ClearContext Corporate Blog

Have you been using ClearContext for a few months?  Would you like to improve ClearContext’s prioritization accuracy?  On setup, ClearContext analyzes your email history to rank contacts by priority.  Over time, this information can become dated as new contacts become more important to you.  You can re-run this process at any time by going to ClearContext > Options and pressing the Analyze Contacts button.  This will re-prioritize most of your contacts while leaving your manually set contact priorities in tact.  Take a few minutes and give it a run.

For more information on prioritization and contact analysis – including a video tutorial – see our User Guide.

I like this article from Entrepreneur.com on better email management.  It’s a little different than most of the “Top-X” email lists, focusing on block and tackle suggestions such as learning the in’s and out’s of your email client and maximizing use of folders.  Check it out.

BONUS: the BBC says that half of Britons are ‘e-mail addicts’ and claims that reliance on mobile email access is becoming as critical as our addiction to mobile phones.  [Thanks for the pointer, LIfehacker.]

Since our last product plan update during v3 development, we’ve had the chance to take a step back and evaluate both upcoming IMS enhancements and our longer term product suite strategy.  We’re excited to tell you about what we’re working on now.  Following a near term incremental release, in our next major development cycle we’re extending the ClearContext Product Suite with smarter email management; personal project management; and analytics, reporting, and alerting capabilities as outlined below. 

Information Management System v3.2 

We’ll complete work on near term feature enhancements to improve IMS in the reporting and management arena, including the following new features: 

• Action Dashboard 
• Custom Forms Support 
• Additional Gadget Support 
• User Interface Simplification

The ClearContext Product Suite 

We will grow the ideas introduced in v3.2 via a major development effort to extend email management, personal project management and metrics and measurement in the ClearContext Product Suite.  Here’s an early look at what these releases will look like: 

IMS 4.0  – the next major release of IMS will focus on making the application smarter and simpler to use.  Major new features include: 

• Automated intelligent Topic assignment 
• Extended contact information including contact-based views 
• Simplified User Interface for email management 
• Quick launch of Topic folders for easy access to archived data

PM – a tool for project management within Outlook.  Features include: 

• Project Overview Dashboard 
• Hierarchical task management 
• Project view for maintenance of project related items including Tasks, Appointments, Emails, etc.. 
• Detailed Project Status at a glance

ARA – tools for analysis, reporting, and alerts on activity within Outlook.  Integrated with all products in the suite, analytics will include: 

• Email usage reporting 
• Metrics and performance measurement 
• Service level alerts

Timing 

v3.2 will be released this summer.  Watch this weblog for additional information on release of the ClearContext Product Suite and beta test program.

A new version of IMS Pro is available for download here.  v3.1.1 is a maintenance release that addresses a few minor issues, including a stability problem with the Email Support function, the ability to add Exchange addresses to the Detected Email Alias field in Identity and a change in the way IMS handles offline contacts in cached exchange mode.  Unless you have experienced an issue in one of these areas, it’s not necessary to upgrade from v3.1.0.

Fortune has posted 10 ways to get a grip on your e-mail, outlining exactly why it’s so important for corporations to get a handle on time spent in email:

"Let’s suppose, for instance, that dealing with your e-mail sucks up 75
days a year, and one-third of that time is thrown away on useless tasks
like reading "reply to all" messages that don’t concern you or figuring
out how to answer long, convoluted questions. Using an average
knowledge-worker salary of $30 per hour, the authors point out that the
cost of 25 wasted days is about $6,000 a year per employee – or, from
the company point of view, $6 million per 1,000 knowledge workers.
Yikes."

Tips include sending less email, scheduling live conversations, and filing effectively.  See the article for the complete list.

Thanks to Renee
Blodgett for pointing me to this article in New
York magazine on busy executives (from the likes of VH1 and ABC) who are
trying to cope with email.  This quote made me look at the article a little
closer:

"Much as it facilitates the conduct of business, e-mail is threatening to
overrun people’s lives. It’s no longer uncommon for executives — even those at
middle levels — to receive 100 to 150 e-mails a day — a
veritable torrent that floods "24-7," to use the macho shorthand of e-business."
(Emphasis added).

