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organdised

My GTD implementation
I was reading Patrick Rhone's excellent Getting Things Done white paper about his implementation and thought perhaps it would be intresting to write about mine. It is slightly simpler although I am used to it I suppose, so it does not seem complicated.

Inbox

I have a physical inbox at home (and one at work, though nothing ever lands in it). Letters, bills, cards, receipts, odd bits of paper and things that need something doing with them, get dropped in the inbox and processed at the weekly review.

Collection bucket

It is very important in GTD to have a collection device always at hand to capture tasks, projects, ideas, book recommendations, and suchlike things. I use a Hipster PDA which is real simple to make, it is just some 3x5 index cards clipped together with a binder clip.

This serves as the collection device, or portable inbox if you like, and also holds my calendar, action lists, projects, and other GTD lists.

Action lists

As you know a key concept of GTD is to organise your actions ("things to do") by context not by subject. For example, lists of things you need to get from the shops would be listed under '@Shops', so you can quickly and easily refer to them when you're in that 'context', or a list of calls to make might be '@Phone'.

I have the following contexts: @Home, @Work, @Shops, and that's it. I have experimented with various different sets of contexts but basically this seems to be all I need. Mind you I lead a simple and blameless life.

The principal difference between GTD and most organisational systems is the concept of the 'next action'; in other words, a to-do item is something small, quick and physical that you can do in a few minutes. Anything else is a 'project', which is quite a different way of using the word 'project' from normal. David Allen regards as a project anything which takes more than one 'action' to complete, so 'get new passport' would be a project since it involves many steps: 'get passport photo', 'get application form', 'fill out form and post', etc.

Projects

You keep a separate list of your projects, and when you cross off an action that is part of a project, you generally know the next action that needs to be done to move the project forward, so you add that as a new action. This means that whenever you survey your next action lists, you can do anything on those lists right now. If an item requires further thought before you can decide what to do about it, it's not a next action. If it involves several actions, it's a project. If it cannot be done until something else happens, it may be a future next action but it shouldn't be on the list yet. If it is something you're waiting for someone else to do, it's a 'waiting for' item and goes on the separate list called '@Waiting For'.

So my next actions are quite small and bite-size and generally say things like 'Call so-and-so about X', or 'Look at Y', or 'Pay Z'. This means I can sit down and crank through this list very quickly the next time I have a free half-hour between appointments or whatever.

'Collecting' things that occur to me or that I suddenly remember I need to do, is just a matter of writing them down as a next action. The 'action', in effect, is to decide what to do about the thing, and move it into the appropriate place in the system.

Calendar

Right on the front page of my Hipster PDA I have a card entitled 'Next 2 weeks'. This just has the days written out for the next 2 weeks and I can write in appointments directly, or check what's happening today or tomorrow. The next card is 'Next 4 months', and I quarter the card neatly and write in the month names, and then I can add in appointments for the near future. I do not know about you, but I have never needed to plan something more than 4 months ahead. If I did, it would go in my Evolution calendar on the computer.

Other lists

The calendar cards are followed by '@Home', then '@Projects', '@Waiting For', '@Someday/Maybe' (things you don't want to forget about, but you're not ready to do just yet), '@Shops', and then the cards I use for keeping track of my calorie intake, and the money I've spent.

Now if you turn the Hipster PDA round, the '@Work' cards are at the front (so I can just flip it one way or the other to get to the relevant actions quickly). Behind these are 'Projects@Work', 'WaitingFor@Work', 'Someday/Maybe@Work', and then the card I use to keep track of my billable hours. So it is really two Hipster PDAs glued together, back to back.

Computer

Most everything lives in the Hipster PDA, but of course I use the computer for email and so on. I use Evolution which is a superb integrated email / calendar / contact manager application, and I keep my inbox at zero by processing everything as it comes in. Using the GTD 'do, delegate, defer, dump' principle, I either act on the email right away (if it would take less than 2 minutes), convert it into a 'next action', a 'waiting for', or just delete it.

I move personal email to a 'Personal' folder for ease of searching, and spam mails to the 'Spam' folder for training SpamAssassin.

At work, I have a separate Evolution setup with all my work contacts, and a different set of folders. Most email gets deleted, even if it is converted into an action first, but if I feel I might need to see this email again in the next week or so, it goes into a folder called 'Current' (in fact, 'Ahora', since my machine is in Spanish, but that's by the by). In the rare event that I may need to refer to an email months or years ahead in the future, it goes into a folder called 'Reference' (things like account passwords, for example).

There are really no other folders - everything else goes straight in the bin. I don't keep things just for fun. The reason most people keep a million emails hanging around is because they're not sure whether or not there's something that needs to be done about them, and they don't want anything to get lost. I am sure, and nothing gets lost.

Filing

I have an actual filing cabinet which is really nice, and I highly recommend it. It just makes you feel a little bit professional when you roll that drawer out and pull the file on 'Building Society' or whatever.

I use straightforward file folders, not suspension files or those awkward 'wallets' with a flap which you have to pull right out of the drawer to open. I always keep a big selection of fresh files handy, and a Dymo labeller for ease and pleasure of labelling.

Weekly review

Without the weekly review, of course, everything falls apart. At the review, I do the following (and I have a little card with this written on to remind me):

• Gather assorted loose papers, letters, notes etc and dump in in-tray.
  
• Process in-tray (everything becomes actions, or gets filed or thrown away).
  
• Go through all my actions and check off the ones that are done.
  
• Of the ones which haven't been done, some of them may actually be projects, so I make the appropriate changes.
  
• Go through all my projects and check that there is a next action associated with every project (very useful for making sure things don't fall through the gaps or get neglected).
  
• Go through my 'waiting for' list and check off things that have been completed, and chase the ones that haven't.
  
• Look at the 'someday/maybe' list and see if the time is ripe to convert any of these into projects or actions.
  
• Look at the Evolution calendar for the next couple of weeks and see if there are any long-term appointments or reminders which need to be copied into the Hipster.
  
• Look through my 'sent email' folder and check that I've had replies to everything which needed a reply; if not, chase the recipient, or add it as a 'waiting for' item.
  
• Look through my 'Current' folder (for the work review) to see if there are any new projects, actions or 'waiting fors' arising from it, and delete all the emails which are no longer 'current'.
  
• Brainstorm to think of any new projects or ideas that I've had which didn't get written down, and write them down. It is surprising how often four or five new things get shaken out at this step, especially as you have now psychically 'cleared the decks' of all the mundane stuff that's clogging up your head.
  

It almost takes longer to describe than to do, as I'm quite used to it now and run through a home review in about an hour, a work review in about two hours or so.

So that is it really, it is very simple and does not involve any fancy gadgets or clever systems, but it works for me. So I would be intrested to hear about yours.