Still working on Weekly Review

[TesTeq]

As David Allen says Weekly Review is the only time during the week when you are thinking what to do (which widgets to crank) - so it is the most demanding nad important task. Then, when you've decided what you should do, cranking widgets is a piece of cake.

[Mike-GTD]

David also says block out 1 to two hours to do a weekly review!

There is no mention of the initial, first time "weekly review" unless I missed something!

There is no way I could complete my weekley review in that time. Most of my projects need lots of basic planning as did the one yesterday. I could spend a week or more doing my weekly review! That's why I have been putting it off for so long, and feeling stressed over it! Should I complete my weekly review so that all my projects are planned out with next actions? I sure would sleep better

[br4978]

In my opinion, project planning should not be part of the weekly review - it's actually a work item (task), so the weekly review should identify the planning process as a task to be either scheduled or placed on the appropriate context list.

To be clear - the review is to organize the work to be done, and I suspect the basic planning you refer to is doing the actual work. Or am I off base?

Best,

[AdamMiller81]

In my opinion, project planning should not be part of the weekly review - it's actually a work item (task), so the weekly review should identify the planning process as a task to be either scheduled or placed on the appropriate context list.

To be clear - the review is to organize the work to be done, and I suspect the basic planning you refer to is doing the actual work. Or am I off base?

Best,

My thoughts exactly. Planning a project in greater depth is an NA in and of itself. I'd move that to the NA lists, and move forward on your review. I also find that once I've done a complete review, sometimes planning is a little easier as I have a more up-to-date/complete mental picture of what context (non-GTD) that I'm working in.

Cheers,

Adam

[sdann]

In my opinion, project planning should not be part of the weekly review - it's actually a work item (task), so the weekly review should identify the planning process as a task to be either scheduled or placed on the appropriate context list.

I fully agree. I am continuously planning projects throughout the week. I could never do all that only during the weekly review. I would never get to the weekly review if I had create and organize my projects during that time. I suggest you create NAs when you want to set-up, fine-tune or brainstorm a projects, or even create an NA just to decide if you should make a project active.

[kewms]

I agree with what everyone else is saying. The Weekly Review is not the time for detailed project planning. I use it for project review and review of higher elevations.

With that said, everything takes longer in the initial stages of GTD. You don't have a system up and running, you still have to discover the methods that work for you, you still have to bring your habits in line with GTD. The good news is that because of that you're keeping a close eye on your system on a daily basis. Especially in this case, where you seem to have a large backlog of planning to do, things probably won't get too horribly out of control if you spend your general review time focusing on some of that backlog.

Put another way, the Weekly Review is most useful once you have a system to review. Right now, you don't.

Katherine

[tiomikel]

I find that of all the GTD system the "weekly review" is the hardest part to crack....
This whole system sounds great, and what I have applied so far makes a hell of a difference to "what I get done" but making this "weekly review" part actually work is challenging to say the least.

Mike,
I don't have a good answer to your specific question (do that well defined project or define others) but as you may see from my earlier post, I too struggle with the time I"m spending on the weekly review. My story was about the calendar, but I find similar things happen to me on projects.

What I've begun to do is create my own weekly review checklist. Collecting loose stuff and getting IN to zero is always part of my weekly review. But I have a rotation for (a) my calendar, (b) my projects, (c) getting creative / someday/maybe. Each week I only concentrate on one of those three to a deep degree. Maybe GTD unorthodox but it's keeping the time down.

Sometimes I think when we find a system that gets us to attend to all the moving parts and we get some control over that, it becomes revealed to us that there are new depths to go. pre-GtD I had little to nothing under control. Now that I have a project list, I am noticing I could (a) define all its subcomponents, (b) reference it against each horizon, (c) have good working project files, etc. etc. Well, in the past I didn't even know the definition of a "project" so I didn't even know I didn't have these things defined.

Still doesn't answer your question but maybe puts in perspective that you may not be behind, rather seeing things much more clearly now. It's a sign of your success with the system.

What do you think?
Michael

[Mike-GTD]

Put another way, the Weekly Review is most useful once you have a system to review. Right now, you don't.

Katherine

Katherine has hit the nail squarely on the head. I was getting frustrated at why I could not complete this weekly review. To complete the weekly review you must be able to ensure each project has at least one next action written somewhere on a list or calendar. If looking at my project list and I see that most of my projects have not been planned out and do not have next actions then no wonder I was going "Numb" to the list! Ok so I made a copy of my project list with a different heading "Projects in need of planning/ starting" I found that I was going numb to this list too!

So I guess what I should do is put most of my projects on my "someday maybe" list, so reducing my "project list". Scrap my second list: "Projects in need of planning/ starting" . Then for any project that needs planning/ starting move them one at a time to my action list and project list. And only have projects that have been "planned/ started" on my project list. Moving my projects from "someday maybe" to the action list and the project list when the time allows.

This way when I look at my project list on the weekly review it will not scare the life out of me to see all the projects that are not moving because they have not been planned! I can then review the projects on that list to make sure they are moving and have next doable actions.

This is all to do with how we put things on lists and the psychological impact they have when we then try to work with them. I did not realise maybe I was biting off more than I could chew!

I now realise the value of having a "someday maybe" list. A place to park the really valuable important stuff that just can't be done yet.

This has been very interesting and helpful.

Thanks for all your help.

Mike