Hidden Productivity Killer: Tasks We Only Do Infrequently

Staying on top of one-off tasks is dead simple: you add it to your to-do list, you do it, and you check it off. If you don’t get to it today, it’s still there tomorrow. Similarly, things you do every day or every Wednesday are no problem. Add it to your habit tracker, calendar, or reminders app. Even projects, while more complex, are relatively straight forward: do step one, then step two, all the way to step n.

But infrequently recurring tasks - things like replacing a filter every six months - are inherently fraught.

Sure, you could set up a repeating all-day calendar event and even add a reminder notification, but there’s a good chance it will get lost in the shuffle. Unlike something on your todo list, if you don’t see the event in today’s calendar, it’s not there anymore tomorrow.

Or you could use a repeating reminder with an assigned date and time. It’ll stay on your reminders list as overdue until you check it off. But let’s say you’re a few days - maybe even a week - late. The next recurrence will show up on the original schedule. There’s no way for the schedule to automatically slide forward based on when you actually did the task.

These solutions also don’t provide any kind of tracking of when you actually completed the task. Keeping a log of dates you did the task allows for all sorts of interesting possibilities.

Finally, even if you have a self-updating list of recurring tasks, you have to remember to actually check it, even though there won’t necessarily be something to do every day.

Essentially, a completely different system is needed for tracking these types of tasks.

Signs That Infrequently Recurring Tasks Are Killing Your Productivity

Do you ever experience any of these?

Taking care of something only when it gets to be a problem - putting out fires
Trying to remember the last time you did something
Doing something twice because you can remember whether you did it
Feeling like you’re forgetting something important
Feeling like you’re not doing a good job of staying on top of things

Why Irregular Tasks Slip Through the Cracks

The human brain thrives on short-term “loops.” We react to what’s visible, urgent, and frequent. When something happens regularly – every day or every week – it naturally stays on our radar. But when something only happens every few months, we mentally file it under “Future Me will remember.”

Future Me rarely does.

There’s also a hidden bias in most of the tools we use. Task managers and project boards are designed for one-off or high-frequency, continuous work, not long-cycle maintenance or low-frequency follow-ups. Calendars work well for actual events but terrible for tracking completion — if you miss a recurring event, it’s gone until next time.

So when that quarterly compliance review or annual budget reset comes around, you’re often starting from zero, digging through emails or old files trying to remember what you did last time.

The result: a subtle drag on productivity that compounds. Time lost to rediscovery, context-switching, and mental clutter.

The Cognitive Cost of Forgotten Work

The real toll of irregular tasks isn’t just the missed deadlines — it’s the cognitive noise.

That nagging feeling that you’ve forgotten something important? It’s your brain trying (and failing) to maintain open loops. This is called the Zeigarnik effect. Unfinished tasks consume attention – actually even taking precedence over “closed” loops – even though you’re not consciously aware you’re thinking about them.

The less frequently a task occurs, the harder it is to remember when to do it, and yet the more mental space it tends to occupy. It’s like a background process consuming mental resources.

Over time, this low-grade anxiety takes a toll on your productivity. You may not even notice it, but it contributes to burnout and decision fatigue.

Why Traditional Systems Fail Professionals

Most professionals cobble together a patchwork of tools:

A calendar for meetings and deadlines.
A to-do list for daily and weekly work.
A project manager for collaborative workflows.

Each of these systems handles a slice of the problem — but none handle time-delayed recurrence.

Calendars can remind you when something should happen, but they don’t adjust if you complete it late (or early). To-do lists are great for short cycles but quickly become cluttered if you add every long-term recurring task. Project tools are powerful but overkill for personal maintenance work.

It’s not that professionals are disorganized — it’s that most productivity tools are optimized for visible work, not invisible maintenance.

That’s why you might find yourself remembering the big quarterly report only when your manager asks for it, or realizing your expense policy hasn’t been updated in a year when a reimbursement goes wrong.

What a Smarter Recurring Task Tracker Looks Like

To manage irregular tasks effectively, we need tools — or systems — that think more like we do when we’re at our best. A recurring task tracker designed for real-world irregularity would include:

Flexible recurrence: not just “every Tuesday” or “monthly,” but “every 90 days,” “two weeks after completion,” or “every spring.”
Sliding schedules: if you’re late, the next due date adjusts automatically.
Completion history: so you can see when you actually did something last — and how often you miss the mark.
Contextual reminders: surfacing the task at the right moment, not spamming you when you can’t act on it.
A clear dashboard: showing not today’s to-dos, but what’s coming due soon and what’s quietly overdue.

This kind of system doesn’t just remind you; it externalizes memory. It offloads the need to remember what needs to be remembered.

That’s the key shift: from trying to manage everything in your head to designing an environment that manages it for you.

Building Your Own Recurrence System

Even without specialized software, you can build a lightweight recurrence workflow that dramatically reduces the stress of forgotten tasks. Here’s a simple process to start:

List your low-frequency responsibilities.
Think quarterly, semiannual, or annual. Examples: budget reviews, vendor renewals, documentation cleanups, equipment checks, compliance tasks.
Choose your cadence.
For each, decide when it needs to happen — not by date, but by pattern. (“Every 6 months,” “at the end of each project,” “every December.”)
Track completions, not just due dates.
A simple table — task, last done, next due — is often enough to spot what’s slipping.
Schedule one “maintenance hour” each week or month.
Use it to review upcoming irregular tasks, update completions, and reset dates.
Automate reminders wherever possible.
Use your tools’ recurring features, but with clear notes about what was done last time and what to do next.

This framework works in a spreadsheet, a Notion table, or a dedicated recurring task tracker. The key is making sure nothing disappears just because it’s not due today.

Remember Less, Achieve More

Most productivity advice focuses on optimization — faster checklists, smarter prioritization, tighter workflows. But sometimes the biggest wins come from removing the need to remember altogether.

Irregular tasks are rarely urgent until they’re emergencies. By capturing them in a reliable system — one that reflects their true cadence — you clear mental space for the creative, strategic, and high-value work that actually moves things forward.

Forget less. Do better work. Sleep a little easier knowing that “once-in-a-while” doesn’t mean “out of sight, out of mind.”