Quote Originally Posted by jduk View Post
Non-urgent work
Say it's due in 2 weeks and won't take more than an hour. Doesn't go on Next Actions, as is time-specific. So it should be the Calendar... but if I put it in in 2 weeks' time, just before it's due, then that's only a safe option if nothing else comes up that could disrupt that. So I'd prefer to put it in for sooner... but because it doesn't *have* to happen at that time, it's not guaranteed to get done, and the calendar is no longer sacrosanct, as DA recommends it should be.
Nex Action list - include deadline in the action's title - for example:
- do non-urgent work - deadline 2013-02-02;

Quote Originally Posted by jduk View Post
Courtesy reply to email
Say I get an email that's not essential to reply to - but where doing so would be courteous and help build relationships, etc. What I like about Next Actions is that these are now things that don't have to happen at any point - so when my calendar is completely full up for extended amounts of time, I at least know that I don't have to worry about what's on the Next Action list. But if I create a Next Action to 'reply to XYZ', I'm not guaranteed to get round to it any time soon - I'd rather not leave it too long. But clearly shouldn't be on calendar either.
Writing "courtesy reply to email" is a 2-minute action - to be done during inbox processing. You don't need any additional information to write some pleasant, meaningless words.