Everything and the Mobile Software Universe…

After few months of “Getting Things Done” practice I can began to draw some conclusions. First I’ve learn…what procrastination means, and how it may be, after all, really usefull to help time management.
Then I’ve adapted the GTD methodology to my needs, really simplifying it: for me small (and, ok, fun) is always beautiful.

After those months of practice here are summed up the concepts I daily use and rely on.

• Task list is your main tool.
• “If something takes less than 5 minutes, do it now”, it may sound stupid but it really helps to keep it in mind everytime.
• Delegate as much as possible, but delegation is the easy part: have a way to keep easily track of the follow up is a key point.
• Take the time to find and list your next actions to complete some higher level tasks: a task list with entries that can’t be done is pointless. If nn item is not actionable, cause it is too high level, or is simply a rough idea jotted quickly on paper or outlook, take the time to break it in piece and extract the things to do to achieve it.
• Tasks lists exists : DO NOT keep your todo’s in your brain, be confident in your system, else your mind will be cluttered with short term goals and actions, and you won’t be able to focus on longer term ideas/project etc…
• Make your system as simple as possible: the fewer the steps/concepts, the more you will be able to maintain it and … rely on it.

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As a proud gadget geek, I’ve got my first palm (a palm III) when I was still a student: at this time in France it was more of a geek oddity than the cool and fashionable gadget for young executives it was in the US. (things have changed, and now in France or US it is no more than a “has never been” gadget )
I was REALLY using it, for all my contacts and all those tiddibits of information one needs to acced/enter anytime. Then I grow up, I began to work with a wifi notebook and above all a cellphone was always in my pocket: my beloved palm Tungsten 3 had been downgraded to a poor game boy like device…And one inspired day I bought a Treo 650 on eBay.
I’m really amazed by this device:

• The keyboard is BRILLIANT, fast, precise: I can really use it to enter data (like this post, or above all ideas/todos).
• It is a phone…so it is CONNECTED email, sms, web all in one package, in comparison my bluetooth phone + my tungsten T3 was a lame package (The treo phone part is good enough to forget easily my K700i).
• And above all it is COOL&FUN to use it

The key part of the equation is that I’ve became addicted to my own adapted (rather simple) GTD methodology, and the treo, as a great data gathering and consulting device really makes the whole thing …hum…should I say efficient?
A next action to add/change/mark as complete…treo. A whiteboard to be saved after a meeting…take a picture with the treo. A new idea that will revolutionize the whole world (hey a boy also can dream)…add a todo or note in the treo.A quick mail check/send…treo.
I’ll describe more precisely my GTD implementation in another, long term due, post.
Anyway I’ve came up with few downsides:

• The treo is far from being as thin as my K700i, and you look like a kind of goldorak/bioman/power ranger with this small brick on your ear … Now I really use my bluetooth headset
• If you have a good keyboard…it is easier to write messages…my sms plan has exploded.
• If you have a good browser/mail app and it is easy and quick to be connected….your data plan, like mine, will explode
• Add/test/remove/configure applications … Procastination takes a looooong time, but it is sooooo fun (more on my treo setup in yet another post)

So for now I use my treo everytime, for everything… Did I say waiting for the next gadget? Anyway I really feel this time I USE my gadget, I’m not only PLAYING with it…perhaps after all I’m really growing up…brrrr…frightening isn’t it?

To be fun, hype and cool today you have to read your news throught RSS feeds (ok not sure it will bring you a lot of sex apeal, or any social success in big garden party … a geek can dream). Simply going on cnn.com to get your daily dose of news, then to slashdot is sooooo old fashionned. Google and Yahoo were already aggregating many things for you, but as a technology overlord you need something less common here come the rss and blogs are coming to your rescue. Yahoo, slashdot, and many other “corporate” web sites are offering feeds, plus many individuals via their blog: it is now possible to make your own news aggregation, choosing your sources, and at a glance, you can visit all those sites in few minutes staying in your feed reader without opening your web browser … thus missing the beloved “side links”, best path to discovery.
It may sounds paradoxal, but choosing the news we will read on an “a priori” basis has a strange side effect: we only read the same things, on the same subjects/topics, forgetting the rest of the world knowledge.
I have around seventy (70!!) feeds in my agregator, and, as a glorified geek, 30 are toward technology/hardware/Palm, 20 for GTD productivity, 7 for comics … and only 10 for general news, and to be honest the later ten are many time left unred.
So OK, I loose less time wandering around the net searching for fun and cool news … but I always read the same kind of things, missing the great discoveries that can only happen jumping from link to link: my point of interests are more radical, more focused … but really less fun and rich, it’s time to react! Let’s go back to web wandering …

