Getting Things Done

Merlin Mann writes a lot about Getting Things Done. If you’re interested, here’s a great way to start:

Getting Things Done: Recap for ‘07

via 43 Folders by Merlin Mann on Jan 04, 2007

Must be the dawning of the new year and the chance for a fresh start, but I’ve gotten several requests from readers for an updated primer for folks who are getting started (or re-started) with Getting Things Done.

I’m happy to oblige with this updated collection of 43 Folders’ most popular, most visited, most-commented-on, and my personal favorite posts about David Allen’s GTD. There should be plenty here to get you rolling. And thanks so much to everyone who wrote to request this.

• Getting started with ‘Getting Things Done’ – “So you sprint from fire to fire, praying you haven’t forgotten anything, sapped of anything like creativity or even the basic human flexibility to adapt your own schedule to the needs of your friends, your family or yourself. Your ’stuff’ has taken over your brain like a virus now, dragging down every process it touches and rendering you spent and virtually useless. Sound familiar?”
• How does a geek hack GTD? – “So I wanted to start a conversation about how geeks handle their lists, their projects, and their agendas–not so much in terms of the tool they use to store the information, although that’s fair game–as with how they segment the information and decide when to break it into pieces.”
• Next actions: Both physical and visible – “But, for me, turning anxieties into projects and projects into discrete physical behaviors has a lot of appeal. It takes all the pressure off your brain and puts it back where it belongs: on your eyes, on your hands, and on that fat ass you need to get into gear.”
• Does this ‘next action’ belong someplace else? – “I’ve noticed that there are often items on my ‘next actions’ list that hang around a lot longer than they should. I scan and rescan and sort and add and delete, but there’s always a few stragglers who hang out there for a week or more. Eventually this starts to vex me, and I try to debug why things aren’t getting done.”
• Mental dialogues, yak-shaving & the triumph of the ‘mini-review’ – “My mini-review falls somewhere between the glances I give my lists throughout the day and the comprehensive weekly review I do each weekend. It’s basically a 10-minute metamoment where I stop working and just try to re-focus on my goals, and the tactical adjustments needed to get them moved forward today.”
• What are you ‘waiting on?’ – “The thread that runs through all of these is that the onus is on me to a) make sure these items represent part of a commitment I’ve made, and b) make sure they actually get done (even if it’s not my direct responsibility); otherwise, they should get moved onto my ‘Maybe/Later’ list, right?”
• A Year of Getting Things Done – (3-part series: 1, 2, 3) – “I recently realized that this month marks one year since I started using Getting Things Done in earnest. With the calendar year closing, it seems like an apt time to look back at what’s worked, what hasn’t, and where I’d like to see GTD heading in the future.
• Choosing a daily GTD action plan – “I employ an informal Getting Things Done action strategy that’s similar to the one Chris lays out in his post. I often have a theme for a given day, where I choose an approach that’s suited to my mood, my energy level, and the kind and amount of work on my TODO list. (I’m especially a fan of days where I knock down ‘mosquito tasks’ as Chris calls them.)”
• Fractal Implementation, or, On the Dangers of David Allen’s Finger – “This is my stake in the ground about GTD: if you can stay focused on drawing from its best practices to get more of the important things in your life accomplished, then you’ll be a happy kid. For real. But if, like a seeming majority of people I encounter these days, you allow yourself to obsess endlessly over the minutest details of implementation and maintenance—well, you’re screwed. You’re wasting your time.”
• Inbox Zero: Processing to zero – “The more email you have been neglecting in your inbox, the more drastic and ruthless your processing must be.”
• Do a fast “mind-sweep” – “By and large, you’ll discover, your head is flooded with this stuff that you aren’t or haven’t been doing anything about. Not coincidentally, this is almost always stuff that represents some kind of incompletion, functional fuzziness, or procrastination on your part.”
• Simplify your contexts – “If you feel a gnaw about the loss of your old contexts, try to shunt some of the mental load into sub-projects and better verb choices in your tasks.”
• Folders for organization and action – “But, as ever, if you’re fussing and thinking and fiddling and wondering about this stuff, you aren’t doing it, and dammit, that’s what this is all about.”
• Priorities don’t exist in a vacuum – “Unless you can always satisfy the big red letter commitments you’ve created for yourself — as well as the ones that are constantly being generated for you by others — an obsession with priority alone is pointlessly stress-inducing, unhealthy, and unrealistic.”
• 6 powerful “look into” verbs (+ 1 to avoid) – “Decisions can only be delivered after you’ve nourished them with timely and thought-provoking information.”
• Productive Talk Compilation: 8-episode podcast with GTD’s David Allen – “Hope you all enjoy hearing the whole series, in order, all in one place. There’s some nuggets of GTD gold in there, if I do say so myself.”

