Archives / October 2011

Here's a note from Calvin B., a Good Todo user who wrote in to describe his experience using the tool.

I've just done the morning review of my todos. I bumped a few forward that I won't get around to today; shuffled the rest into order of priority. It took five minutes. I've got a clear agenda for the day and I'm ready to go. That's how it should be, but it's taken me a long time to find a task manager that gets me there so painlessly.

I've been a devotee of emptying my email inbox for several years. The problem was where I put my action reminders after that. I've tried a bunch of systems, from plain text lists to elaborate todo software and web apps, but nothing stuck beyond the initial honeymoon period.

I generally have 200-250 active todos on the go. With most systems that meant I either became overwhelmed or ended up putting them more or less permanently out of sight and out of mind in multiple lists or categories.

Being able to assign tasks to a future date and quickly postpone them has been a revelation, allowing me to focus on my key tasks for the day. It helps considerably that Good Todo is peerless at dealing with all the tasks that come at me via email.

Bottom line: since I started using Good Todo I'm getting more of the right stuff done, when I need to do it.

You can try this, too, by signing up at Good Todo. You can then log in on our free iPhone, iPad, or Android app. (And thanks again to Calvin.)

From my betabeat column on why you should use a todo list:

Here's a complaint I hear disturbingly often: "I'm really stressed by the 10,000 emails in my inbox, but I don't have time to do anything about it." Countless users worldwide face stress and anxiety daily as they wonder what important item might be missing in the crowded chaos of their email inbox.

Ironically enough, many productivity systems only add to the stress. You know the kind: "Just add plug-in X, configure setting Y, install widget Z, and use this particular app and this 19-step process and you'll begin to get a handle on it." This may work well for software engineers who debug compilers for fun, but the other 99.9 percent of users are unlikely to adopt such a complicated system, no matter how effective it is for the elite few who can get it up and running.

Let's be realistic. Most people need a system that solves their email overload but doesn't require a lot of time to learn or special tools to install. People want something simple, quick to learn, easy to use, and not dependent on one particular platform.

If this sounds right, I've got the system for you.

Read the full piece. Or just head over to my todo list, Good Todo, to give it a try.