Your to-do list is not a schedule

Hi Reader,

I like to-do lists. I use them all the time.

They help me get things out of my head, see what I am carrying, and remember the small things that would otherwise disappear.

But a running to-do list has a problem: things keep getting added to it.

Even when I am making progress, the list may not get much shorter. I cross off three things and add four more. Logistically, that can make it difficult to tell when any particular task is actually going to happen. Psychologically, it can also make it feel as though I am not making much progress at all.

That is one reason I use both broader strategic plans and shorter weekly plans. The strategic plan helps me think about what I hope to accomplish across a semester or another planning period. The weekly plan asks a narrower question: Given the time I actually have this week, what am I going to try to move forward?

A to-do list and a schedule do different jobs.

A list tells me what I might need to do. A schedule helps me think about when I might actually do it.

That distinction matters especially for research. A meeting usually happens because it is already scheduled for 2:00. A class happens because students show up. But “revise discussion section” or “analyze data” can sit quite happily on a to-do list for weeks without ever finding a place to happen.

This connects to the research syllabus and strategic plan I wrote about in the first issue of The Project Log. I find it useful to start with the time I actually have, including teaching, service, personal commitments, travel, and everything else competing for those hours.

Then the tasks have to fit into that time somehow.

Of course, not everything on a to-do list is equally easy to put on a calendar. Some items are already concrete enough to schedule, while others are really placeholders for work that still needs to be figured out. I’ll come back to that in the next issue.

For now, I am not trying to build a calendar that predicts every step. I am trying to give the work I hope to move forward a realistic place to happen.

Try this

Look at the research tasks you are carrying this week.

If you used the A/B/C approach from the last issue, you might start with the tasks you identified as A: Advance. Which of those do you genuinely hope to move this week?

Then look at your actual calendar.

Where could that work fit alongside everything else already there?

You do not necessarily need to account for every task or every hour. The point is to notice whether the work you say you want to do has any relationship to the time you actually have.

And when the week is over, you have something more useful than an endlessly growing list. You can look back at what you planned, what actually happened, and what needs to move forward into the next week.

A suggestion

I would not try to schedule every item on a to-do list. For me, that would create more work than it solves.

Instead, I try to notice the tasks that require real time and attention and make sure I have made some space for them. Smaller coordination or maintenance tasks may fit around other work, and I might group them into a dedicated block. A substantive analysis or writing task probably needs a more deliberate block.

And sometimes looking at the calendar tells me something I did not want to admit: there simply is not room for everything on the list this week.

That is useful information too.

As with the research plan itself, this takes some trial and error. You may work well with long research blocks, short ones, or some combination. The goal is to find a relationship between your task list and your actual time that works for you.

One question for your research: What is one task you genuinely want to move forward, and where could it realistically live in the time you have?

Happy projecting,

Shiri

P.S. These days, I also color code my calendar. Just as I suggested you might color code A/Advance, B/Bridge, and C/Contain tasks in last week’s issue, color can make it easier for me to see at a glance what kinds of work are actually taking up my time. More on that in a future issue of The Project Log.

If this was useful, feel free to forward it to a colleague, student, writing group, or research team. You can find Project Management for Researchers, ordering information, and free worksheets on my Project Management for Researchers page. I also offer talks and workshops on research project management for departments, centers, graduate programs, and research groups.