5 Signs You’re Getting Better at GTD

August 28, 2017Leave a comment

The game of productivity and efficiency work can sometimes be hard to score. As this is a skill to be mastered, it is helpful to identify key stages of progress in order to feel a sense of achievement. In a recent blog post, Coach Kelly Forrister identified five key markers of a proficient GTD practice.

1. It feels weird to keep stuff on your mind
Capturing what has your attention is a key practice with GTD. Getting better at GTD means you are capturing what’s on your mind when it shows up, moment-by-moment and keeping something ON your mind, well, it just feels weird.

Read the other four signs on the Getting Things Done web site.

Why is there stuff on my chair?

August 22, 2017Leave a comment

Have you ever come back to your desk to discover that someone left a note on your chair? I am sure most office workers regularly encounter this situation. I believe the reason people leave notes on their colleague’s chairs is that they do not trust that person’s inbox.

messy-chair The inbox is designed to capture new information and works best when new input is regularly processed and organized. Once an inbox fills with clutter, new input quickly gets lost. People see that messy inbox as a graveyard and avoid it like a real one. Therefore, they will find ways around the dysfunctional inbox and a favorite option is to use the chair. They assume that the person will see it before they sit down!

To avoid having your colleagues turn your chair into an inbox, try working the one on your desk more efficiently. Clean it out every 24-48 hours to stay fresh for new input. Be warned, some people are now programmed to bypass even a clean inbox and automatically go for the chair. When this happens to me, I tell that colleague that I will sit on the item, literally and figuratively. Then I politely point them to my inbox and ask that they place it there instead for timely processing. It keeps the chair much more comfortable that way.

New Guidelines on Passwords

August 15, 2017Leave a comment

Passwords are an unfortunate reality of our online lives. With the average person having multiple accounts for everything from email, credit cards, shopping sites, and more, and each one requiring a different password to protect it. In the past, the guidelines for passwords instructed people to string together complex sets of characters that were often hard to remember on the assumption that it would be more secure. However, new research shows otherwise. A recent NPR story explains why:

“The traditional guidance is actually producing passwords that are easy for bad guys and hard for legitimate users,” says Paul Grassi, senior standards and technology adviser at NIST, who led the new revision of guidelines.

The organization suggests keeping passwords simple, long and memorable. Phrases, lowercase letters and typical English words work well, Grassi tells NPR’s Audie Cornish. Experts no longer suggest special characters and a mixture of lower and uppercase letters. And passwords never need to expire.”

Read the full article on the NPR web site. Then create a new project titled “simplify my passwords” to start making better, safer passwords for yourself.

If it only takes 2 minutes …

July 31, 2017Leave a comment

two_minute_timer Want a great time saver for your work and personal life? Try a solution promoted in the GTD methodology: the two minute rule.

When processing your inbox any action associated with an item that will take two minutes or less to do should be done immediately. This is because it would take more time to organize the item in your system then to resolve it straight away.

The two minute rule has some flexibility. For example, if you have lots of time available for processing, extend it to three minutes or more per item. If you have limited time, reduce it to a minute or ninety seconds per item.

In the end, some actions are best done when they first show up. That is why completion of two minute items leads to less stress and more success in your work and life.

David Allen Interviewed in Inc. Magazine

July 12, 2017Leave a comment

A short interview with David Allen recently appeared in the pages of Inc. Magazine. While not a long article, it offers insight into the mind of the Getting Things Done author and his own personal challenges. He also provides valuable advice for being productive. From the article:

Why aren’t people able to be productive and manage their time well?

The first mistake is people keep stuff in their head. Your head is a crappy office! Building the external brain is a whole lot of what GTD is about. Your brain was not designed to remember and remind. That’s not its function and most people are still using it for that, and it doesn’t work.

Read the rest of the article at the Inc.com web site.

Getting Back on the Wagon

July 3, 2017Leave a comment

wagon It would be nice if productivity and efficiency practices were instant install, point, click, and forget applications; the type of thing you only have to do once to set on autopilot forever. Unfortunately, the art of knowledge work requires ongoing diligent application of core concepts in order to keep the system functioning smoothly. Alas, it is very easy to fall off the wagon and resume old habits.

A recent blog post on the GTD web site explores this problem and how to resolve it.

“The good news is that a few simple steps can help you start to make the behavior changes necessary to get back on the Path of GTD Mastery. Furthermore, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel or take drastic measures to get going. Here are five steps I have seen work time and again.”

Curious about the five steps? Read about them by clicking here.

A Manifesto of Human-Centered Work

June 14, 2017Leave a comment

forte In the past I have pointed to the work of Tiago Forte who is a serious thinker around cutting edge ideas of productivity in the workplace and life. While his web site this past year went largely behind a subscription pay wall, he recently freely posted his Manifesto for Human-Centered Work, which is well worth the read. Below is one of his beliefs:

I believe productivity is an excellent sandbox for life.

Anything worth doing, and especially anything we have to do, is worth doing well. Productivity makes an excellent sandbox because it operates according to the same principles found in any other area of life.

And it leaks — success in productivity is easily translated to success elsewhere. If we want to free up time and energy to pursue what matters to us, it’s a good idea to start by streamlining the boring but necessary activities we have to do to get by.

Read the full Manifesto at: https://praxis.fortelabs.co/a-manifesto-of-human-centered-work-76060e51d0c8

Speed Up – Slow Down

June 8, 2017Leave a comment

As we pursue greater efficiency in our work lives, some paradoxes may appear that seem to define common sense. For many years I taught and practiced yoga, which emphasized the need for relaxation or effort as a tool to go deeper. In a recent blog post, David Allen highlights the art of speeding up by slowing down.

“One of the greatest lessons I have learned and continually must practice is that in order to really be in control, I must surrender. In the martial arts things must be held lightly. Grabbing too tight, whether it’s my muscles, my ego, my trowel, or my lists of projects and actions, can be dangerous and ultimately ineffective. I must at a moment’s notice be ready to let go, walk away from it all, and do nothing. Nothing at all.”

Read the full blog entry at: http://gettingthingsdone.com/2017/06/speeding-up-by-slowing-down

Searching vs. Sorting

June 2, 2017Leave a comment

Question – where should reference emails be stored? Many people follow a strategy derived from paper filing by creating a large number of subject based folders into which they sort their messages. Another strategy is to have only one reference folder for everything and power search it. Is either approach better than the other?

According to the book, Algorithms to Live By: The Computer Science of Human Decisions, there is an answer to this question. On page 72 of the paperback copy, they explain the dynamic at work:

“And one of the most central tradeoffs is between sorting and searching. The basic principle is this: the effort expanded on sorting materials is just a preemptive strike against the effort it’ll take to search through them later.”

On page 73 they state:

“Filing messages by hand into folders takes the same amount of time as filing physical papers in the real world, but emails can be searched much more efficiently than their physical counterparts. As the cost of searching drops, sorting becomes less valuable.”

Therefore, the advice is to get by with as few email reference folders as possible. Save the time you would have spent sorting emails for something more useful, like watching adorable kitten videos on YouTube …

Efficient Librarian

Exploring the Intersection of Efficiency and Librarianship

Category: Efficiency & Productivity