What is Attention Compass and How will it help me? (Classic Episode) This is one of a series of posts that are going to discuss Attention Compass in detail. Attention Compass is my proprietary tool and workflow to put you in control of your information and attention - making you a better more confident knowledge worker and reducing your stress over your productivity. I think many people are struggling with the problem(s) that Attention Compass solves – overwhelm, associated stress, and fear that things are falling through the cracks. If that's you, I want to serve you as best I can. So, I'll tell you how to implement your own Attention Compass. If you try to do it and struggle, give me a call and I'll help you get it fixed. We'll start with some assumptions that explain why Attention Compass is built the way it is. This will help you make decisions about how you want to use your Attention Compass. It should also help you figure out more about why you want to have an Attention Compass. Underlying assumptions

There are more than we could ever…

There are more things to do than we could ever get done
There are more things to know than we could ever learn
This makes us fear forgetting/losing/missing something

This fear is low-level, continually stressful for us

Our memories are unreliable as to time, particularly in the future
We know this so we create artifacts and systems, but our brains don't trust them
Misusing the 'workbench', the productive asset, our mind/brain
That means we need to get things off our mind

Implications

More than we can look at and more than we can get done = a ton of stuff
This means that we have to store it in a system
Task management

We get paid on delivering artifacts and we call the work to do so 'tasks'; tasks need to be first-class citizens in our information management system; a task is just a specific kind of information
Managing 'time' vs. managing 'attention'

Properties of the system

Electronic is best, mostly because it'll be a lot of stuff
And we need to use a backlog (metaphor) to store it

What a backlog is
Backlog justification (vs. PMI 'calendar' and WBS)

And we have to make and track postponement decisions

When we say we're 'not doing' something, we're usually postponing; these decisions need to be tracked

About Attention Compass

So, these things mean that you need a personal Information Management System; Attention Compass is precisely that

The four workflows (most frequent to least)

Capture

Observing the internal and external worlds
Capture is semi-continuous, event-driven

Processing

Turn it in to want it is and put it where it belongs

Daily review

Don't have to make a to-do list, just pull from the backlog
Validate against other commitments

Weekly Review – the bigger picture

Maximum clarity and control

So what? Now you understand some of the ideas of Attention Compass. Pick one and work to implement it in your life - tracking your postponement decisions is a good example. You can go to my website for instructions on how to make a physical system (called a "tickler file") that will put you in complete control of your postponements. As you create this habit, you will begin to see a new clarity and confidence about your tasks and attention management. This should encourage you to continue your efforts to improve in this critical area of your knowledge work life. larry@dobusyright.com or www.linkedin.com/in/larrytribble

What is Attention Compass and how will it help me? (Classic Episode) - DBR 096