Uncommon To-Do List Templates to Improve Your Productivity

Calendar Comparison list

How many times a day do you check your calendar? In the amount of time you spend remembering what time your meetings are, you could probably have finished two or three daily tasks. Some people create a two-for-one situation with their to-do list, choosing to create it in line with their daily schedule.

This results in some major clarity re: scheduling and project management. If you're an online calendar person, plug your planned tasks in line with your meetings, and any priority tasks in your free time or open windows. You could even go as far as to commit to start dates and timeframes for your tasks. If you're more of a pen-and-paper person, you could create a list like this: 

Color-Coded List

These weekly to-do lists make you think of a stoplight. Green, yellow, and red. Green projects, not time specific. Yellow projects, get done by the end of the week. Red projects, get done by the end of the day. Full stop.

This is a great way to manage your workload for those of you who are big-idea people, where nit-picky tasks might overwhelm or annoy you. If you just need to keep yourself on track for the day or week, and don't need to micro-manage your time, try this out. Personally, I love to use this for running errands and other personal tasks as well.

I also love that my most important tasks for my entire day and entire week are easy to identify. The red gives projects a sense of urgency, which is helpful when you're feeling overwhelmed.

Ivy Lee List

The Ivy Lee Method (named after it's creator, Ivy Ledbetter Lee) is a super simple task list template. You're going to write down six tasks. That's it. You write them down the day before, and when you get to work the next morning—you take out your list and get going. (Okay, fine—maybe you start after you've checked your inbox.)

Prioritize these tasks so that the first one is the most important, followed by the second most important, and on and on. When you work through the list, you only work on one task at a time. And, you can only move on to the next task when you've finished the previous one.

Whatever you don't finish gets moved to the list for tomorrow. Pretty easy, right? Here's what the list would look like:

If you're totally attached to your daily planner (I get it!), you could easily adopt a system like this for each day as well. By being able to plan each day but have the entire week laid out, it makes it easy to roll over anything from the previous day's list.

Stacked Project Management List

We all have big projects. But writing down one big task isn't always helpful if you're not tracking all of the little tasks that have to get done within it.

You don't want to put on your to-do list, "Create website", if that involves first designing your logo, choosing which website to launch your site on, getting a headshot, nailing down your personal brand, etc. It can be too overwhelming to just work towards "creating a website."

If you can break down the big project into smaller, actionable tasks, it's motivating because you feel like you're actually making progress toward your goal. A list of tasks helps your workflow not only run smoothly but keep running! Try a stacked project management to-do list, where you include the big goal in addition to the little ones that will help you get there. 

This could also work for household chores. Instead of "clean house," you could organize the cleaning into smaller tasks where each family member is also involved. When I was growing up, we assigned days to a family to-do list. For example, Sunday we focused on the kitchen, Monday we focused on our own rooms, etc.  

1-3-5 List

This list is another prioritization-focused time management method. You set one big goal, followed by three less-daunting tasks, followed by five small projects. You set these goals each day—either in the morning or at the end of the workday for the following day.

Unlike the Ivy Lee method, you can work through these projects at any pace, and in any order. It's super flexible. You can start working on the big project, switch to two tinies, dabble in a medium, and go back to the big goal—whatever works for you. Setting these nine to-do's each day might just change the way you work.

Master To-Do List For All The "Extra" Stuff

We've talked a lot about to-do lists that are focused on getting things down on a specific day or week, but I also like to keep a master to-do list in a digital format. This is just an ongoing collection of ideas and things I want to don't want to forget. They usually aren't super urgent but I feel better knowing they are written down.

This can be as simple as just keeping a bulleted list on your phone (Notes app is great), using Google docs, or using a free PDF template you can get almost anywhere on the Internet. Many monthly planners will also include just a general "notes" section that you could also use!

A Final Note

At the end of the day, the most important thing is that you find a weekly to-do list template that works for you! If you prefer a PDF format, download one each week to use! If you prefer printable checklist templates so you get the satisfaction of checking the box, go for it! There are tons of free printables and free online tools to help you find a system that works for you. I love these less common to-do list systems so I don't get overwhelmed with my weekly tasks. Happy organizing!