P.A.R.A. stands for Projects — Areas — Resources — Archives, the four top-level categories that encompass every type of information you might encounter in your work and life.
The Definitions
A project is “a series of tasks linked to a goal, with a deadline.”
Examples include: Execute business development campaign; Write blog post; Finalize product specifications; Attend conference.
An area of responsibility is “a sphere of activity with a standard to be maintained over time.”
Examples include: Health; Finances, Professional Development; Travel; Hobbies; Friends; Apartment; Car; Productivity; Direct reports; Product Development; Writing.
A resource is “a topic or theme of ongoing interest.”
Examples include: habit formation; project management; coffee; music; gardening; online marketing; SEO; interior design; architecture; note-taking.
Archives include “inactive items from the other three categories.”
Examples include: projects that have been completed or become inactive; areas that you are no longer committed to maintaining; resources that you are no longer interested in.
The Difference between Project and Area
We spend our days completing tasks, which are grouped naturally into projects, which fall under areas of responsibility.
A project has a goal to be achieved — a discrete event that will happen, allowing this item to be completely checked off and struck from the list. And this goal is supposed to take place by a specific moment in time. It has a deadline or timeframe.
An area of responsibility, by contrast, has a standard to be maintained. And there is no end date or final outcome. Your performance in this area may vary over time, but the standard continues indefinitely and requires a certain level of attention at all times.
For Example, running a marathon is a project, whereas Health is an area. Similarly, publishing a book is a project, whereas Writing is an area. The projects have completion dates. They are either complete or incomplete. The areas of responsibility, on the other hand, have standards of performance that must be maintained indefinitely.
There are three absolutely critical things you cannot do unless you break out your areas of responsibility into clearly articulated projects:
- you can’t truly know the extent of your commitments
- you can’t connect your current efforts to your long-term goals
- you can’t know if you’re making progress toward your goals
There is an exercise you can perform once you’ve taken the time to formulate a clear Project List. Put it side by side with your Goal List, and draw lines matching each project with its corresponding goal. A project without a corresponding goal is known as a “hobby” and if you have a goal without a corresponding project, that’s called a “dream.”
Start by Defining your Project List
You should define your projects apart from any particular program or tool. Write them down on a piece of paper or in a blank document. What this allows you to do is extend and manifest these projects across any program you choose: Task Manager, Evernote, Dropbox, Google Drive. What this allows you to do is extend and manifest these projects across any program you choose: Task Manager, Evernote, Dropbox, Google Drive. Keep the list of projects identical in every program. This leverages the unique capabilities of each program, while keeping the project layer unified across interfaces. It is important that projects be stored all in one place.
Put personally relevant information in Areas, and generally useful information in Resources.
Information Flows Within P.A.R.A.
The information flows from Projects to:
- Areas: Sometimes what starts as a limited-time project becomes a long-term, ongoing responsibility.
- Resources : During the course of a project, it is common to generate all sorts of “intermediate work” (brainstorms, notes, background research, diagrams, interview notes, etc.). When you finish a project, before moving it to Archives, it’s a good idea to scan it quickly for any such material that might be useful for future projects.
- Archives: Since our goal is rapid project turnover, this is one of the most common flows, moving completed or inactive projects to Archives for future reference.
The information flows from Areas to:
- Projects: It is common to start a new project, and realize there is something you’ve been collecting for a long time that is potentially useful to the new project.
- Resources: it’s a good idea to keep personally relevant information in Areas, and generally useful information in Resources. But sometimes you realize a note you thought was only relevant to you can also provide value to others.
- Archives: Although it is rare, sometimes an area ceases to be active, and can be archived.
The information flows from Resources to:
- Projects: Often, what was previously just an interest becomes a full-blown project. This is one of the primary use cases for resource notebooks.
- Areas: This flow would occur if you realized a piece of information in a resource notebook could apply to an area of responsibility in your life.
- Archives: It’s natural to expect some interests to go dormant over time.
The information flows from Archives to :
- Projects: This use case is one of the primary reasons to keep archived projects in the first place. It makes sense that there would be useful information from past projects you could use in current and future projects.
- Areas: Similarly, a piece of information you collected long ago can suddenly become relevant for a new responsibility you’re taking on.
- Resources: A past project, now archived, might later become an interest.
P.A.R.A. perfectly mirrors your task management and project management systems. It also preserves and actually enhances the most important distinction that any productivity system must make: between actionable and non-actionable information.Day to day, you might look at material related only to the active Projects. On a wider horizon, for example, while doing a weekly review, you would expand the scope of information you’re considering to include Areas of Responsibility. On an even wider horizon, perhaps during a monthly review, you could expand the scope of what you’re looking at to include Resources. And finally, the Archives are your portfolio of completed projects, each one inactive but ready to offer up potentially useful material to reuse and recycle in future projects.
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