Google Maps is the New Bible Atlas

www.BibleMap.org integrates Google Maps and the ESV text to create an interactive Bible atlas.

Enron

While at Babson, the Enron scandal broke. It was a fascinating accounting case (if “fascinating” and “accounting” can be used in the same sentence).

Malcolm Gladwell (The Tipping Point and Blink) wrote an article back in January in the New Yorker that was interesting:

Enron

My semi-defense of Enron is now out, in this weeks’ New Yorker.
   
And here is the link  to Jonathan Macey’s wonderful law review article on the Enron case, which was my inspiration for the piece.

I also have a minor challenge for aficionados of the Enron case.

Years ago, when I was at the Washington Post, one of my colleagues on the science desk—Bill Booth—called up a dozen or so Nobel Laureates in physics and asked them to explain, in plain language, the nature and significance of the Higgs Boson atomic particle. None of them could. This was at a time, mind you, when the physics community was arguing passionately for the construction of a multi-billion dollar particle accelerator to look for things like the Higgs Boson.  So it wasn’t for lack of interest. They were gung-ho for nailing the Higgs Boson. They just couldn’t explain the Higgs Boson.

Can anyone explain—in plain language—what it is Jeff Skilling and Co. did wrong?

I’m not asking for an explanation for what they did wrong as businessmen. That’s plain. They did a mountain of stupid and arrogant things. Nor is this about what Skilling and company did that was unethical or in bad faith. There’s a mountain of evidence on that too. The question is strictly a legal one: according to the way the accounting rules were written at the time, what specific transgressions were Skilling guilty of that merited twenty-four years in prison? For the sake of argument, let’s stipulate that summaries must be three sentences or less.

When I was reporting the piece, I tried to get someone to answer this question. But everything ended up very Higgs Bosonian.

The Prodigal Sons

My Favorite Tim Keller sermon of all time is on Luke 15 – the story of the Prodigal Sons. Here it’s online. Worth a listen.

His sermon has helped me make the gospel incredibly clear to people.

Perfecting the Pitch

For all you Babson students out there, here’s a great article from Guy Kawasaki’s (garage.com) blog. It’s written by one of his colleagues, Bill Reichert.

“Endless articles, books, and blogs have been written on the topic of business plan presentations and pitching to investors. In spite of this wealth of advice, almost every entrepreneur gets it wrong. Why? Because most guides to pitching your company miss the central point: The purpose of your pitch is to sell, not to teach. Your job is to excite, not to educate.

“Pitching is about understanding what your customer (the investor) is most interested in, and developing a dialog that enables you to connect with the head, the heart, and the gut of the investor. If you want advice about pitching, you can ask a venture capitalist, but you probably won’t get a very good answer. Most VCs are analytic types, and so they will give you a laundry list of topics you should cover. They won’t tell you what really “floats their boat,” mainly because they can’t articulate it in useful terms. “I know it when I see it,” is about the best answer you’ll get.”

Here’s the whole article: The Entrepreneur’s New Year’s Resolution: “I Will Fix My Pitch”

A good pitch is rare because it is so hard to execute on everything else that has to be done to build a successful company. But the ability to pitch is a key indicator for investors—if the entrepreneur doesn’t know how to sell, how can he or she build a great company?

