Track Follow-Ups in Both Directions, Not Just Your Own
Key takeaways
- Standard task lists capture one side of a two-sided commitment.
- Commitments you are owed are the ones that block work without anyone noticing.
- Attaching follow-ups to a person, not a project, is what makes them retrievable when it matters.
- A specific, dated reminder reads as helpful; a vague chase reads as distrust.
Open any task manager and look at what is in it. Almost everything on the list is something you owe someone else.
Now think about what you are owed. The document a colleague said they would send last Tuesday. The introduction someone offered three weeks ago. The decision your manager said they would make "by the end of the month," which was two months ago.
Where is that written down? For most people the honest answer is nowhere. It is in memory, which means it is on the forgetting curve.
Why the missing half causes more damage
Commitments you owe fail loudly. Someone chases you, and you feel it.
Commitments you are owed fail silently. Nobody chases, because the only person who knows the promise was made is the person waiting — and they are waiting politely. Work stalls with no visible cause. Weeks later someone asks why the project has not moved, and the answer turns out to be a document that was promised in April.
The asymmetry matters: the invisible failures are the ones that last longest, because nothing in the system is designed to surface them.
Attach it to the person, not the project
Most tools organise by project or by date. That is the wrong axis for commitments between people.
The moment you need this information is not when you are reviewing a project board. It is thirty seconds before a call with a specific person, when the useful question is: what is outstanding between us?
Organised by person, that question has an instant answer — two items you owe them, one they owe you. Organised by project, you have to reconstruct it from memory, which is the thing that failed in the first place.
This also changes what you do with it. You rarely need to send a chasing email, because you are speaking to them on Thursday anyway. The item comes up naturally, in a conversation that was already happening, which is a far lighter touch than a message that exists only to apply pressure.
How to chase without it feeling like a chase
Three things make the difference.
Be specific. "Any update on that thing?" makes the other person do the work of remembering. "You mentioned you'd send the pricing model after the board meeting — is that still on?" costs them nothing to answer.
Be early. A reminder before the deadline is a courtesy. The same message a fortnight afterwards is a complaint, no matter how it is worded.
Give them an exit. "Happy to drop this if priorities have shifted" removes the defensiveness. Often priorities have shifted, and the honest answer — that it is not happening — is more useful to you than another vague promise.
None of this works without an accurate record. Chasing something the person never actually promised is worse than not chasing at all, and it is a real risk when you are working from a four-week-old memory of a conversation.
What it feels like when it works
The change is smaller than you might expect, and it shows up in an unglamorous place: you stop being surprised.
You know which three things are blocked and on whom. You notice a stalled commitment in week two rather than month two. You walk into your 1:1 already knowing the two items outstanding in each direction, so the meeting starts somewhere useful instead of with five minutes of mutual reconstruction.
And the reputational effect is real. Being someone who does what they said, and who remembers what you said, is rarer than it should be — and almost entirely a matter of record-keeping rather than character.
If you want an app that does this
PplBrief is a private app for iPhone and the web that tracks follow-ups in both directions — what you owe people and what they owe you — attached to the person, not a project. You capture a quick note after a conversation, its AI pulls out the promises each side made, and the open items between you are there to check before your next call. For the step-by-step method, see how PplBrief tracks follow-ups both ways.
Get PplBrief on the App Store, or read what PplBrief is first.
Frequently asked questions
- Isn't tracking what people owe me a bit adversarial?
- Only if you use it that way. The purpose is to remember accurately, not to build a case. In practice a specific, well-timed reminder is easier to act on than a vague chase, and most people prefer it.
- How do I chase someone without damaging the relationship?
- Be specific, be early, and give them an easy exit. Naming the item and the date, and offering to drop it if priorities changed, turns a chase into a check.
- Where should follow-ups live?
- With the person they came from. Project-based lists lose the human context, which is exactly what you need when you are deciding how and when to follow up.
- Is there an app that tracks what other people owe you?
- Yes. PplBrief is a private app for iPhone and the web that tracks follow-ups in both directions — what you owe others and what they owe you — and files each one under the person it came from. You capture a quick note after a conversation, and its AI pulls out the promises each side made.