Effective Delegation using Microsoft Outlook

del·e·gate
[v., del-i-geyt]

1. transfer power to someone
2. give an assignment to (a person) to a post, or assign a task to (a person)

The key to GTD is deciding if an item is actionable and if it is; decide what that next action is. Once you know the next action Do it, Delegate it, Defer it or Delete it.

Today, I am going to show you how I use Microsoft Outlook to effectively delegate, track and manage those delegated actions.

When I receive an e-mail, I go through a standard GTD thought process. I decide what the next action is. If I decide to Delegate the next action associated with the e-mail, I simply forward it to the person I wish to take the next action.

Pretty simple, eh? Well, there is a bit more to this… What I really want is to see that action completed. How will I know when it’s done? If I delegate 25 things today, how can I possibly track all of these delegated tasks?

I use an Outlook Folder called @WAITING FOR. Within this folder is a set of sub-folders named for each person I delegate to.

For each of these sub-folders, I set the properties to display the number of e-mails they contain. To do this; Right Click on the folder name and select Properties. Then, choose the option to Show total number of items.

When I forward an e-mail to Steve Davidson, asking him to take care of something, I also copy that forwarded e-mail to my @WAITING FOR – Davidson, Steve sub-folder.

After about a week, my @WAITING FOR folders looks like this:

This works for me in a couple of ways.

1. At a glance, I know who owes me a lot of things and who owes me only a few things.

2. Before I go into a meeting with someone, I can quickly review the contents of their @WAITING FOR folder and in an instant, I know everything I what to review with that person.

3. During my weekly review, I can check each folder and if things are really late, and send a follow-up e-mail gently reminding this person that I asked them to do something.
   
   

4. During my weekly review, if I see something that I know has been completed, I simple delete the 'request' e-mail from the @WAITING FOR sub-folder.

It’s not a perfect system and I could get a little nutty by automating things, but in its basic form, it works quite well for me.