Glossary
Productivity glossary
49 productivity terms explained in plain English, from time blocking and GTD to deep work, the Eisenhower matrix and Zettelkasten, with where each idea came from.
Short answer
A productivity glossary explains the methods, laws and ideas behind getting things done. This one covers 49 terms, each with a two-sentence answer, how to try it today, where it came from and free tools that help.
Updated
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Browse by topic
Every term sits in one of seven groups.
Time management· 8
Focus and attention· 9
Planning and goals· 7
Teams and projects· 5
Knowledge and learning· 8
Habits and wellbeing· 6
A to Z
Short answers for every term. Open a term for the full explanation.
A
- Attention residue
- Attention residue is the part of your attention that stays stuck on a previous task after you have moved on, which makes you worse at the new task.
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B
- Body doubling
- Body doubling is working alongside another person, in the room or on a video call, so their presence helps you start and stay on task.
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- Bullet journal
- A bullet journal is a paper planner you build yourself, using short bulleted entries for tasks, events and notes, plus monthly and daily logs.
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C
- Context switching
- Context switching is moving your attention from one task to another. Each switch has a small cost in time and accuracy, and the costs add up when you switch often.
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D
- Decision fatigue
- Decision fatigue is the idea that making many decisions in a row wears down the quality of later decisions. It is a popular and useful idea, but the research behind it is contested.
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- Deep work
- Deep work is focused, distraction-free work on a cognitively demanding task, the kind that builds skill and produces hard-to-copy results.
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- Digital minimalism
- Digital minimalism is using only a small number of digital tools that clearly support what you value, and happily ignoring the rest.
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- Don't break the chain
- Don't break the chain is a habit method where you mark a calendar with an X every day you do the habit, then focus on keeping the streak of Xs going.
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E
- Eat the frog
- Eat the frog means doing your hardest or most important task first thing in the day, before easier work and distractions take over.
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- Eisenhower matrix
- The Eisenhower matrix sorts tasks into four boxes by urgency and importance: do it now, schedule it, delegate it, or drop it.
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F
- Feynman technique
- The Feynman technique is a way to learn by explaining a topic in plain words, as if to a beginner, and going back to the source wherever your explanation breaks down.
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- Flow state
- Flow is a state of full absorption in an activity, where the challenge matches your skill so closely that time seems to disappear.
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G
- Gantt chart
- A Gantt chart is a project timeline that shows each task as a horizontal bar across a calendar, so you can see start dates, end dates and which tasks overlap or depend on each other.
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- Getting Things Done (GTD)
- Getting Things Done, or GTD, is a personal productivity method where you capture every task and idea in a trusted system, decide the next action for each, and review it all every week.
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H
- Habit stacking
- Habit stacking is linking a new habit to one you already do, using the formula "After I [current habit], I will [new habit]".
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- Hofstadter's law
- Hofstadter's law says that things always take longer than you expect, even when you take Hofstadter's law into account.
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I
- Implementation intentions
- Implementation intentions are if-then plans that link a situation to an action, such as "If it is 7 am on a weekday, then I go for a run", which makes follow-through more likely.
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- Inbox Zero
- Inbox Zero is an email method where you decide what each message needs as soon as you read it, so the inbox stops being a to-do list. It is about attention, not about always having zero emails.
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- Ivy Lee method
- The Ivy Lee method is a simple daily plan: each evening, write down the six most important tasks for tomorrow in order, then work through them one at a time.
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K
M
- Maker's schedule
- The maker's schedule is a day built from long, unbroken blocks for creative work like writing or coding. It contrasts with the manager's schedule, where the day is cut into one-hour meetings.
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- Mind mapping
- Mind mapping is drawing your ideas as a diagram: a central topic in the middle, with branches for subtopics and smaller branches for details.
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- MoSCoW method
- The MoSCoW method sorts requirements into Must have, Should have, Could have and Won't have (this time), so a team knows what to cut when time runs short.
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- Most important tasks (MITs)
- Most important tasks, or MITs, are the one to three tasks that would make today a success if they were the only things you finished.
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O
- OKRs (objectives and key results)
- OKRs are a goal-setting framework that pairs an ambitious objective, what you want to achieve, with two to five measurable key results that show whether you got there.
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P
- PARA method
- PARA is a way to organise digital files and notes into four folders: Projects, Areas, Resources and Archives, sorted by how actionable they are.
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- Pareto principle (80/20 rule)
- The Pareto principle, or 80/20 rule, is the observation that a small share of causes often produces most of the results, for example 20% of tasks creating 80% of the value.
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- Parkinson's law
- Parkinson's law says that work expands to fill the time available for its completion: give a task a week and it will take a week.
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- Personal knowledge management (PKM)
- Personal knowledge management, or PKM, is the practice of capturing, organising and using the information you come across, so it turns into understanding and useful work.
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- Planning fallacy
- The planning fallacy is the tendency to underestimate how long a task will take, even when you know similar tasks have run late before.
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- Pomodoro Technique
- The Pomodoro Technique is working in focused 25-minute blocks called pomodoros, with a 5-minute break after each and a longer break after every four.
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- Procrastination
- Procrastination is putting off a task you intend to do, even though you expect the delay to make things worse. It is usually about avoiding an unpleasant feeling, not about laziness.
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S
- Scrum
- Scrum is an agile framework where a small team works in short, fixed-length sprints, usually one to four weeks, and reviews and adjusts after each one.
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- Second brain
- A second brain is a personal, digital system for saving and organising what you learn, such as notes, highlights and ideas, so you can find and reuse it later.
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- Shallow work
- Shallow work is logistical, low-concentration work like email, routine meetings and admin: it is often necessary, easy to do while distracted and easy for someone else to replicate.
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- Single-tasking
- Single-tasking is doing one thing at a time with your full attention, the opposite of multitasking.
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- SMART goals
- SMART goals are goals written to be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound, so you know exactly what success looks like and when it is due.
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- Spaced repetition
- Spaced repetition is reviewing what you learn at increasing intervals, just before you would forget it, so it moves into long-term memory with less total study time.
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T
- Task batching
- Task batching is grouping similar small tasks, such as email, calls or errands, and doing them together in one sitting instead of scattering them across the day.
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- Time audit
- A time audit is tracking how you actually spend your hours for a week or two, then comparing it with how you thought you spent them.
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- Time blocking
- Time blocking is planning your day by giving every hour a job in advance: you put blocks for specific tasks on your calendar instead of working from a to-do list.
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- Timeboxing
- Timeboxing is giving a task a fixed amount of time and stopping when the time is up, whether or not the task feels finished.
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- Two-minute rule
- The two-minute rule says that if a task takes less than two minutes, do it now instead of writing it down or scheduling it.
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U
- Ultradian rhythm
- An ultradian rhythm is a body cycle shorter than a day. In productivity, it usually refers to the idea that alertness rises and falls in roughly 90-minute waves, so work in 90-minute blocks with breaks.
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W
- Weekly review
- A weekly review is a short, regular session where you clear your inboxes, check every project and plan the week ahead.
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Z
- Zeigarnik effect
- The Zeigarnik effect is the tendency to remember unfinished or interrupted tasks better than finished ones, because open tasks keep tugging at your attention.
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- Zettelkasten
- A Zettelkasten, German for slip box, is a note-taking system of short, linked notes, each holding one idea in your own words, that grows into a network you can think and write with.
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