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Home » Computers And Internet Articles » Philosophy Of Successful Time Management Or How To Start Working With Leadertask

Philosophy Of Successful Time Management Or How To Start Working With LeaderTask?

Introduction. LeaderTask what is it?

Before you start using the LeaderTask organizer, you should learn about its features, i.e. find out what it can do and what it cannot do. First of all, LeaderTask is a personal organizer for everyday activities whose main features are:

* Task Scheduler (http://www.leadertask.com/content/view/49/53/)
* Calendar
* Personal Information Manager
* Contact Manager
* Project Manager

The organizer has a portable version, i.e. it is completely autonomous = mobile. LeaderTask depends neither on the computer, nor on Windows registry, it can easily exist on your flash drive and travel with you!

Getting started.

Important issues you should know about:

First - LeaderTask is a unique organizer. It is not an advertising slogan, it is a new concept for managing tasks, projects, time and human activities. You can see it for yourself. So what is unique about it? It is the following things: tasks have a set of parameters (tags) you can use to quickly get answers to your questions. For example, you can get the following to-do lists in one mouse click: "My today tasks", "IMPORTANT", "URGENT", "Monthly Sales", "Project XYZ in September", "Monitoring delegated tasks", "Bank", "To buy", "To read", "Meeting issues", "Overdue tasks", "Year goals"...

Second - LeaderTask is very flexible. Anyone can customize LeaderTask and implement his own usual methodology for managing his activities. It is also possible to successfully use David Allen's GTD (Getting Things Done) system in LeaderTask.

Third - it is possible to associate tasks in LeaderTask with any context you find suitable. Any thing can be used as context - place (home, office, bank, store...), contact (boss, subordinate, spouse...), category, project... Speaking the language of time management, any task can be associated with its kairos (context), i.e. the circumstances that suit the task best. For example, if you need to do it in a bank, it is better to add it to the "Bank" section, if another person should do some task in a project, it should be added to the corresponding project and assigned to this person, if a task is important, you should give it the corresponding priority, etc.

Entering initial data.

To start using LeaderTask, you should enter some minimum initial data without which it will be difficult to understand how LeaderTask works. For your convenience, you can use the predefined initial data you are offered in the Quick Start wizard when you start the program for the first time.

Contacts. Add your contact groups and the contacts you need. Make sure you add information about yourself - the very first contact (set the Favorite property)

Categories. Define the categories of your activities. To make planning convenient, create types of your professional activities, hobbies and also places you visit most often in the Categories section. Sample categories: "Calls", "Meetings", "Reading", "Watching", "Buying", "Thinking", "Family", "Rest", "Health", "Office","Bank", "Store". Set the Favorite property for the main categories.

Projects. Define the projects you work on. Do not mix up categories with projects and tasks. Remember that a project is what you can do. A project has time limits, and its aim is to produce something unique. It is convenient to divide projects into meaningful groups. Set the Favorite property for the main projects.

Calendar. Use the calendar to define periods of time that are most suitable for planning your time. For example: Today, Tomorrow, Current Week, Month, Year, 1st quarter 2007, 2nd quarter 2007... Also, set the Favorite property for the main periods.

The Favorite property makes the item to be shown in the drop-down menu on the Filter bar.

How it works.

The main areas in LeaderTask - Navigator, Filter bar and Task pane. The task pane (displayed as a calendar here) shows only those tasks that meet the filtering criteria. I.e. if you select "Project -YZ" in the filter, all tasks related to project XYZ will be displayed. You can filter tasks by projects, contacts, categories, date. There can be several filtering parameters at a time, but there can be none at all, i.e. no filtering (all tasks present in the LeaderTask database will shown in this case). For your convenience, you can save a set of filtering parameters as a ready-made filter. You can make such a filter favorite and enable it from the quick menu.

Quick favorite filter selection menu.

When you select a filter, tasks with the necessary parameters are shown. For example, when you select the "Mine for today" filter, your tasks for the current day will be shown. The "Site activities in November" filter will show tasks related to the "Site" project for "November". The filter "Monitoring delegated tasks" will show all tasks related to other people (contacts) you delegated tasks to. Filters in Leadertask actually make its use much easier. You can use them to instantly get answers to the following questions: "What is the most important thing at the moment?", "Where am I supposed to be tomorrow?", "What has been done since 15-21 in the -YZ project", "What tasks are the most urgent ones?"

Tasks can be displayed both in the calendar grid (fir. 1) and in the task tree (fig. 2).

Filtering work in the same way both for the calendar and for the task tree. In different situations it can be convenient to view sets of tasks both in the calendar (visually arranged in time) and in the task tree (you can see their order and how tasks are split into smaller ones).

