What to do with daily e-mail, voice mail, snail mail, new ideas, delegations, meeting agendas, stuff to read, stuff to file, and a messy desk?
I don't know about you, but I can get overwhelmed with stuff that comes my way each day. I put in a full day's work, plus come in on Saturdays, and each week I seem more behind than the last. My inbox is overflowing. My desk is a mess. I haven't looked at my snail mail in a week. Factor in my many weekly meetings, my family duties, my personal and civic responsibilities, and my hobbies, and it is easy to feel out of control.
Getting Things Done
Over the past several months, I have immersed myself in David Allen's "Getting Things Done" (GTD) approach to "stuff management" (http://www.davidco.com). I have read his two books, listened to associated tapes, and attended one of his live seminars. Slowly, with the help of some GTD desktop software and my Pocket PC, I feel that the ship is turning, and I am getting my stuff under control.
David Allen's productivity classic "Getting Things Done".
Allen says it could take a busy person as long as two years to totally master his system. However, the good news is that the effect of implementing GTD is cumulative and immediate. Many of his concepts are simple, powerful, and easy to implement, and can be gleaned from a single reading of his well-written book.
The goal of GTD is an uncluttered "clear" mind, present on the task at hand, with no content in "psychic RAM". Stuff (items mentioned in this article's title) is either dealt with immediately or clarified and placed in a trusted system that is reviewed as often as necessary.
Where does the Smartphone or Pocket PC fit in with GTD?
A Windows Mobile device can play a central role in the GTD system, since it is almost always available. As Allen says, new ideas as well as existing commitments still in "psychic RAM" can come at you at any time. A PDA lets you transfer those thoughts to your "trusted system". Thanks to your handy Pocket PC, if you have a few moments, you can review items in that trusted system. You can even act on an item from your list of next actions, which have been organized by context (errands, home, online, etc.).
At work, much of my time is spent in Outlook with e-mail. Therefore, I gravitated to the Outlook GTD add-in from NetCentrics (http://www.netcentrics.com) recommended by Allen's company. Although slightly awkward due mostly to the nature of Outlook, I found the add-in an excellent way to "learn by doing" Allen's system.
Heart of GTD—clarifying stuff
To give you a flavor of the GTD system, here's how I handle around 100 non-spam e-mails a day. Before I used GTD and the add-in, I always had pages of e-mails sitting in my inbox. According to Allen, first you have to gather all your "stuff" in one place—easy enough for the e-mail-centric. Then, you must examine each piece and decide what it is. Once you clearly identify what it is, you can:
- Delete it
- Delegate it
- Defer it to a later date
- File it
- Do it if it takes less than 2 minutes
- Put it in "next action" list if it is truly an actionable item
- Put it in a projects list (Projects are two or more actions. So, "buy present" might require several "next actions," such as researching online and shopping at a local store.)
- Put it in a "someday" list
- Put it in special lists such as software to test, books to read, movies to see, etc.
