliverables. Tech-wise, I'm of medium skill but always interested in something creative. TIA!

May not be the most glamourous way, but I use outlook.

Our company runs on outlook. I keep a "To Do" task pane open on my right side of the Outlook View. If an important email comes in with a need for action, I do one of three things:

* I move it over as a High Priority task if it is just that -- only my top 2 maybe three (no more) items can qualify.
* I move it over as a Regular task and then I sort them throughout the day as I get down (complete) from the High Priority tasks into regular
* If it is an action Item i've assigned to someone and need their work before I can do something, then it goes into the "Low Priority" part of the To Do list -- I rename the task with a "w/o" for 'waiting on' and the person's name and a short description of the thing "w/o Jennifer , Add Jan Costs to Quarterly Report" would be an example.

It takes a while to type this out, but it doesn't take long to actually do these steps, which has been a real time saver and organization saver in staying on task

Try Trello or Microsoft's To-Do application. Trello has quite a bit more features.

A smattering of different things:

* Zero inbox. (and that inbox isn't just your email inbox) Everything gets assigned through loose filter of delegate/do it now/schedule work on calendar.

* WFH allows for broken up day for other life stuff, so I also use one of those rip-off daily planner forms (they come in like 60 per) where I blend work meetings/life stuff and make sure that kids doctor visits and whatnot are blocked off on work calendar.

* 5 min daily review at end of day to ensure completion. 15 min EOW review for same thing.

That said, it's always just a discipline topic. There's no tool out there that will make you do your work when it's time to do it. I know VPs that use your primitive lists. It's all pretty much about what looks good to your eye and will make you do what you need to do...espeically when you don't want to.

I use the "Tasks" section of Microsoft Teams. I set up 5-6 buckets based on how I am sorting the task activity and create individual tasks under these buckets. I then have a "Prioritize and Execute" (thanks, Jocko) bucket where I move the critical items to help plan my day.

Tasks can be moved by clicking and dragging, color coded, given due dates, assigned to other Team members (although I seem to be the only one to use it at my current firm), and notes/files can be attached to each task. When complete, simply click the checkbox to drop it off the list. I've used this consistently for the last two years or so and have found it to be a great system.

Oh, the productivity rabbit hole. I can opine for hours on this as I consider it a personal hobby.

Personal Use
I would highly recommend ToDoist which I used for a couple of years and it worked fantastically. $4 / month. I migrated to this from Microsoft To Do which I'm paying for by the way, but ToDoist is so good I was willing to pay the additional $4 / month on top of my 365 sub.

For Small Teams
Currently using Evernote and its new Tasks capabilities. For those that haven't taken a look at Evernote in some time, they have revamped it quite a bit and now have a Home view with integrated Tasks. I like it and it's unique in that Tasks are tied to your Notes.

You can see your Tasks with four built-in views:

• My Tasks - everything assigned to you either by yourself or others
• Assigned - all Tasks in the system by person
• Notes - all Tasks in system across all notes; sounds cumbersome but actually works well for a weekly review when you need to clean stuff up and reorganize and notes are tied to the meeting when you had it giving you further context
• Due Date - all tasks by due date and/or time

I just use excel so I can customize everything how I want it.

MyNameIsJeff said:

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I use the "Tasks" section of Microsoft Teams. I set up 5-6 buckets based on how I am sorting the task activity and create individual tasks under these buckets. I then have a "Prioritize and Execute" (thanks, Jocko) bucket where I move the critical items to help plan my day.

Tasks can be moved by clicking and dragging, color coded, given due dates, assigned to other Team members (although I seem to be the only one to use it at my current firm), and notes/files can be attached to each task. When complete, simply click the checkbox to drop it off the list. I've used this consistently for the last two years or so and have found it to be a great system.

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This - just look up Kanban Boards, this concept is found in a ton of tools. Trello was mentioned, smartsheet, teams, bunch of other tools all capable. It works for me as a nice visual cue of what's high/low priority and what's close to the finish line.

It's good to set up the buckets according to stages of your workflow, then move the tickets/cards along as you make progress.

Notion or ClickUp

Engine10 said:

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MyNameIsJeff said:

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I use the "Tasks" section of Microsoft Teams. I set up 5-6 buckets based on how I am sorting the task activity and create individual tasks under these buckets. I then have a "Prioritize and Execute" (thanks, Jocko) bucket where I move the critical items to help plan my day.

Tasks can be moved by clicking and dragging, color coded, given due dates, assigned to other Team members (although I seem to be the only one to use it at my current firm), and notes/files can be attached to each task. When complete, simply click the checkbox to drop it off the list. I've used this consistently for the last two years or so and have found it to be a great system.

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This - just look up Kanban Boards, this concept is found in a ton of tools. Trello was mentioned, smartsheet, teams, bunch of other tools all capable. It works for me as a nice visual cue of what's high/low priority and what's close to the finish line.

It's good to set up the buckets according to stages of your workflow, then move the tickets/cards along as you make progress.

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Third vote. Ran a team of 4 PMs and 15 engineers using that.

Username fits…