100 – 150 messages?  This article was published in the Summer of 1999.  I’m
willing to bet that the executives quoted in this article now long for the days
when they only received 150 messages/day!

Anyway, the article is a good read and serves to
highlight just how long the management of email has been a problem in the
corporate world.  If you suffer from some of the addiction issues described in
the article, try my easiest productivity tip: turn off your
mail notifications and set Outlook to only check for email every 30 minutes
or longer.

Robert Scoble from PodTech.Net came by a for a demo of Inbox Alert and IMS
Professional.  The result is an 18 minute video on the ScobleShow.

Thanks for coming by, Robert.  Next time I’ll have a better haircut!

So far we’ve given an overview of using ClearContext IMS Pro with Getting Things Done and talked about Action Management, Project Designation and Review.  Our last excerpt from the setup guide Using ClearContext IMS Professional for Microsoft Outlook with Getting Things Done talks briefly about prioritization and points to additional resources available on our website.

Prioritization

A core feature of ClearContext is the automated prioritization of individual email messages. Though email prioritization is not a core tenet of GTD email processing, ClearContext’s prioritization engine can be extremely helpful when trying to get the Inbox down to empty. When there are too many messages to process in the time available, ClearContext’s prioritized views allow you to address your most important messages first while saving the less important items for later.

Priority is determined by the sender of the email, the recipient(s) of the email, your level of involvement in the email thread, and numerous other factors associated with the message. Designate given senders, messages, or message characteristics as higher priority and IMS will use that information to prioritize the Inbox exactly to your specifications. Messages are color-coded and ordered by priority, with the most important email from the most important senders appearing at the top of the inbox and junk mail appearing at the bottom. In addition, as you process individual emails, manually mark email conversations as higher or lower priority, changing future email’s placement in the inbox.

Additional Information

There is a wealth of additional information on the use and optimization of Outlook available on the ClearContext Website. All of the above features are documented in more detail in our User Guide. We have created several short tutorials to help learn about the product. Check out our weblog for tips and techniques for getting the most out of ClearContext IMS and/or our User Forums for technical questions and features and tips suggestions.

[This concludes our GTD series.  Download the entire guide here.]

GTD and Getting Things Done are registered trademarks of David Allen & Company. ClearContext Corporation is not affiliated with David Allen & Company in any manner.

Our last post detailed Project Designation using ClearContext IMS Pro with Getting Things Done.  Our next excerpt from the setup guide Using ClearContext IMS Professional for Microsoft Outlook with Getting Things Done is on Review.

Review

Once the Inbox has been processed, IMS provides several methods for reviewing and acting on To-Do Lists.

ActionView

To view action items, select the ActionView button on the ClearContext toolbar and filter the results by category. This is your Action List – it shows all open tasks and appointments for the given context. Further refine the results by filtering by priority, topic, or date range. Show/hide filtering options by clicking the yellow information bar at the top of the ActionView.

Create pre-defined filters for lists that you review periodically. For example, to create a filter to show all of the tasks you need to perform when you are ready to work at your computer:

1. Open the ActionView and press the yellow information bar to open filtering options.
2. Select the category @Computer from the drop down in the middle of the options.
3. Under saved filters, type a filter name in the drop down (where it initially says <DEFAULT> or <LOAD FILTER>).
4. Click Save Filter.

The next time you are at your computer, select the newly created filter from the drop down and click Load Filter to open all of your To-Do’s assigned a category of @Computer.

Weekly Review

Many GTD users find David Allen’s suggestion of a weekly review to be the most critical component of their GTD implementation. To automate the weekly review with ClearContext IMS, use the ActionView and ClearContext’s custom Inbox views to process actions by project. To perform the review, use these tools on a weekly basis:

1. Select the ClearContext Prioritized By Week view (ClearContext > Inbox Views > Prioritized by Week), go through the email remaining for the last week and action it using Task, Schedule, Delegate, Defer or Delete. 
2. Select the ActionView button on the ClearContext toolbar. This creates a list of all Tasks, Appointments, and Deferred messages in the mail file. 
3. Use Filter By Date to review the last week’s tasks and appointments and take action or mark complete as appropriate. Optionally filter by category (action), topic (project), or priority. 
4. Change the filter to review future tasks, appointments, and deferred messages. Capture any new actions that come to mind using the buttons at the bottom of the ActionView dialog. 
5. If filtering by category or project, repeat for each item on these lists. 
6. Review the Someday/Maybe folder and transfer any items to your system that have become active or delete any items that are no longer relevant.

