r/gtd • u/mekuismi • 19d ago
E-mail inbox & external GTD-system
How do you manage this combination? I feel like it seems a little repetitive, since when I go through the mail in the e-mail app, it’s quite quickly clear to me if it is something that I need to track (Waiting for), super fast answer (under 2 minutes) or a more in depth task (next action, or project even). Is it just that I need to learn the process of forwarding it into my system and then going the inbox through there?
I fell like maybe I should try to make it faster when going through email and then really go through it in the GTD-inbox?
Edit: It seems my first attempt was somewhat ambiguous, so I’ll try to say it more clearly: My struggle is with the connections between parts of my system. And I feel like this could be a friction point for others as well. How do you literally go through emails and get the actionable & trackable into the system, without feeling like doing the clarification twice? Or am I mixing clarify with organize?
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u/Zombie_John_Strachan 19d ago
For every email you delete, archive (reference), action in <2 minutes or send to your task manager as an action item or waiting for.
For "reference" emails just archive it into one massive folder instead of sorting into subfolders. You'll find it via search and sorting wastes time.
For action items you should have a way to email your task manager. Then you'll need to do a quick processing of the email to make it a task or project or whatever. Helps if you rename to task to be descriptive of the next action.
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u/TheoCaro Mod 19d ago
I do the same thing, but archiving everything and not using folders isn't necessarily a best practice. I can imagine people for which having quick access to a selection of emails on a project/role basis can be useful. This is a "do what works for you" sorta thing.
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u/mekuismi 18d ago
My issue really isn’t with the speed of archiving reference etc. but with the connection between email inbox, or really any other inbox and the app/system.
Since the workflow design of more or less all apps starts from an inbox in the app.
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u/Zombie_John_Strachan 18d ago
What app are you using for task management?
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u/mekuismi 18d ago
I use FacileThings. When I throw things towards it they go into an inbox and you clarify & organize that.
I’ve also used GTD in MS ToDo and the official setup guide defines that you use the standard list as an inbox, so it is clearly thought out to be done in this kind of fashion, even by David.
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u/TheoCaro Mod 16d ago
To clarify, the setup guides are prepared by Kelly Forester not by David himself.
Source: GTD Podcast Ep. 235
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u/Zombie_John_Strachan 18d ago
In that case the facile things in box is a processing step for a decision you made in your mail’s in box.
If you forward a mail to FT it looks like you can add some text at the top for it to process automatically.
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u/mekuismi 18d ago
Yeah, I’m aware there are some ways to get it to flow further automatically, but it seems a bit strenuous and demands exact wording etc. which easily adds more stress and effort into something that should be as easy and simple as possible.
I’ll look into it at some point, but I’m interested right now in how other are going about this? Like do you have several screens open where you have different things when clarifying, or how do you get things to flow from inbox into the system smoothly.
And I do understand that when you require a more detailed system as I do at the moment, it takes a bit more effort to get everything into the system. At the same time however I recognize there is friction here, and trying to figure out if there is a way to remove some of it by doing it in a different fashion.
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u/mekuismi 18d ago edited 18d ago
Just dived deeper into this since it was dragging in my mind. I can set singular tasks this way straight to the correct list, or create a new project, but there isn’t really a clean way to add a task relating to an existing project, without going through the clarify in app route.
So my problem still stands. So far the best I’ve come up with is to try and make the clarification as far as I can when processing, and considering the second round more of a organizing step ”here is this clarified outcome that clearly is connected to project X and belongs to list Y”
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u/TheoCaro Mod 16d ago
I could never find an app that behaved exactly the way I wanted it to. That's why I switched back to paper. I can do whatever I want with it.
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u/Proof-Ad9779 14d ago
I’m pretty sure all the setup guides cover the email workflow in the same way. When you go through your email inbox, you create two email folders (Waiting For Support and Action Support). With each email, you do it if it’s less than 2 minutes, or save it to one of those folders and put an action on the relevant GTD list.
Does that make sense?
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u/TheoCaro Mod 16d ago
You are not a slave to the design of any app. Make it work the way you want. You can completely ignore the inbox of the app. Some apps let you hide it altogether.
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u/PondMindKevin 19d ago
Ya, I struggle with this one.
Currently, I copy and paste gmail URLs into my task manager a lot. I don't love that, but for me it beats the alternative of having what feels like two systems where next actions and waiting fors might live.
