There are only two problems in life. Isn’t that nice to know? You only have two things you ever need to be concerned about. Not only are there only two problems—they are really quite simple. Ready? Problem #1: You know what you want, and you don’t know how to get it. Problem #2: You don’t …
Closing the Loops on Meeting Notes
I’m often asked about the best practices for taking meeting notes, including how to process them after the meeting. Here are some tips and suggestions that I hope will be useful to you. Capturing ideas, relevant information, etc. during meetings is important so that you don’t have to rely on your brain to remind you …
Completing and Creating
Seems that we’re here on the planet to learn about and do two things—complete and create. We are responsible for what we have put into motion on all levels, and we must manage the process of what we are putting into motion every moment. I work with people and organizations about both aspects. Complete means …
New GTD® & Google® Apps Setup Guide
We’ve updated our GTD & Google Apps for Desktop Setup Guide to work with the latest versions of Google Tasks™, Google Keep™, Gmail™, and more. If you passed over Google Tasks in the past because of its limited functionality, the new version is much more user-friendly and functional. Download or see a sample. This …
News on GTD Setup Guides
Looking for the best coaching advice on getting GTD® setup in your favorite tool? Check out our popular GTD Setup Guides. They are written by our GTD experts and are packed with step-by-step instructions and advice on how to get the most out of many common tools for Getting Things Done®. We currently have GTD …
Two themes for the GTD Summit
The global GTD Summit we’re organizing for this coming June has two primary themes, neither of which is about working harder or longer, or motivating yourself in any kind of “rah, rah!” way. They are: The strategic value of clear space, and There are no problems, only projects In my experience the essential aspects of being …
Jared’s GTD Story
Tell us a little about yourself My name is Jared Caron and I live in Nashua, New Hampshire. What do you do for work? I am a Registered Nurse. My current role is as a Nurse Educator for the 2nd largest primary care network in the state. We have over 70 medical practices spanning numerous …
Dealing with Free-Floating Anxiety
One of the Greatest Challenges One of the greatest challenges to keeping an empty head is maintaining the drill of processing our interactions to closure. In the course of our day, we often generate much more value-added thinking and agreements with ourselves and others than we realize, especially in the context of conversations and communications. …
GTD Summit in Amsterdam
GTD is learned behavior We are not born knowing how to deal with things that we need to think about. What we need to think about, and how we need to think about it, in the most effective way, are learned behaviors. Our brains evolved to respond, highly effectively, in the present, to a perceived situation. …
TED Talk on Getting Things Done for Teens
Equipping teens with GTD Mark Wallace, co-author of Getting Things Done for Teens, recently did a TED Talk on equipping the next generation to conquer overload and distraction. Digital connectivity has exponentially increased the volume and velocity of “stuff” coming at us every day. A new mindset and new skill sets are needed to help young …
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GTD® & OmniFocus® 3
New GTD & OmniFocus 3 Setup Guide We are excited to announce the release of a new GTD Setup Guide for OmniFocus 3. Given the significant changes in this new release, we’ve overhauled our Setup Guide specifically for version 3. This Guide will show you how to: – Understand the fundamental GTD best practices – …
How to Balance Meetings and Work
Too many meetings? Along with email volume, the overabundance of meetings is the major complaint of knowledge workers today. That said, meetings can be extremely effective and are even critical to getting meaningful work done. It would be an interesting experiment to cancel all meetings and watch what happens. What would we miss? What negative …
The GTD Horizons of Focus® for determining your priorities
How work is defined David Allen defines “work” from at least six different horizons, corresponding to different altitudes of perspective. The GTD Horizons of Focus HORIZON 5: Purpose and Principles HORIZON 4: Vision HORIZON 3: Goals and Objectives HORIZON 2: Areas of Focus and Accountability …
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How do I get other people to do GTD?
Question: How do I get other people to do GTD? David Allen’s answer: Getting other people to do GTD is really about: How do we effectively communicate? How do we not have to have ambiguous non-decisions made about stuff? So, if nothing else, make sure you have your own GTD system in practice and let …
The Strategic Value of Clear Space
Are neat people more productive? How easily you can make a mess is how truly productive you can be. Maximum freedom to generate and play around in creative chaos is the optimal condition for constructive thinking and work. This is true on a project, in the kitchen, in your office, and at your writing table—anywhere …
David Drake’s GTD Story
Tell us a little about yourself: My name is David Drake, MS, PhD. I am a professor of microbiology & infectious diseases. I am in the Iowa Institute for Oral Health Research, College of Dentistry, University of Iowa. How did you hear about GTD? When I became an Assistant Professor many years ago, I realized that …
When did email become my job?
Question: At what point did answering e-mail become my job? David Allen: Well, at what point did answering anything—your mail, having conversations in your hallway—become your job? It’s all your job. You just have to decide what your work is. As the late, great Peter Drucker said, that’s your biggest job, to define what your …
What should you do?
What should you do? With many choices you are given moment-to-moment, what should you do? There are five steps in the Mastering Workflow model of GTD®: Capture, clarify, organize, reflect, and engage. So which step is most important? How do you decide whether to collect stuff, process an inbox, organize your work, reflect on all …
The 2019 GTD® Organizer is now available
What is the GTD Organizer? The 2019 GTD Organizer is an elegant, functional, and complete system, built on the GTD principles. We created it to give people a way to get people up and running with a tool that is completely aligned with GTD. How to Use It The GTD Organizer comes as an editable …
Getting things off your mind
Even very important things can be on cruise control and not on your mind. If your attention is being grabbed, then there’s almost an inverse relationship there. The degree to which your attention is being grabbed is the degree to which you are not free to place your attention where and how you want to. …