GTD (1) Getting things done.

In case you don’t know what GTD means, it’s the term from Dave Allen’s book and stands for Getting Things Done.
There are a bunch of web sites around to support this, in fact it’s become a cottage industry.   New job, new roles and all that, I think I need a little help at the moment.

At random . .  A summary of GTD.  There are scores of these.
Here are a few links I’ve visited in the last week: 

Comparison with “Seven Habits” – (Rosa Say, http://www.sayleadershipcoaching.com/ )
http://successbeginstoday.org/wordpress/2005/06/the-7-habits-and-gtd/

I have benefited from the Seven Habits over the years, but have faltered a bit with GTD, and it has not taken root in my practices or thinking. What has changed has been a Dave Allen podcast with Merlin of 43folders.com.

43folders is one of the premier GTD sites (it is a little Mac oriented)

This podcast detailed two observations:

1. GTD can fail after 3-4 weeks (and Dave lists a few reasons)
2. GTD often takes 2 years to really take hold. This I can cope with. I’m now back on the wagon.

Getting Things Done: The Procrastinator’s Version Contains a great summary diagram. http://blogs.salon.com/0002007/2005/12/13.html

Rosa Say’s Blog has some of her personal story A really interesting read.

So to from Will Simpson: http://www.willsimpson.org/taxonomy/gtd/

ASIDES: HISTORY

An interesting article on Stephen Covey with comments on the Franklin Covey merger (USA Today, 2004) http://www.usatoday.com/money/2004-11-08-covey-usat_x.htm

ASIDES. GTD TOOLS:

A diagnostic tool for those interested in GTD. Dave Seah has an interesting approach, a little analysis tool to look at time on task, with a neat flash app to support it. Read about it:
davidseah.com/archives/2006/04/18/the-printable-ceo-iii-emergent-task-timing/
The Flash app: http://www.lifehack.org/free-online-graph-grid-templates-pdf/

Paper implementation discussion: http://www.davidco.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2100