So…what’s your pitch?

Devotional Tips for the Professional Christian

While I bristle at the moniker “Professional Christian,” I was helped by this article: Devotional Tips for the Professional Christian.

The Queen

I like going to movies. And actually, I like going to movies alone. The idea of taking someone to a movie on a date seems a bit of a waste of time to me. I’d much rather “do something” with the person. That said, I still like going to the movies, so often I go alone. One movie I saw by myself was “The Queen.” Fabulous.

I know it’s a bit late (given the fact that Helen Mirren has already won an Oscar for her role), but here’s a link to a review I enjoyed:

The Queen is surprisingly touching and my ‘must see’ film of the year. It demonstrates that what we know of people, particularly public figures, may not be a fair representation of their character. Rather, the film underscores the truth that it is impossible to separate the public and private spheres of life, because what a person is in private they remain in public, despite all the trimmings. But what are we to do when the public perception of our behavior has become so warped that the resulting image seems to bear no relation to our real character? In The Queen, Elizabeth reminds herself of the vow she took when she ascended the throne. “I declare that my whole life will be devoted to service – a vow I made to God as well as the people.” And it is only to their Creator that a person can truly trust themselves to in the end.  Though all the world may mock you, the comfort is that God knows a person’s heart be they maid or monarch.

The T-Shirt Rule

Last month, I got to design and print a T-shirt for our 26 hour road trip to Panama City Beach, Florida. I’ve seen students actually wear the shirt. It’s pretty cool to go from sketching with pencil and paper one day to physical shirts two days later (and Florida one day after that). Making the shirts reminded me of Seth Godin’s T-shirt rule:

The T-shirt rule

It’s a simple test of whether you’ve created a remarkable experience:

“Would I buy the t-shirt?”

A t-shirt for your blog or your accounting firm or your bug-fighting software.

If you’re not t-shirt worthy, what would it take?

We never get beyond the gospel

From Tim Keller (hat tip to JT’s blog)

We never “get beyond the gospel” in our Christian life to something more “advanced.” The gospel is not the first “step” in a “stairway” of truths, rather, it is more like the “hub” in a “wheel” of truth. The gospel is not just the A-B-C’s of Christianity, but it is the A to Z of Christianity. The gospel is not just the minimum required doctrine necessary to enter the kingdom, but the way we make all progress in the kingdom.

We are not justified by the gospel and then sanctified by obedience but the gospel is the way we grow (Gal. 3:1-3) and are renewed (Col 1:6). It is the solution to each problem, the key to each closed door, the power through every barrier (Rom 1:16-17).

It is very common in the church to think as follows: “The gospel is for non-Christians. One needs it to be saved. But once saved, you grow through hard work and obedience.” But Colossians 1:6 shows that this is a mistake. Both confession and “hard work” that is not arising from and “in line” with the gospel will not sanctify you—it will strangle you. All our problems come from a failure to apply the gospel. Thus when Paul left the Ephesians he committed them “to the word of his grace, which can build you up” (Acts 20:32).

The main problem, then, in the Christian life I that we have not thought out the deep implication of the gospel, we have not “used” the gospel in and on all parts of our life. Richard Lovelace says that most people’s problems are just a failure to be oriented to the gospel—a failure to grasp and believe it through and through. Luther says (on Gal. 2:14), “The truth of the Gospel is the principle article of all Christian doctrine… Most necessary is it that we know this article well, teach it to others, and beat it into their heads continually.” The gospel is not easily comprehended. Paul says that the gospel only does its renewing work in us as we understand it in all its truth. All of us, to some degree live around the truth of the gospel but do not “get” it. So the key to continual and deeper spiritual renewal and revival is the continual re-discovery of the gospel. A stage of renewal is always the discovery of a new implication or application of the gospel—seeing more of its truth. This is true for either an individual or a church.

If you’ve got an hour, here’s a talk worth listening to: The Supremacy of Christ and the Gospel in a Postmodern World.

