Uncommon Cents

While I love 43 Folders the Web site, I’m talking in this case about 43 folders the system that David Allen–the originator of the super Geek friendly Getting Things Done productivity methodology–uses as his “tickler file”, as well as other ways to remember to do things early.

Randy Pausch would say that doing things when they’re urgent is a lot more expensive than doing things just before they’re urgent–paying a late fee on a bill is a lot worse than getting the bill there just in time; shipping something via the United States Postal Service is a lot cheaper than doing so via Federal Express. That said, there’s a need for a system to help us remember when we need to take care of something–sometimes long into the future.

David Allen’s 43 folders system involves 31 folders–one for each day of the month–plus 12 more–one for every month of the year. Things that need to be taken care of are placed in the folder; for instance, a bill that I need to pay on the 10th may be in the folder marked the 3rd of the month. An appointment that may need to be scheduled three months down the line may go into the folder for the month that’s appropriate. It’s a relatively simple system that has a lot of positives.

You can do similar things just with a calendar, but for some things, a multi year calendar would be better (actually, the 43 folders system can be modified to have a 44th folder for items that need to be handled a year or more from the current date). But (again) paraphrasing Randy Pausch, it doesn’t matter if your calendar is paper or electronic, all that matters is it works for you.

Personally, I use Google Calendar more than anything else at this point, but I’ll use just about anything to try to make things work. Again, it doesn’t matter what your system is, as long as you can make it work for you.

Tags: Productivity, Social aspects, Time management

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