The amount of inputs in our lives seems to be multiplying every day.  Email, text messages, voice mail, letters, conversations, blogs, twitter, facebook…and the list goes on.  How do we handle all of these inputs and make sense of them?  How do we translate all of this information into actionable things that keep us on the productivity upswing?

The productivity tip this week is to narrow down the inputs by creating a few key “capture buckets.”  David Allen, the productivity guru, in his book Getting Things Done talks about the importance of capturing thoughts and inputs in an inbox for review and processing later.  It is during this review time that inputs and information gathered there can be turned into physical action steps that fuel productivity.

What you and I need to do to manage the information coming into our lives and make it useful is to funnel it into one or more inboxes that we process regularly…at least weekly, but preferably daily.  I have four inboxes that I faithfully attempt to get to zero every day.  They are:

• Desk Inbox – This physical inbox sits on my office desk and catches any physical inputs, including mail, phone messages captured on paper, notes from meetings and phone calls, receipts, cds, etc.  Anything that comes into my office that needs to be processed goes into that inbox.  This keeps my desk clear and brings focus to my mind when it is time to process.
• Email Inbox – This digital inbox captures anything that inputs that come to me through email.  This includes work correspondence, invites to meetings, requests for information, data to review, and emails to myself (I often send emails to myself from my smartphone to capture things I need to do when that occur to me when I am away from my office).
• Home Office Inbox – This is a physical inbox that sits on my desk at home.  There is a whole other set of inputs that comes into my life from home.  Receipts, mail, notes of things to do at home, etc.  Having a place at home to throw all of those inputs allows me to keep all of them in one place, which focuses my attention on what I need to process there (which I always do at least once a week, but usually three or four times weekly).
• Travel Inbox – This physical inbox is a plastic file folder labeled “In” that I keep in the outer pocket of my satchel.  This bag travels with me to and from the office, on business trips, vacation, and pretty much wherever I go.  Having a place to put receipts, notes, documents, etc. that I receive when I am away from my home or office is invaluable.  I simply dump that folder into one of my physical inboxes when I arrive back at my home or office, or if I am away from those locations for more than a day, I process the “in” folder on the go, on the plane, at the hotel, or at a table at Starbucks (with my triple grande caramel macchiato, of course).  This keeps me up-to-date and helps prevent things from falling through the cracks.

When something pops into my life that needs to be turned into an actionable step or needs to be filed away for future reference, I throw into one of my capture buckets.  This signals me to process it, usually that day, so it gets into my system.  Turning inputs into actionable steps is a crucial part of productivity, and capture buckets are a great way to narrow down the inputs at the front end of the process.