This is a Community Contribution from Jon, a GTD enthusiast who hails from the midwestern U.S.

From long To Do lists to overcommitted schedules, we tend to take on too much.  When is the last time you said no to someone when they asked you for something?  It can be hard to do.

Most of us want to help others when they need it.  There are times, however, when we need to say no.  I know I don’t like to say no.  I like to help people.  It feels good when someone wants you to do something for them.

It may help to start weighing that commitment against what you’re trying to accomplish in other facets of your life.

Here are three questions to ask yourself when faced with saying yes or no:

1. Do you have the capacity to say yes? If you have the capacity, great, go for it.  Say yes.  Make sure you can commit 100% though.  Committing and not delivering is much worse than not committing at all.  You’ll know if you have capacity because with GTD, you already have an inventory of your projects and actions, the things you’re already commited to. [Read more →]

2 Comments »

John Tierney has written a fascinating piece, excerpted from a book David Allen is featured in called “Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength.” It’s coming out next month.

These experiments demonstrated that there is a finite store of mental energy for exerting self-control. When people fended off the temptation to scarf down M&M’s or freshly baked chocolate-chip cookies, they were then less able to resist other temptations. When they forced themselves to remain stoic during a tearjerker movie, afterward they gave up more quickly on lab tasks requiring self-discipline, like working on a geometry puzzle or squeezing a hand-grip exerciser. Willpower turned out to be more than a folk concept or a metaphor. It really was a form of mental energy that could be exhausted. The experiments confirmed the 19th-century notion of willpower being like a muscle that was fatigued with use, a force that could be conserved by avoiding temptation. To study the process of ego depletion, researchers concentrated initially on acts involving self-control ­— the kind of self-discipline popularly associated with willpower, like resisting a bowl of ice cream. They weren’t concerned with routine decision-making, like choosing between chocolate and vanilla, a mental process that they assumed was quite distinct and much less strenuous. Intuitively, the chocolate-vanilla choice didn’t appear to require willpower. Read the full article

1 Comment »

The Managing Projects & Priorities seminar is a wonderful opportunity to take GTD to the next level in your professional and personal life. Upcoming seminars in 2011 will be held in Boston, Chicago, and Dallas.

You will learn:
• The power of creative brainstorming
• How to define your priorities through the Horizons of Focus® Model
• The advantages of using the Natural Planning Model®
• How to effectively develop and move your projects to the next level

This is how David Allen Company staff member Kari McGee described her experience with Managing Projects & Priorities:

Sometimes a vision seems to be all we have, but it doesn’t have to be. That’s the lesson I walked away with after attending the David Allen Managing Projects and Priorities seminar. I realized that the projects piece of GTD is where the magic really happens. To be able to work through clear purpose and not just be prepared for the latest and loudest is really where the bigger dreams start to take shape on the GTD Journey.

[Read more →]

1 Comment »

Question: In your book, you talk about the 3 kinds of work:

1/ Pre-determined work
2/ Doing work as it shows up
3/ Defining your work

What percentage of a person’s time should be dedicated to defining work?

David Allen: No rules here.  “Defining work” usually takes about 30 seconds per input (email, notes, paper, thoughts, etc.), which means 30 to 90 minutes a day for most professionals.

If you want a great guide to help you define your work, grab the free GTD Workflow Map illustrating the steps for processing & organizing.

No Comments »

TEACH GTD IN YOUR ORGANIZATION
Are you an experienced in-house corporate trainer, interested in learning how to provide the GTD methodology within your organization? The GTD® Essentials Trainer Certification Program provides the education to get you certified to do just that. Get started now. Sign up for our next three-day Certification Program, October 4-6 in San Diego, CA.

Help manage overwhelm and uncertainty by providing affordable, convenient, and accessible GTD training to those critical workers who are responsible for taking your organization to the next level.

This certification program is perfect for training and empowering staff, managers and front-line workers for the constant change and complexities facing your organization today.

[Read more →]

15 Comments »

Q: You talk about attaining balance in whatever you’re most positively engaged in, rather than trying to juggle life vs. work. Could you elaborate, and why is this effective?

David Allen: When you’re most productively engaged with whatever you’re doing, you won’t be concerned about balance, other projects, other things. You’ll simply be “on.” Time will disappear. There will be no sense of overwhelm. There will be no question about “work/life balance.” Those questions and issues only show up when you haven’t appropriately handled the specific issues, projects, problems ,or  opportunities in either realm. If you know and incorporate the best practices about how to put things onto “cruise control,” whether they’re finished or not, you can be fully present with whatever you put your attention on.

4 Comments »

TechCrunch TV’s Andrew Keen recently conducted several interviews with David Allen.  This entertaining segment starts out on the topic of how to get things done in American government, and then moves to other points of interest for GTD fans.

(The video is streaming from TechCrunch TV, so you may need to give it a moment to load.)

No Comments »

Join David Allen and Marian Bateman for a unique webinar about the freedom of completion.  What holds you back from completing things in your life?  Where could you free up your energy through completion–even if that means deciding to not do anything about it at all? This webinar will blend discussion with practical examples and creative questioning for you to look at where you can gain greater freedom.

When: Thursday, August 25, 11am-12pm Pacific Time

Who: Hosted by GTD Connect–the online learning center for the David Allen Company

How: Login to gtdconnect.com to pre-register. Free for all GTD Connect members and current guest pass members.

No Comments »

Q: I am part of a team with five teammates who are not using GTD. How do I handle the frustration within the lines of communication and organization/productivity? How do I handle people who don’t do this method?

David Allen: The more anyone around you is out of control, the more you need the GTD method! You can only be responsible for what YOU need to track about what THEY are supposed to be doing, and following up with them accordingly. Of course, the more they get onto this method, the more they’ll be doing their part…but you’re going to have to manage yourself, no matter what.

The more out of control your environment (including people), the more critical that you implement your own GTD process. You need to know what’s yours and what’s not, and manage your own “10 acres” with rigor. And as you hold new standards, it impacts everyone to some degree. Though there’s no guarantee, the more you manage your own stuff pristinely, the more people tend to engage with you at that level.

9 Comments »

A Community Contribution from Björn Ljunggren, a GTD Connect member from Sweden. He shared this in our members-only Forums and we thought it was such a great story that he gave us permission to share it with our GTD Times readers.

My little GTD baby is celebrating its first birthday and it is time to look at the giant leaps and small steps taken towards a “mind like water”.

Even though I bought the book in 2007 I just implemented parts of GTD. I fell of the wagon a lot during these first years and had a major crisis in 2009 when my whole digital GTD system crashed together with the hard drive (no backup). It took until summer of 2010 before I was up and running again and decided to go “all in”.  So the system is based on three critical components:

• Complete system both Home/Work
• GTD Connect Member
• Weekly Reviews

Having a complete system is a big task to do, and I guess it is never really “Done”. But I feel very good about my system. I trust it. The GTD Connect community has helped to stay on course and get constant reassurance that I’m not alone in doing GTD when nobody I know is. Thanks Kelly and everyone! I did 49 weekly reviews the first year. Probably the biggest single factor for GTD success. [Read more →]

5 Comments »