Following on from my previous posts about using Microsoft Outlook for GTD (here and here), I’d like to mention a further tweak that we can make to Microsoft Outlook’s folder view control. Most of us probably have Microsoft Outlook display the number of unread items in each folder. However, for the GTD folders that I mentioned earlier, it’s likely that you will have read the items before they are filed in the GTD Action, Defer, Waiting For or Someday Maybe folders.

For these folders, I prefer to see the total number of items regardless of whether they have been read or not. Like a lot of things in Microsoft Outlook, the folder list is configurable. Right-clicking on a folder, then choosing Properties will allow us to configure the “total” that appears after the folder name.

This is a simple little tip, but one that might be of use to you if are are “rolling your own GTD” implementation.

Other posts
GTD Action/Deferred/WaitingFor/Someday folders in Microsoft Outlook – Show Item Count
Making e-mail simpler and easier to handle: using Microsoft Outlook rules
Elementary GTD using Microsoft Outlook “move to folder”

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