How to finish tasks 10x faster
To get stuff done fast you need a good task management system that you stick to in the long run.
I have been experimenting with many task management tools and systems over the past 4 years. Some concepts have skyrocketed my productivity, others were a waste of my time.
In today’s post, I want to break down the essential parts of your task management system. I want to provide you with a toolkit to choose from when jumping into your next internship project.
Back to the Basics…
You have to master the basics of task management first. This comes down to having a to-do list and a calendar. You need a place to enter and organise tasks, a calendar to keep track of important dates, and potentially block time for the tasks that you want to do. Ideally, you can add to or view both tasks and calendar events within 2-5 seconds at any time.
Don’t fall for any fancy productivity tools or systems. Unless you have built a habit of regularly planning your tasks at the end of the day and reviewing your most essential todos at the start of the next day, there is no need for anything like Notion, ClickUp or similar project management tools. I’ve used both before, and I failed. I have spent more than 400 hours building perfect systems in both, but I did not end up using them in the long run…
Here is the exact breakdown of what I use today:
The Calendar
You should use your calendar for three things:
Time-Blocking tasks
Scheduling Meetings
Keeping track of (career) events
I use the app Cron to do these three things. It’s just simple. With a few clicks, I can view all my calendars (personal, work, and uni) and add important events.
The To-Do List
A successful to-do list only comes down to two features:
The ability to group tasks into different areas of your life or projects that are going on
Pinning down and reminding you of the most critical tasks for each day
To do that, I use Apple Reminders. Why? Because it’s simple. It takes me almost no effort to add, view or check-off reminders. It perfectly syncs across my devices, and I can get reminded even based on locations.
How one thing keeps my whole system running
The only thing that matters is consistency. You have to be consistent and build a habit of planning your days, weeks, months, and even years. To plan, you need a to-do list and a calendar. We just discussed the essential features of both.
Any complex personal task management system is very likely to fail. Simplicity and easy access are key to building this habit. I have easy access to my tools with Raycast. This app allows me to view and add tasks to my todo list with one click. It lowers the effort and thus a barrier to built the habit by 20x easily.
When I click option and spacebar on my computer, it brings up a floating widget where I can easily enter a new task. When I press option and the letter “r” it bring up a floating widget where I can see my most important tasks for the day. And all of that without the need to open a physical todo list or switch to a to-do app on my computer.
Learn the basics of task management and built a habit of planning your days. How? A simple todo list, a simple calendar, and a way to quickly access to those two. That’s it.
I hope you find any value in what I talked about today. If you did, as always, share this with your friends or colleagues to get them on the same track.
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