I tend to work iteratively. That is not to say "like an idiot", but rather by homing in on where I want to be via multiple steps instead of making a single correction for each thing. The first corrections are the gross ones addressing the largest and most obvious changes needed (and serves to make it more enjoyable to listen to while making other corrections), the last corrections are minor fine-tuning corrections which take into account the effect of other corrections I've made.
I never really thought about it this way, but I'm more or less going through a general procedural order, then going back and making smaller polishing corrections by sort of going in reverse order through the previous steps. Something like this-
>Gross level corrections- adjusting to something more reasonable if they are very low (no need to get overly precise at this step)
>Sync/time-stretch sources if required
>Stereo balance corrections
>Gross error corrections (dropouts, ittermitancies, whatev)
>Gross EQ corrections (fix bloated bass, dull treble due to windscreens, presence-range correction, and whatever else obviously needs correction).
>Dynamics corrections- knock down errant peaks (manually or with a limiter), pull up the level of quiet parts if called for (volume envelopes and/or parallel comp), reduce the level of loud audience reaction between songs if called for (volume envelopes usually for me, some use a limiter for this), overall compression if called for.
(^Dynamics changes can change EQ balance, so there can be less differentiation between these two steps than it may seem. Especially with multiband compression)
And sort of back though in sort of reverse order..
>Small error corrections (spectral editing of clicks, whistles, candy wrappers, coughs, whatev)
>EQ polishing
>Balance check
>Fades
>Final level adjustment (master bus fader gain / limiting)
>Downsampling if required
>Bit reduction (with dither) if required
>Save and output
Not all projects need all this stuff, and not everyone will want to do all this stuff. Just skip the steps which aren't required. Tracking/tagging however you do it, either within the editor or afterwards in CDWAV or whatev (this will not alter the audio data other than chopping into separate files, so not necessary to do this prior to downsampling and bit reduction steps, making this step sort of an exception that way).