The GTD methodology has been out in the world for over 25 years. Millions of people have used it to better organize their work and get more done. However, one challenge people often face is being the only person in their office applying GTD. It can be hard to keep up a successful system when everyone else is doing their work less productively. Aside from trying to get everyone to commit to it personally, can it be scaled to teams?

David Allen and co-writer Edward Lamont believe that it can, with their new book, Team: Getting Things Done with Others. As shared on the book jacket:

By building on the effectiveness of what GTD does for individuals, Team will offer a better way of working in an organization, while simultaneously nourishing a culture that allows individuals’ skills to flourish. Using case studies from some of the world’s largest and most successful companies, Team shows how leaders have employed the principles of team productivity to improve communication, enable effective execution, and reduce stress on team members. These principles are increasingly important in the post-pandemic workplace, where the very nature of how people work together has changed so dramatically.

Over the next few months, I will share teachings from Team. Today I’ll start with a tease of their discussion of moving from one person to a group, which involves a different approach to work.

At a team level, we see the equivalent of “mind like water” to be something we’ve come to describe as “healthy high performance.” This is a way of working together that is not just able to keep pace with, or outrun, the competition, but to do it in a way that is sustainable – fun, even – over the longer term.

With this approach they are aiming to share ways for teams to be successful both in terms of their work goals and also to be healthy in mind, body, and spirit. Stay tuned over the next few months to learn the specific techniques to achieve it.

If you don’t want to wait, get your copy of Team: Getting Things Done with Others and read ahead.