South Africa: Good News/Good Deeds Summer Project

This summer we’re sending two teams of students on summer projects: one to Boston and one to South Africa. Here’s the proposal for the South Africa trip. It’s got a little bit of “insider” language particular to Campus Crusade for Christ, but it should give you a flavor of what we’re doing.

Project Overview

We would like to take a pioneering trip this Christmas (3 interns 6 students) and another this summer (~12 students, 4 staff, 4 staff kids and 2 interns). We are calling this summer project “Good News/Good Deeds South African Summer Project”

We will also be partnering with a mission agency called African Enterprise (AE) in Pretoria (AE works directly with indigenous evangelists, orphanages, medical clinics, impoverished communities, and prisoners). They have agreed to arrange our lodging, in-county transportation and service projects. One of AE’s staff members, Dana Mahan, graduated from Harvard Divinity School and worked for two years as an hourly operations leader for our Metro ministry and administrative assistant for me as a Harvard chaplain and Metro director. We have a great working relationship and friendship. He is an organizational guru, understands CCC and understands South Africa—he is married to a South African woman and lives in Pretoria.

Background of the Project

For four years God has been giving our family, several of our Boston staff and Harvard and MIT students a burden for Africa—particularly the portions of Africa that have been devastated by the AIDS epidemic. We have also been exploring more holistic approaches to evangelism that brings Good Words and Good Deeds together.

We have always marveled, since the day we first arrived in Boston, at the way in which God has made this city a magnet for some of the world’s brightest minds (students and professors). Boston, with its ¼ million college students, 43 colleges (including five of the nations top 40 Universities), has become a hub of astounding intellectual, technological, and economic resources. As a result, we have become more and more comfortable these past seven years with “feeling stupid” here in Boston. But, at the same time, we have become more and more uncomfortable with a growing trend that we have observed. We have witnessed nearly all of our graduates going from this hub to even greater hubs of skill, knowledge, power, and affluence—e.g., to graduate school, Wall Street, Washington DC, Silicon Valley, etc..

Now certainly this is one of our hopes—that the students we send will go on to lead the world and reach the world for Christ from within the strategic positions of leadership and influence God places them. But, in as much as these hubs simply maintain the status quo and represent being just one more step removed from the most needy, under-resourced, unreached, under-developed, impoverished hubs of the world, something needs to be done.

Project/Partnership Objectives

In the face of this unsettling reality we intend by the grace of God to forge a dynamic partnership that will upset this disconcerting trend by linking the enormous material, economic, intellectual and technological resources and reserves of Boston (especially Harvard & MIT) with one of the most impoverished, undeveloped, under-resourced and marginalized parts of the world (by which I mean not just the impoverished sections of South Africa but some of the central African countries in which African enterprise operates).

Objectives of this project include: 1) redirecting some of the talent, skills and resources of our graduates and these universities toward some of the most needy and least reached parts of the world, 2) transferring technology and skills to nationals so that they can empower others, 3) enlarging the radius of students that we can recruit to go on a summer mission projects—e.g., Harvard and MIT students that will not consider a mission project that involves just doing evangelism and discipleship, but one that will enable them to use their training in engineering, medicine or economics, 4) strengthening our partnership with MIT & Harvard (MIT is helping to fund each student that will be going over winter break), 5) sharing the gospel daily with words and deeds, 6) giving these student leaders a life changing experience that will forever alter the way they live their lives, share their faith, relate to others, employ their talents, and spend their money.

Specific Proposal

We would be delighted to help out in any way with what our national Impact staff are doing in and around Pretoria. For example, if the Impact ministry would welcome it, we would love to be able to do evangelism at least once a week on one of the campuses in and around Pretoria or Johannesburg. Let us know if this is something that you would like for us to do or if there is some other way that you can make use of our team.

If you would rather that we just work with AE and stay off the campuses we are fine with that, but we want to make ourselves available in whatever we can make work for you.

Sincerely,

Pat McLeod
Boston Metro Real Life Director