Today's productivity post has nothing to do with Google or Gmail, but I AM going to use Google Docs to share a resource with you.

It was my mentor who first gave me the idea to print out a weekly project list that sits on my desk (on top of anything else that happens to be piled there). I admit I was a little skeptical – wouldn't it be more efficient (and fun) to keep experimenting with online productivity tools?

Well, I have been using this simple little tool as a structure for many months now, and I LOVE IT! There is something so grounding about having a physical piece of paper on my desk with all of my current and upcoming projects.

My favourite part? The front page, which represents the current week's work, including an estimate of how many hours it will take. When I get tempted to say, "Yes, I can do that by Thursday," or, "Sure! I can take on your rush job!" I am getting better and taking a breath and looking over at my piece of paper.

The fact is, if there is no space left to write on that front page, there is no space left in my week.

It helps me stay very clear about how much time I have available for new projects, and when. It hasn't completely solved my "magical thinking" about how much I will be able to get done within a finite span of time, but it is definitely improving.

I've recently tweaked my project list template to help me stay even more organized. For example, I'm using some of the precious real estate of the front page to record when I've had inquiries or sent estimates, so I can see at a glance if it's time to follow up again.

Gmail's conversation view is taking me awhile to get used to (I even missed a few messages early on, because I didn't scroll down far enough), but the more I use it the more I like it!

Where it's really working for me is in handling the abundance of messages I receive as part of my membership in the New Coach Connection.

I love this group – I joined back in 2005 when I launched You Talk, I'll Write, on the suggestion of my coach at the time, Andrea Lee. I knew that I wanted to work with coaches, and here was a fantastic group of coaches! There are also other members who serve coaches, such as virtual assistants.

I've made wonderful contacts in the NCC – people who have helped me in immeasurable ways (and yes, some treasured clients as well), and people I have really enjoyed collaborating with.

I noticed that my participation had dropped off lately – I wasn't even contributing to Free Friday, when we're invited to send promotional messages (otherwise that is strictly prohibited on this list, which is more about networking, guidance and collaboration).

The issue was that I had switched to digest email in an effort to tame my Inbox. But that meant I had to pore through really long emails. As well, replying to a digest message was cumbersome because I had to retype the subject line and trim away everything except the message I was responding to.

The solution? Switch back to receiving individual messages, and put Gmail's conversation view, labels and filters to work for me. Here's what happens now:

1. When a message from the NCC comes in, Gmail marks it as "read." This takes away some pressure, since I tend to feel compelled to read or deal with every single piece of unread mail in my account.

2. Gmail also attaches the label NCC, and there is a link in my sidebar that will pull up all emails with that label (or any of my other labels – it's Gmail's cool "instant folder" feature).

3. With Gmail's conversation view, when I open my NCC "folder," I can quickly scan the subject lines and open up and reply to the messages that interest me. Other people's replies are stored neatly underneath the original message – I can see how many replies there have been, but those replies are not taking up any valuable real estate.

4. To get back in the habit of joining the party at the NCC, I've added it to my list of business/relationship development tasks that I like to do on Friday mornings.

A special reminder to my NCC friends – please be descriptive with your subject lines! So instead of "I have an announcement," or "I have a question," say a few words about the specifics. That way I'll know instantly if I can help and I'll be much more likely to click through to your message.

It happens to the best of us – you write a detailed email introducing the wonderful document you are attaching, and then you send it off without attaching the file. Argh!

Aside from consulting a checklist before you send every email (highly recommended, and I provide one in Chapter 19 of The Customizable Style Guide for Coaches Who Write), how can you seamlessly check the status of your attachments before your emails go out?

Enter the forgotten attachment detector, which basically scans your email text for telltale phrases like: see attached, I've attached, enclosed, I've included, etc. If one of the phrases is there, but your file is not, this detector interrupts the Send process to gently inquire if perhaps you forgot to attach it.

This tool has caught/saved me a few times already, in the few short weeks since I made the transition from Outlook to Gmail.

The forgotten attachment detector is from the Gmail Lab, where you can find beta versions of innovative tools designed to make our lives online easier (thank you, Google!). You can read my earlier review/love letter about another Gmail Lab, canned responses.

I was flattered when TimeDriver contacted me for an interview about how I use their great service (still FREE to this date), and they recently published my case study. [Update December 22, 2012 – The case study is no longer available from the TimeTrade site.]  I truly love this service and it really does save me a lot of time. By far my favourite feature is how it automatically handles time zones based on each user's computer.

Of course now we have to update the case study to reflect my transition to Gcal. There have been a couple of little bumps in how TimeDriver handles my multiple Gmail accounts – right now it's adding one of my secondary Gmail addresses as a guest for every new event that's scheduled. Whooops! [Update: This is actually something that's happening on Google's end, though Liz from TimeDriver Support has been kind enough to follow up with them about it for me.]

Also, though I have my Gcal set up to automatically give me a 10-minute pop-up reminder of every new appointment, events scheduled via TimeDriver don't have this.

Luckily, TimeDriver has a very responsive technical support department (thanks, Liz!) and we are working out these bugs.

In the meantime, I just open up new appointments the minute I receive my email confirmation, so that I can: 1) Remove the extra email address as a guest and 2) Add a pop-up reminder so I'm ready when my clients call.