Mastering Workflow

The crew from the GTD Public in Chicago

We held a GTD public seminar this week in Chicago to a sold-out crowd. Here’s a picture of some of our staff with some friends of DAC, enjoying some time in downtown Chicago after the event:

Pictured from left: David Kwo of Logan Consulting, DavidCo Senior Coach & Presenter Danny Bader, Kevin Murnane, DavidCo Events Director Rachelle Bonsignori, and Heather Meibach from the Gleacher Center.

Rachelle shares her experience with the GTD public events

Rachelle Bonsignori, who has serves as a our wonderful director of events, shares her personal experience with the GTD public seminars.  Rachelle spends most of her time on the road, making sure the events are run without a hitch.  She’s always happy to answer any questions you have about our classes and can be reached at publics@davidco.com.

See the current schedule of classes.

Best Deals: Get a 25% off coupon to attend a public class when you buy the GTD System or become a GTD Connect member.

A Reverend shares how he implemented GTD

Rev. Chip Granthan sent this letter along to Danny Bader, who was the facilitator who led the GTD Public Seminar he attended in Atlanta. Chip was happy to have this shared with our GTD Times readers too.

Danny,

I’d been trying to find the tool to bring clarity to my situation and had stumbled upon the GTD Coordinator® that Staples sells back in November.  I’d liked the layout, and had followed up by getting a copy of David’s book.

I’d read Getting Things Done 3 or 4 months ago.  I’d tried to absorb it and get my arms around it.  I picked it up about 6 weeks ago and read it again.  I’d gone online to DAC’s website, and had seen the information on the Atlanta seminar.  I’d downloaded the free materials and had purchased the GTD and OUTLOOK 2003 guide.  I’d signed up for the seminar, and in the interim I started actually processing my email the GTD way.  What a difference!  I started looking at the changes I needed to make in my office.  I am a stacker and a packrat. I’ve always known what was where in what stack, [Read more →]

Boston GTD Meetup

Chip Joyce, who many of you know as a regular GTD Times contributor on the topic of GTD & Sales, is now part of the David Allen Company team!  We are thrilled, as Chip brings a wealth of experience in client management, and is obviously enthusiastic in his own application of GTD.  He’s based in New York City and will take care of all of our clients in the New England region.  He is hosting an informal GTD Meetup following the Boston GTD public seminar on Thursday, March 25th.  Here are the particulars: [Read more →]

Getting started with GTD

One of the most common questions we get is how to get started with GTD.   New people, especially, will ask this after coming to us dazed and confused by what GTD is really about.   And, lots of people seem to be hoping a piece of software will teach them GTD.  Sorry, but that’s kind of like buying a car and then learning how to drive.  You’ll make your way down the road, but it won’t be pretty.

As a GTD Coach, and also intimately involved in the education and offerings from David Allen, I would suggest one of the following products:

The GTD System – This is, in my opinion, one of the best educational products we offer.  You get a ton of resources to learn GTD at your own pace.  You get the GTD book, coaching CDs with David Allen, GTD Connect and more. Good stuff. [Read more →]

Tips for managing email with GTD

A GTD’er wrote to us to ask what resources we have for helping her manage email. She wrote that email is “vying for top ten on my list of overwhelming.”  Here’s what one of our coaches shared:

There are a few excellent resources from the David Allen Company for applying the GTD methods to your email:

  1. The GTD Setup Guides, specific to your tool, will cover the best practices of email.
  2. There is a terrific free article called “Getting Email Under Control” that covers this issue as well.
  3. Our GTD Connect online learning center also runs regular Webinar classes on topics such as email. There is a Webinar in the Archive Library called “Managing Email” that you should find useful. GTD Connect is $48 per month (cancel anytime) or $480 per year (one-year commitment.)
  4. Our public GTD Mastering Workflow classes cover email best practices.  These one-day classes are a great way to learn all of the GTD essentials, including email.
  5. There are loads of posts on GTD Times on the topic of email. Search on the keyword “email” or follow the tag.

The GTD Best Practices Series

Do YOU know the best practices of GTD?

Although they’ve been recorded for our GTD Connect online learning center, we have been posting the GTD Best Practices series to our free public podcast as well, for all to benefit from.  These informal podcasts are a great way to learn the essentials of GTD.  Here is the series:

Best Practices of Collect

Best Practices of Processing

Best Practices of Organize

Best Practices of Review

Best Practices of Doing

If you like these podcasts, GTD Connect has over 110 recordings like these, with more added every week, that you can play on the Connect site or  sync to iTunes.  It’s a great way to learn coaching tips from David and the staff, listen to interesting interviews with GTD’ers (Evan Taubenfeld being one of the recent ones), watch the “Slice of GTD Life” videos and more.  Good stuff.  Check out the free trial of GTD Connect.

The Master Key to Clarity

The master key to clarity is maintaining a complete and current inventory of all your commitments and agreements with yourself. You need to capture, clarify, and organize them, so you can constantly review and reflect on the totality of your engagements with the world, so you can trust your choices about what you’re doing, moment to moment. -David Allen

Grab the free article on the 5 phases of Mastering Workflow.