One of the highest risks in modern workplaces is the poor synchronization of work. When work is not synchronized, risks are increased by: slowed workflows, wasted time and effort, lost continuity, increased stress and frustration, and under achieving people. Yet many managers believe that changing current work management methods will lead to increased risk. However the opposite is true.

Current work management practices are incredibly high risk, because managers rely on people remembering what to do and actually doing it. So there is a huge gap in current work management practices. The rise of project management methods to reduce the risk of failing to successfully complete clearly defined work shows that a small part of the gap has been recognized.

Unfortunately project management only improves a project manager's work lists for a project; it doesn't solve the problem of synchronizing the project work list with the ToDo lists of people doing project work. In addition, project management attempts to isolate the project from work that is not in the scope of the project. This can work for construction projects, but most projects are completed by people doing work on both project and non-project lists.

Creating lists is the way most people remember what is important and what they need to do. In the workplace, lists are used to keep track of strategies, governance, compliance, projects, operations, and personal & team ToDo's. Unfortunately the majority of these lists are not explicitly connected and people don't have the time or discipline to manually keep them synchronized.

So techniques and tools to keep work lists synchronized have perhaps the greatest potential to increase efficiency and reduce the high risks associated with unconnected lists. Over 12 years ago, TASKey submitted a patent application for a method to keep lists synchronized globally. The last 12 years have been spent in the workplace developing, testing and validating the software tools required to consistently apply TASKey's work list synchronization methods.

Although work list synchronization has been available for a number of years, its use has been constrained by an inability to effectively link people ToDo lists when they are dispersed or mobile. This inability meant that a lot of the information required to synchronize ToDo lists with other work lists was not readily available.

It is only recently that the availability of web mobile browsers has provided the platform for people to receive and update personal ToDo lists and other relevant work lists from anywhere at anytime. So now the information required for the timely synchronization of work lists for strategies, governance, compliance, projects, operations, and personal & team ToDo's is readily available.
Dr Neil Miller