HOW TO manage activities

NORBERT FUCHS (nfuchs@attmail.com)
Sun, 11 Aug 1996 15:04:25 +0000

One of the reasons I bought the Omnigo was to throw away paper planers, p=
hone =

books and so on, without being dependend on carrying a notebook all the t=
ime.

One of the challenges was to implement a sophisticated activity managemen=
t on =

the OGO that is capable of sorting and prioritizing activities. This requ=
ires =

some non-OGO stuff to understand what=B4s meant by that:

Requirements for the implementation result out of the activity management=
in =

our team: We implemented a team process with eight steps to identify =

bottlenecks and to set goals for individual work. Team meetings are used =
to =

reach agreement on the bottlenecks, define the necessary actions, the own=
ers =

and the timeframe. Therefore, the individual activity and time management=
has =

to sort activities along this process, prioritize process steps and prior=
itize
activities in each single step. (This results in time management - e.g. a=
=

weekly plan).

The OGO appointment book is not capable of sorting activities according t=
o =

process steps AND priority. I only use it for appointments, birthdays and=
so =

on.

I realized a database with number fields for process steps, priorities fo=
r =

process steps and activities, the action itself, expected duration, sched=
uled =

date and a category field for the status (pending or done).

Advantages: The database application sorts for all three shown fields (e.=
g. =

process step, priority of activity, action) and is capable of suppressing=
=

categories on the display (e.g. activities marked =22done=22). You can co=
nvert and
print the contents.
Disadvantages: You still need the appointment book for time management, =

especially for recurring events, but I don=B4t think that=B4s a big point=
. More =

important: This is no common electronic solution like Lotus Organizer or =
=

Schedule. Our reason to use the database was the demand for sorting activ=
ities
according to process steps AND priority.

Norbert Fuchs
AT&T Solutions Berlin Germany
nfuchs=40mail.att.net