Adding tasks.

Adding tasks is designed in such a way that it is as easy and quick to add tasks as possible. You can do it quickly due to hotkeys and minimizing manual input. When you add a task, its parameters are specified automatically - project, contact, date, category. This data is copied from the filter. I.e. if "Project XYZ" is selected together with the "URGENT" category and you add a new task, it will be added to "Project XYZ" and it will be urgent. Another important issue: this task will also be visible when only "Project XYZ" or only "URGENT" is selected. How to add tasks. You can always open Leadertask using the Alt+Ctrl+A key combination no matter what application you are working with at the moment. For example: you are tying some text in the editor and suddenly remember about an important thing that should be added at once. What you should do: press Alt+Ctrl+A, press Insert, type the text of the task, press Enter, press Alt+Ctrl+A again and that is all, the task has been adde!
d. And note that everything is done without using the mouse. Another way with the help of the mouse: right-click the LeaderTask icon and select the necessary filter, then press Insert and do what you did in the first case.

Task priority.

Priority allows you to highlight the importance of each task and each priority can have its own representation.

Priorities make up a strict sequence, i.e. the order where each priority is higher or lower than another. Every user can define his own set of priorities, their order and how they are displayed. The standard classic set is:

* High (red font)
* Regular (block font)
* Low (gray font)

Summary.

Time management in LeaderTask is arranged somewhat differently than, for example, in Outlook. That is why when those who use old organizers start using it, they have a lot of how-to questions. In order to master the new methodology of LeaderTask, you should at least read this guide. It will be much easier for those users who have never used software for organizing their activities before.

After you understand the philosophy of LeaderTask, it will be very easy and pleasant to work with it - a lot of feedback from users proves it.

Along with the above basic features, Leadertask has other features as well: storing any information (text, images, files), arranging bookmarks, task reminders, storing passwords.

A modern person needs a smart tool for time management. This tool must not burden, but help and save the person's time and effort. LeaderTask is exactly this kind of tool. Try it and see it for yourself!

WebSite:
http://www.leadertask.com/

Download LeaderTask
http://www.leadertask.com/download/leader.exe

And here is another random article you might be interested in...

Write and Speak for the Ear

You and I may not aspire to write great books or make great speeches. But almost all of us want something to happen when we write or speak. And, the more we direct our words to the ears of readers and listeners, the greater our chances of getting the results we want.

By writing or speaking for the ear, I mean that spoken words can have more power than written words. After all, when we have important messages, we prefer to deliver them verbally and personally, rather than by sending a written message.

Of course, it's not practical or possible to deliver every message verbally. But, if we can capture some of the nuances of the spoken word we can increase the power of our messages. When we write for the ear, our writing undergoes some subtle but important changes. Our words, sentences, and paragraphs change in several ways.

Consider the number of pauses that occur when we speak. Most of us pause often, more often than when we write. To capture those pauses, use commas or one of the other 'slowing' punctuation marks, such as colons and semicolons.

Writing for the ear also means shorter sentences. And even fragments of sentences. As you can imagine, speech tends to greater spontaneity than written expression, which means shorter sentences and more fragments.

Many of the same principles hold when we make formal speeches or presentations. Especially if we speak from prepared notes.

Whatever we say, when we speak publicly, has to go in through listeners' ears. And so, if you'll allow me to belabor the obvious, we need to write speeches for listeners' ears, not our mouths.

You can call on many quick and easy techniques. For example, use short words whenever possible. Words such as 'many' rather than 'numerous'; 'use' rather than 'utilize'; and 'need' rather than 'require'.

You can also speak for the ear by using common words rather than jargon or technical words. Step back from your speech, after writing it, and ask yourself if you use words that a child will understand.

We also want vivid words, words that fire up our imagination, that paint new images on the canvases of readers' minds. Descriptive words that convey action and emotion, words that drive ideas into our heads.

Use active verbs and not passive verbs. Banish words like 'is', and 'are'. Also, check for the word 'being' and rewrite to get rid of it. Bring in verbs that do something.

Now that you've got the words you want, put them into short sentences. One short sentence. Followed by another short sentence. But, every once in while add a longer sentence for variety and to reduce the chances of boring your audience. And, keep the ideas simple within those long sentences.

I'm biased, I know. After spending the better part of a decade writing and reading radio news copy, I think it's a good idea to write for the ear.

Try it for yourself. Write something, read it out loud, and ask yourself about the effect it's likely to have on readers. Re-write as necessary, and read it aloud again. Repeat the process a few times. By the time you finish you should have a well-crafted piece of writing, even if no one ever reads it aloud or hears it spoken.