RelatedView

The RelatedView is a view of all related items for a given conversation. For example, your Inbox is empty and you receive a new message regarding a meeting you are attending later in the week. Click the RelatedView to see previous emails about this meeting, along with any tasks or appointments created from the conversation. In Outlook 2007, the RelatedView is integrated into all messages, tasks and appointments.

For Advanced Outlook Users: Creating Custom Task Views that Include the Topic Name

The ActionView is the quickest way to view all To Do items, including Tasks and Appointments, by Topic name. If desired, the Topic name can be added to custom task views so that tasks within the native Outlook task pane can be sorted by project as well. To add Topic to a Task view:

1. Go to the task pane and click on the view that you want to alter.
2. Right click the header on the tasks list (i.e. where it says Subject, Due Date, etc.) and select "Field Chooser."
3. Select "Form…" in the drop down where it says "Frequently Used Fields:"
4. In the "Select Enterprise forms for this folder" dialog select Application Forms.
5. Highlight ClearContext and press Add…
6. Close the current dialog.
7. In the Field chooser, add CC-TopicName by clicking it and dragging it to the headers you initially right clicked.
8. Exit out of the field chooser.
9. If desired, change the name of the header on this field by right clicking CC-TopicName, selecting Format Columns, and changing the Label.
10. Repeat for each view that you want to alter.

[Our last post in the GTD series will be on Prioritization.  Download the entire guide here.]

GTD and Getting Things Done are registered trademarks of David Allen & Company. ClearContext Corporation is not affiliated with David Allen & Company in any manner.

Our last post detailed Action Management using ClearContext IMS Pro with Getting Things Done.  Our next excerpt from the setup guide Using ClearContext IMS Professional for Microsoft Outlook with Getting Things Done is on Project Designation.

Project Designation

Using ClearContext Topics to designate projects ensures that all messages in an email conversation – past, present and future – are automatically associated with these projects. Each email message may be assigned a Topic via the IMS toolbar. All future email in that email thread (or “conversation”) will be automatically assigned this Topic name. 

File Msg, Thread and Topic buttons quickly move email messages with assigned topics from the Inbox to automatically created Topic folders for later reference. In addition, IMS can automatically save sent messages in these topic folders to ensure that all project correspondence is properly tagged and stored together in one filing system. Topic assignments are automatically carried over to Tasks and Appointments generated from email conversation and Topics can be easily assigned to new items as they are created. 

Topic Selector can be used to quickly assign Topics. Press the Topic button to the left of the Topic drop down to pull up the Topic Selector window. Start typing the Topic name and IMS will narrow the Topic list to match your search. Arrow down to select a Topic and assign to the conversation. This dialog is particularly useful for those who have a long list of projects. The Topic Selector is also launched when a file button is pressed on a message that does not have a Topic assigned. 

To automatically assign projects, create AutoAssign rules to analyze incoming messages based on sender, domain, keywords, etc… To create multi-level projects, place a “/” between the Main Project heading and the Sub-Project (i.e. “Client/Implementation”). ClearContext will automatically create Topic folders that reflect the hierarchy (i.e. main folder “Client” with sub-folder “Implementation”). 

Users of mobile devices can instruct ClearContext to duplicate Topics in the category field to ensure that project designation is communicated to the external device in addition to context. See ClearContext > Options > Preferences > Topic Options for more detail. 

Someday/Maybe File 

If you would like to follow David Allen’s suggestion to maintain a Someday/Maybe file, create a special IMS Topic called “Someday.” Assign Topic “Someday” to ideas that you want to think about later. Click the file button and the message will automatically be placed in a subfolder of your ClearContext Topic folder. When you’re ready to review these items, open up the Topic folder for review. 

[Our next post in the GTD series will be on the Review process.  Download the entire guide here.]

GTD and Getting Things Done are registered trademarks of David Allen & Company. ClearContext Corporation is not affiliated with David Allen & Company in any manner.