Thomas

Ok, it’s time for me to face reality : I have a team, I have too much work, I have to get serious about my productivity.
So let’s go web shopping for Productivity secrets ! … and let’s face a second reality : I love to dig for information, try software, in a word, loose my time playing with new toys, not sure it is good for my current issue .
Being a proud arrogant froggy, I feel really uncomfortable with the zillion of anglo-saxon self-management craps we can found everywhere, promoting the same mantra every time :”If you really want it, you can do it”.
Then I found a great community around a great Guru with an interesting approach : David Allen and it’s GTD, “Getting Things Done”. For me all the great “teaching” books has to be easy to read, all the depicted ideas have to appear as simple and good sense ones, and above all make me feel that, with an hour of thinking, I could have come up easily with a fair amount of those “brilliant” ideas . The Allen’s Book is one of those. It’s not one of those change-your-lifestyle-with-mine approach, but a more personal one, Allen seems to say : “Ok, you are good at what you are doing, I’m good at productivity, let me give you some tricks I’ve learn, and see if it fits”. Ok, I like that.
I’ve spent a lot of time trying tools, tuning my setup, reading web blogs, etc…

1. I’ve lost A LOT of time studying
2. I’ve lost A LOT of time tweaking a system that may fit my needs, even learnt VBA to tweak Outlook and adds macros…
3. I’ve lost A LOT of time … because I began tweaking my system before discovering my needs
4. I have a A LOT of FUN doing that

Now it’s time to use it …. ahum, do I really need that? Is that all? Only few categories in Outlook? those four added buttons?… Yes I think it is, the real step, as always, is in my mind, not on my laptop: what I’ve learnt, tools stay tools, a mean, not a finality, and many time, especially in computer science, we tend to forget that!
My day to day practice is changing (albeit slowly), following those common sense principles:

• Even if it may sounds obvious, GTD made me really think about what has to be DONE, how to translate “stuffs”, ideas, meeting outputs into actionable items : giving time to extract tasks from this information magma, on a systematical basis, is, for me the greatest contribution from Allen.
• Power of delegation without loosing control.
• If something takes less than 2 minutes, DO IT NOW.
• Track, write and forget : once actionable items are extracted, store them in your system (delegate or deferre them) … and be confident in your system, forget: it gives you the freedom to think about new ideas, longer term goals … precisely what I was missing, as I was overhelmed by short-terms goals and views.

Those four points may sound like GTD propaganda, blablabla … but, to be honest I’m myself surprised to follow them naturally, with few efforts. David Allen gave principles, few details, and I think, like Kathy Sierra in her great post Making happy Users, that fewer details equals better identification and appropriation of the ideas. Check also Metagrrrl Post about a similar GTD point of view.
Does it really helps my productivity? Not sure at this time. So does it help me ? definitively, cause I have less and less of those “little-things-to-change-to-improve-to-say-to-write” in mind, leaving room for more important thinking.

I’ll certainly add some other posts about my setup, my outlook/evernote customization, desktop search etc.

As a side effect of all this self-teaching I’ve discovered many great blogs and posts, particularly those GTD few ones:

• Working Smart
• Office Zealot and The Latest Getting Things Done Blogs
• GTD Wanabe
• The famous 43Folders

And a special mention to the excellent Creating Passionate Users, that has nothing to do with productivity, but is one of my preferred read, waiting eagerly each new post with a mixed feeling od admiration …and yes jealousy for the Kathy Sierra’s style sharp mind and clever comments, thanks Kathy for sharing your talent! Do not miss her posts about the Devil’s advocate or Making happy Users.

For english readers … sorry for my style but, hey, I’m french

Thomas