Kelly Forrister is a Senior Coach & Presenter. She also runs and regularly contributes to GTD Connect, the online learning center for the David Allen Company. She’s worked with David Allen for nearly 20 years and is a fluent geek with GTD and technology.
Many people have found this tip we share in our GTD & Outlook 2010 Guide to be super helpful for corralling the myriad of emails that need to be tracked as a “Waiting For.” You simply need to create a rule in Outlook to copy delegated items to an @Waiting For Support folder (create that folder if you don’t already have one.) Here’s what to do:
1. Select Rules button from the ribbon
2. Click Manage Rules & Alerts
3. Click on New Rule
4. Select Apply rule on messages I receive
5. Click Next
6. Check off from people or specific group. Then click on where people or public group is underlined and select yourself as the From contact (if you are not listed as a contact in your address book, you will need to create that first with the exact email address used by Outlook when you send email for this to work). Click OK. Click Next. [Read more →]
A great way to kick off the New Year is with a review of GTD’s five phases of Mastering Workflow:
For each area, ask yourself:
What’s working well for me in this area now?
What would I like to improve upon in the coming year in each of these areas?
How I could support myself more in that?
Acknowledge yourself for how far you’ve come. Be realistic in your commitments about where you want to be. GTD is a journey…
Happy New Year!
There is a plethora of discussion about the tools people use for GTD, but what were your wins around changing your productive behaviors and habits in 2011?
What are you doing better than in previous years? What’s more habitual for you? What’s easier for you now with the GTD methodology? How far have you come from when you first started with GTD that you could acknowledge yourself for?
We’d love to hear from you!
An easy way for me to explain the “Doing” phase of GTD is to simply say “trust your gut/butt/intuition/hunch/heart.” There is gold in that, and ultimately that’s what it will come down to. But how do you even get to the point of trusting whatever part of you makes a trusted decision? Here’s where the “ecosystem of GTD” starts to make more sense:
Capture everything that has your attention (Collect)
Make decisions about what it means and what you are going to do about it (Process)
Park those decisions in trusted places (Organize)
Step back to reflect on those choices from a clear, current, and creative place (Review)
So that you can make the best action choice (Do)
So how will that help narrow down a To Do list the length of your driveway? You’ll want to pull in the Criteria for Choosing model: [Read more →]
David Allen calls the Weekly Review the “critical success factor” to GTD. Why? It’s the glue that keeps it all together. It’s also one of the steps people tend to resist the most. Here are some keys for getting the most out of the Review phase to keep your GTD system humming along.
WHAT TO REVIEW:
There are 11 steps in the GTD Weekly Review. David Allen recommends leading yourself through this every 7-10 days to get clear, current, and creative.
Get clear – ensure all your “stuff” is processed
Collect Loose Papers and Materials
Get “IN” to Zero
Empty Your Head
[Read more →]
Organize, by far, is one of the most talked about parts of GTD. And why not? It’s all about cool gear! With GTD, choosing your tools is up to you and there’s incredible freedom in that. David Allen is not telling you what tools to use, but how to use your tools. So let’s dive in to look at what’s helpful to know about this phase.
WHAT TO ORGANIZE:
Organizing identifies the various placeholders or “buckets” where actions and support material are stored that you’ve processed. David Allen has also described organizing as simply “things are stored based on what they mean to you.” The four primary action lists are:
Organizing also includes setting up your workspace, a reference system for non-actionable information, and incubation systems (Someday Maybe and Tickler Systems) for possible later actions.
We’re continuing our series on the best practices of GTD’s five phases of Mastering Workflow: Collect, Process, Organize, Review, and Do. Let’s look closer at the Process phase.
WHAT TO PROCESS:
Processing is the core fundamental thinking that defines the meaning of each item collected. Outcomes and next actions are determined for actionable items, and the non-actionable items are identified as trash, something potentially actionable in the future, or reference material. This decision process transforms unclear stuff into defined work.
Download a free version of the GTD Workflow Map illustrating Collect, Process, and Organize or view the classic version on page 32 of the Getting Things Done book.
KEY PROCESSING QUESTIONS:
1. What is it?
2. Is it actionable?
3. What’s the desired outcome? If it is multi-step, write it on your Projects/Outcomes list.
4. What’s the next (physical/visible) action? Write it on the appropriate Next Actions list. [Read more →]
How well do you know the GTD’s five phases of Mastering Workflow? In case you could use a refresher, we’re going to do a five part series on the best practices of each phase: Collect, Process, Organize, Review, and Do. Let’s start with Collect!
WHAT TO COLLECT:
Every commitment unfinished is an “open loop”; and when it is tracked in your psyche, instead of your system, it will require energy and attention to track and maintain. Once the open loops are captured, you can manage completion by using an external system that takes much less energy than keeping it in your head. Every commitment unfinished requires management in a trusted system until it is done or discontinued.
COLLECTION SUCCESS FACTORS:
Capture it all (Get it out of your head)
Every open loop must be in your collection system and out of your head. Keep collection tools nearby so that no matter where you are, you can capture anything that has your attention. The result of this practice is to have everything out of your head. The less you track in your mind, the clearer you will be, and the more important and functional the collection tools will become, which allows for your mind to be optimally clear. This will make your collection tools more important. [Read more →]
Question: How do you handle reading material? I have magazine articles, web articles, books, newsletter special articles, blog interesting articles, etc. Do you input them into “context” just like any other task?
Senior Coach Kelly Forrister: I consider reading materials fall into two categories: nice to read and must read. Nice to read is like a newsstand. I can read it or not. Those are not tracked on any lists. they are organized into a plastic folder called “Read/Review”. For must read items, those are tracked on my Next Action lists, just like any other action I am committed to complete. Those are organized based on where the reading takes place (@Office, @Home, @Anywhere or @Computer). The reading is typically stored in a project folder if it’s related to a project, an @Action email or hard copy folder, or I simply paste the URL if it’s a website into the note field of the next action in my list manager.
If you look back over the last month, what got in the way of you being more productive? What slowed you down when you were just hitting your stride? Interruptions? Others lack of planning? Untrusted systems?
What are your productivity speed bumps?
