Office Productivity: My 20 Steps to Improve Your Productivity: Do the GTD Weekly Review
Welcome back!
Doing the weekly review……..that’s something that is very important to both the GTD process as well as your own mental health. The Weekly Review does several things:
- Tells you where you are
- Tells you where you’ve been
- Tells you where you need to go
That may sound trite, but that is exactly what the weekly review accomplishes for you. In a short review at the end of each week, it gives you direction, assessment, and areas that you’ve done well. My weekly review consists of TWO weekly reviews: one at corporate america and one at FFOP HQ. Let’s go through both. 
Corporate America – we live and breathe Outlook, so I keep all of my everything in OL. I do much prefer OL in a corporate environment compared to Lotus Notes – I used Notes for over a year and really did not like it – the interface was clunky, and tasks seemed to take too much time. In OL I can zip right along. So at CA, here’s what we do:
- Look at uncompleted tasks from the current week
- Assign them to one of the four lists
- Check email messages for new task (usually I’ll add those on the go so this is more of a mental review)
- Check calendar for upcoming meetings, etc
- Plan week based on what materials I need for what meetings and/or projects
- Fill in with my other ongoing tasks that is going to take me 15 years and 12 months to complete
At home, we do a bit of a different review:
- Look at physical inbox to see what I can clear out of there
- Email is at zero each night, so I don’t have much to do in there
- File all paperwork on top of my filing cabinet (the catch-all for things that need filed) By not filing these at the end of each day, it allows me to go through them again to see exactly what I’ve accomplished
- Check calendar for upcoming appointments
- Check clockingit.com for tasks that need completion
After all those are finished ( both in CA and FFOP HQ), it allows time for contemplation and reflection on what the week has held for me, as well as what dreams and aspirations I want to address. Doing a weekly review has definitive benefits. Unfortunately, there are weeks where I am unable to do them, so I do them the following week. How do you implement your weekly review? What tools do you use to do it? Let’s chat in the comments.
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I like the way that you split up your WR into the two contexts, it is important to keep things in the right place. I am doing my own WR today, and prepping for Quarterly and Annual reviews. I especially like the Quarterly Review for the big-picture stuff, really helps keep me on track. I designed a process to be a supplement to the Weekly Checklist, it guides your focus onto longer-term goals and higher-level values:
1. Review 3-5 Year Goals ~ Is it still worthwhile? Always a good question for clarifying intentions. Can any of these get moved up into a new category such as @Next Actions, @Projects, or @1-2 Year Goals? Brainstorm one thing that can get done this Quarter to advance one or more of these goals.
2. Review Career Goals ~ Are you where you want to be? Where do you want to go? What Next Action can be undertaken this Quarter to advance your career goals? Use the Tickler File to help track your progress.
3. Review Purpose ~ Are your Principles still in line? Brainstorming will help most here.
4. Review Lifestyle ~ Once again, are your choices still valid? In line with Values and Principles?
* Are your Roles and Current Responsibilities in harmony with the Lifestyle you have?
* With the Lifestyle that you want?
* What are two positive changes that you can make to improve your lifestyle this Quarter?
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Kris reply on December 21st, 2008 10:24 am:
Those are some very good points about furthering your WR. Do you do steps 1-3 weekly?
Looks like we need to get together and create a Weekly Review Checklist. Could be a great idea!
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