The In's & Out's Of The ResultsManager In-Tray

Normally I wouldn't post this here, but Gyronix's CTO Nick Duffill has given the most cogent explanation of why the ResultsManager In-Tray exists and how to optimize its usage, that I wanted to give those who aren't subscribed the opportunity to benefit from it as well.

-----Original Message-----
From: GTD_MindManager@yahoogroups.com
[mailto:GTD_MindManager@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Nick Duffill
Sent: Thursday, April 20, 2006 1:58 PM
To: GTD_MindManager@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [GTD_MindManager]
Re: In-tray best practice ?

Dave, Volker

The purpose of the "In-tray" or "In-box" areas of project maps is as a
temporary holding place for actions that are not integrated into their
associated project.

This differs from the "bits and pieces" map in that In-trays are specific to a project, and things in the bits & pieces map will probably never belong to a dedicated project - they just don't fit anywhere else.

The reason for the apparent complexity of the In-tray system is so that it supports the following:

(1) It displays In-trays in the Action dashboards, so that you can send a new task you just thought of straight to the in-tray of a specific project, without opening that map. You just click on the In-tray within the dashboard and insert a new activity.

(2) ResultsManager will display items sitting in In-trays in the review dashboards, so that you can see which maps need tidying as part of your review process.

Generally, you would not leave activities sitting in In-trays indefinitely. They are normally integrated into the project map (or otherwise triaged) during the review cycle. They exist only to provide a quicker way to add something to a project without navigating to the perfect spot in the project map.

I hope this helps,
best regards

Nick Duffill

Gyronix

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For more information on using ResultsManager with the GTD principles, visit http://groups.yahoo.com/group/GTD_MindManager/