Getting Things Done: the art of stress-free productivity by David Allen

This book will change your life for the better. Probably. Getting Things Done (GTD) certainly made me feel much better and helped me sort stuff out. My office job got easier. My home life got easier. I don’t put all the ideas into practise, but even just the broad strokes helped me. This is the only book I’ve actually bought twice. I lent my copy out and never got it back. I missed GTD so much, I bought another copy.

I spent years struggling with To Do lists and productivity stuff. I hated To Do lists. They made me feel so bad when my day finished with more tasks on the lists and nothing completed. When I got into GTD, everything changed for the better. Less stress. More satisfaction. More stuff actually done.

GTD presents clear and practical steps to help you sort stuff out. These are some things that have worked for me:

• First, get your thoughts out of your head and on record somehow. The easiest way is to write them down. Allen says that trying to recall stuff stresses you out. Not from memorising, but having two tasks on your mind creates an internal conflict. Write all your thoughts down and the conflict stops = Less stress.

• Second, process these notes routinely. The book gives you a simple flowchart. Stuff that can be done in a few minutes now, just go do it now. Anything else gets diarised for later, or delegated, or dumped or turned into a project. Organised = Less stress.

• Next, break every task down into smaller steps until you finally reach the Next Action. Always define this Next Action to the smallest step. What is the smallest thing you need to do to move that thing forward? Look something up? Ask somebody? Ask by phone? Get the phone number? Okay, the Next Action is to get the phone number you need to call. And so on and so on. Keep drilling down to the Next Action. Simplified = Less stress.

• Now add a Context to these actions and sort them by Context. Phone. Online. In Person. At The Shops. Whatever contexts suit you. Then, when you are in position to do something by Context, you know what your Next Action is. Sorting = Less stress.

There is a lot more to GTD than just this. But simply learning this process turned my world right side up. I keep a notepad and pen on me all the time. I write down whatever comes into my head. I turn it into Next Actions and Context. Then I forget them until I am in the right Context. GTD lets you clear your thoughts out, sort them out, and put them into productive steps. Just defining the Next Action was a big deal for me. Finishing work meetings by asking “What’s the Next Action?” was powerful. Clear simple progress.

Am I super productive? Hell no. But I am stress free, which is the point of GTD.

By Jon Power, Information Adviser at York St John University