I work at an insanely corporate corporation and I work on too many projects at one time. There are several people involved with each project and at all times I’m always awaiting information or action from someone so I can continue my bit. I have no clout so most of the time I have to remind people to get back to me on everything.

Using Outlook, what I do is use the follow-up system. Whenever I send an email requesting something from someone, I copy that email into the body of an appointment called Follow-up that’s set for 11am two days in the future. Then everyday at 11am, outlook reminds me to follow-up – I open this appointment and within it are the emails I sent two days ago. I go through them, and any for anybody who hasn’t gotten back to me, I send them the email again “are you gonna get back to me on this??” and then copy that email to the follow-up appointment two more days into the future.

When it’s an urgent issue, I’ll copy the sent email to the next day, and when I know the person is going to need several days before they can get back to me, I’ll copy it to a follow-up appointment the following week etc. I’ve even got reminders to follow-up with people several months from now.

I use this system for all my personal going-ons as well. I don’t necessarily do everything by email, so I might just put the statement “call that guy” in the appointment.

To give you an idea of how dependant I am on this system, it’s Tuesday today, and

Wednesday I have 12 things to follow-up
Thursday I have 11 things to follow-up
Friday I have 0 things to follow-up
Monday I have 1 thing to follow-up
after that I just have the odd thing to follow-up once a week or so

Once the reminder is in a future Follow-up appointment, my mind is clear and I can focus on more productive stuff. Like figuring out ways to get even more organized.

Sean

Organized on the computer: if I’m deep into work on my computer, but an unrelated thought somehow works its way to the forefront of my mind, I’ll quickly do a “Ctrl-Esc r notepad ” (or even just a “Ctrl-Esc r ” if possible) and then type “buy peanut butter” and then Alt-Tab back to whatever I’m working on before losing my roll. Later on, I’ll transfer my notepad notes to their appropriate spots.

The trick is, I suppose, to ‘sell out’ just enough that you can make some cash — I’m writing a Web site for high schoolers on Aboriginal issues that has turned out to be absolutely fascinating, and extremely profitable — without losing interest entirely in what you’re doing. Not what I thought I’d be doing right now. But still fun.

Also: You might be working with friends, per the above poster’s comments, but the standard corporate rules of business still have to apply. They have to pay you. And you have be on top of them to ensure they do — don’t bend on that. In fact, it’s probably better to say no to your friends. You might end up losing a friend or two by working with them and finding out that they have no money to pay you, which I have. The hard way.

ZH

You’ve Said NO to Authority, Capitalism, and The System: Now Say it to Your Friends!

It’s just as helpful for me to hear about problems as well as solutions… I’ll change the entry to reflect that. Thanks Christia!

But the more I get involved in, the more I dilute what I can do for the things I do get involved in.

So, the hardest thing for me is to say no to people/projects I like.

That’s it.

Christina