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How Can You Kick Your Agenda Up a Notch?

Agenda Lists are intended for any ‘next action’ that you need to discuss with another person. The advise is to create agenda lists for the people you speak to most often. This could be personal (such as family) or work-related (such as your boss, direct reports, or colleagues you would with often).

The standard list of GTD® contexts for ‘next actions’ (or tasks) you have includes one called @Agendas.

You will see examples of GTD systems with an @Agendas context where people might keep these agenda topics.

After years of trying this and always forgetting to pull up certain agenda items when speaking to the person or in the right meeting, I have changed my approach.

The key realization for me is that @Agendas is not a realistic context for me.

My first clue … I could never seem to remember to get into that context or rerealizehen I was in the context.

What I do know is where I’m most likely to see the person, or what meeting is the best place to bring up the agenda item.

Now those are definitely contexts. @Home, @Office, @Weekly Leadership Meeting, @Calls and so forth. I know when I am @Home, @Office and I know when from my calendar when I have @Weekly Leadership Meeting and when I have some time to get to my @Calls list.

So here are the basic steps for how I deal with Agenda items.

Tag as Agenda Item

Once I identify an agenda item in a project or as a single ‘next action’, I tag it as an agenda item. While I keep this tag in the @Context tag category, it is not a context. I use a ^ symbol to prefix it which is the symbol I use for indicators.

Assign a Context

I also give each agenda item a context. The most likely contexts are within the red bar on the right.

Tag with a Person or Meeting

I also give more details about either the person I need to have this discussion with or the meeting where I need to bring up this agenda item. So when preparing for meetings, I can simply pull up the agenda items for that meeting and make sure it’s been added to the agenda.

And when speaking to someone, I simply pull up their name in the tag categories and I can see all agenda items related to their name.

It is definitely more likely that I will remember to pull up a person’s tag when I see them.

The nice thing about using this ‘Who’ tags is that I can also use them on @Waiting For’s, @Delegate’s and @Email’s so all of those ‘next actions’ show up when I see the person and click on their name.

And if I happen to pull up an ^Agenda item by the context, like @Office, the ‘Who tag is a quick indicator of who I need to go talk to.

With this method, I definitely miss fewer ^Agenda items during the day.

Why don’t you give it a try and see if it works for you?

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How Can You Kick Your Agenda Up a Notch?

Agenda Lists are intended for any ‘next action’ that you need to discuss with another person. The advise is to create agenda lists for the people you speak to most often. This could be personal (such as family) or work-related (such as your boss, direct reports, or colleagues you would with often).

The standard list of GTD® contexts for ‘next actions’ (or tasks) you have includes one called @Agendas.

You will see examples of GTD systems with an @Agendas context where people might keep these agenda topics.

After years of trying this and always forgetting to pull up certain agenda items when speaking to the person or in the right meeting, I have changed my approach.

The key realization for me is that @Agendas is not a realistic context for me.

My first clue … I could never seem to remember to get into that context or rerealizehen I was in the context.

What I do know is where I’m most likely to see the person, or what meeting is the best place to bring up the agenda item.

Now those are definitely contexts. @Home, @Office, @Weekly Leadership Meeting, @Calls and so forth. I know when I am @Home, @Office and I know when from my calendar when I have @Weekly Leadership Meeting and when I have some time to get to my @Calls list.

So here are the basic steps for how I deal with Agenda items.

Tag as Agenda Item

Once I identify an agenda item in a project or as a single ‘next action’, I tag it as an agenda item. While I keep this tag in the @Context tag category, it is not a context. I use a ^ symbol to prefix it which is the symbol I use for indicators.

Assign a Context

I also give each agenda item a context. The most likely contexts are within the red bar on the right.

Tag with a Person or Meeting

I also give more details about either the person I need to have this discussion with or the meeting where I need to bring up this agenda item. So when preparing for meetings, I can simply pull up the agenda items for that meeting and make sure it’s been added to the agenda.

And when speaking to someone, I simply pull up their name in the tag categories and I can see all agenda items related to their name.

It is definitely more likely that I will remember to pull up a person’s tag when I see them.

The nice thing about using this ‘Who’ tags is that I can also use them on @Waiting For’s, @Delegate’s and @Email’s so all of those ‘next actions’ show up when I see the person and click on their name.

And if I happen to pull up an ^Agenda item by the context, like @Office, the ‘Who tag is a quick indicator of who I need to go talk to.

With this method, I definitely miss fewer ^Agenda items during the day.

Why don’t you give it a try and see if it works for you?

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