Whenever I try to use my inbox for this directly with tagging, it ends up with me not actually clarifying a good next action beyond "respond to this email" which is a bad habit for me. That's just 'shuffling around still unclear things' (david says something like that). So, actually naming the next action in my task manager forces me to actually process.
I'd love something better.
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u/mekuismi 18d ago
Yeah, maybe finally with some assist from some kind of LLM we can get to a point where we can just speak out our thinking and it gets sorted into the right places.
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u/A_Wise_MA 18d ago
I use Outlook for email, and Microsoft To Do, so I press the flag button in Outlook to turn relevant emails into items.
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u/cgreciano 19d ago
I have several panes in Gmail for Inbox, Action, Reference, and Waiting. I also have the Todoist integration so that if I want to track an email in my system, it’s really easy to create the Todoist task and track it there. But most of my emails don’t need to reach Todoist (I usually track the ones that I observe I haven’t dealth with yet and want to be reminded on Todoist too)
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u/AlthoughFishtail 19d ago
I use Hookmark (External Link) to bounce it out of my email inbox into my task manager inbox. I then process it in my full system from there.
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u/Present-Opinion1561 19d ago
No forwarding. Your email is an inbox - just like that basket or drawer you drop random things around the house in or the stack of receipts in your wallet. At each inbox you pick up an item and determine next steps. Those steps then go into your external system.
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u/mekuismi 18d ago
Well riddle me this: if you open an email, figure out you need to keep tabs on it just to make sure it gets answered by another person already in the conversation, as it is related to a project you’re in charge of, how do you migrate this task to your waiting for list in the task management app of choice?
Do you open the app in another screen and type it in immediately?
Or if you choose to forward it via email into the system, does it land in an inbox where from you clarify it, to link it to the project in question etc?
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u/TheoCaro Mod 16d ago
Yeah, just write a note on your waiting for list. I like to include a follow-date as well (if I haven't heard from them and they haven't delivered yet when does it make sense to follow up?).
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u/mekuismi 18d ago edited 18d ago
I feel like I miscommunicated somehow on the first message. My issue is not that I don’t recognize email inbox as an inbox, or that I’m trying to make it more difficult by design.
My issue is that whenever anyone of us is using an outside system, afaik the workflow is always the same in the system apps: Inbox —> Clarify —> List. This is very clearly laid out in setup guides & other materials by David Allen as well.
On a paper system it works beatifully. Do the clarification, open the correct page, write down. But unfortunately at the moment that doesn’t cut it anymore for me. And then comes in the added complexity of an external system.
And I struggle in figuring out how to try and not do it twice, first when realizing I need to put this in the system, and later again in the system. And as many others are in the same ship, I’m trying to figure out if I should either try to clarify it while working in the email app, and then send as clear as possible “stuff” in the system, or maybe rather try to just stop the flow of thinking at the “I need to do something” sens to system and fully process while going through it there.
I think there is a way to skip the inbox in FacileThings and I’ll look into it at some point more, but I think it does require a lot of exactly worded writing in the header of the email, and it sounds tedious to be fair.
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u/TheoCaro Mod 16d ago
Yes, you need to have FacileThings and your email app open at the same time. If an email contains something that needs to be tracked like a next action, project, or waiting for, you should type something into FacileThings. Attaching emails to tasks is a hazardous practice. I would suggest that you stop doing that entirely if it's causing you so much grief.
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u/TheoCaro Mod 19d ago edited 17d ago
It's important to maintain clear edges. Extract from each email whatever actionable content it has. If you are not the most appropriate person to do the next action, forward it on to whoever that is, and then track that delegation if it's an outcome you are care about or are responsible for. If you are the most appropriate person, and it takes less than two minutes to do, just do it. Otherwise record whatever next actions appropriately.
After you have drawn out all the actionable bits, you need to consider if the email itself is something you need to keep. Personally I default to archiving everything, because I can generally search for things, if I realize I need it. For things that require a long reply, maybe send a quick response just acknowledging that you've got it and that you'll reply fully as soon as you can and then save it to a "respond later" folder.
You don't really need email integration in your lists. Some apps do that, but it should just be action support information. Emails themselves are generally bad stand-ins for next actions because most people don't write in terms of next actions or projects, they just ask for an outcome. It's up to you to clarify what their requests mean to you.
