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A lot of books on writing tout the value of tracking writing progress, but none of them address to my satisfaction how to cope with the problem of juggling mulitple writing projects in parallel. Many academics have to work on manuscripts, grant applications, grant reports, and books in parellel. My approach is to track my writing progress on a per project basis in an Excel workbook that automatically tallies the progress for the day by word count and minutes spent and then updates a bar graph of the cumulative progess. The graphs are set up to show the cumulative progress across all projects. Each months has its own graph. To get the cummulative progress for a project, you select the appropriate column and the sum will be reported. The entry of the progress per project requires only a few seconds. I have shared this Excel workbook and a Libre Office version on a GitHub repository called writingProgess2023. I have included a webpage where you can paste text into a text area to get the word count. I also have updated the extensive README.md file. I actually import the workbook into Google Sheets and then add the link to my browser toolbar. This gives me instant access to the workbook without the startup time of Excel. This convenience further reduces the motivational barier to updating the project worksheet.
tags: writing progress tracking - project management - multiple writing progect management - time management - distress management - career planning and management