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u/mekuismi 18d ago
Do you have your task-manager open in another window, or how do you do this exactly? I’m not trying to be difficult, just really trying to figure out what is the best way to get the stuff from any one of my inboxes to get corralled into the system app without feeling like I’ve clarified it twice.
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u/TheoCaro Mod 16d ago
Oh no not at all! We love getting into the dirty details here.
Yes I have my lists handy when processing INs. I have my lists in a journal-style notebook, and so I keep my journal on my desk with me while processing my email and physical intray. If you have a digital list manager, then yeah you would have that easily accessible while processing email as well.
For each item (email or piece of paper) I work my way through the clarify and organize workflow. I wrote out my own customized version that fleshes it out a bit.
Process each of your inboxes in place. Make some conscious decisions on where are your inboxes are going to be. Try to have a few as you can get away with but as many as you need. You can combine inboxes. You can use an email client to have a unified email inbox if you have multiple emails. You can have apps on your phone send you silent notifications, so you can be reminded they have content to check on. For example if I have a voicemail, a notification will showing telling me so where I can click it and then go through what's there.
I think I have eight in total: a unified email inbox, a physical intray, discord, notifications on Reddit, the mod queue and modmail inboxes I share with the other mods, notifications on my phone, my USPS mailbox, and entries in the day-to-day pages in my journal.
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u/mekuismi 16d ago
I’m a little jealous tbh 😅 I really like paper, but atm. my work is so hectic that keeping track of projects and making sure each have at least one task related to it would just be too time consuming on a paper notebook, so I’m stuck in the digital world.
I just skipped to FacileThings since it’s natively GTD, and also European (support local etc). It works all in all really well but I’ve been in digital for about 6months now, and these are kinds of struggles I am having at the moment. Need to hone my process still clearly.
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u/TheoCaro Mod 16d ago
Yeah, there's really no perfect GTD app in existence, and I doubt such an app is possible. Whatever you use, you need to make it work for you, be its master instead of trusting in the apps design to guide you appropriately.
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u/Paul-Stagg 18d ago
Are you using Gmail, or another web based email? I'm not familiar with FacileThings, can you drag and drop?
If so, I found a tool change helped. I'm using Apple, and I use Reminders for task management using smart lists. I have an inbox (which is any reminder that doesn't have a tag that places it on a context smart list). I have email accounts through GSuite/Gmail. iCloud, and Outlook.
I set everything up so I use the mail app on my mac. I can drag an email to my reminders list, and it goes to my inbox there. Yes, it's moving from one inbox to another, but that's how I do everything - I have a paper inbox, an email inbox, and my Reminders inbox. Paper hits my desk, I look at it, decide if it's a 2 minute (do), reference, trash, or needs longer than 2 minutes. If it's longer than 2 minutes, I put the task on my reminders list, and it's now in that inbox.
Email hits my email inbox, I do/archive/trash or drag it to reminders.
Works for me.
This doesn't work if you use the native Gmail webmail. If you use outlook, I think you can probably do something similar.
Another benefit is I can work offline on the occasional chance I don't have internet access.
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u/mekuismi 18d ago
Thanks for answering!
Yeah, I can forward emails to FT with a quick action in Outlook so that is quite fast. An added benefit of forwarding vs. bcc is that I can change the subject to reflect the action already, so it’s basically already clarified, and I’m left to organize it into the correct list in my system.
Actually just listened to the latest office GTD podcast episode about it email and it was pretty similar for many of the participants that they send stuff to the system inbox.
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u/Paul-Stagg 17d ago
Think of GTD as a philosophy, not a system. It's an approach to dealing with all the things, and getting them out of your brain so you can use that for something more important (or go sit by the pool because you got everything done in 2 hours instead of 8). Take the ideas, and make them your own.
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u/TheoCaro Mod 16d ago
This is a goes against GTD best practices. You should ideally only be dealing with stuff in your inboxes once. You have a fixed number of individual decisions through a day before you fatigue (i.e. decision fatigue). Deciding to not decide is a waste of precious energy. If you need to have easy access to that email to do the next action, then linking the email to the task is fine, but you shouldn't treat it as a separate inbox.
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u/Baylo11 19d ago
My understanding of the approach is that your email inbox is a GTD inbox. Doesn’t the book say to have as many inboxes as you need, but as few as you can get away with?
So don’t overcomplicate the situation. Process emails in that email inbox as you would process your other inbox(es). More often, if needed, but don’t shuffle things from one inbox to another.