One of the biggest obstacles to getting more productive is getting started. Here’s a two minute guide to Getting Things Done (GTD).
1. Capture– Get all your to dos into inboxes. e.g. mail goes in one spot, verbal to dos go in your notebook etc.
2. Process– Go through all your inboxes and empty out anything in your head onto a to do list. Here’s how to filter your list:
- Delete- If you wont need it, get rid of it.
- File- file away anything you’ll need later- but dont need now
- Delegate- if someone else should be doing it- let them know. keep a to do item to follow up
- Defer- Is this task not important enough to be done soon? Put it on a “someday/maybe” list. Review the list weekly.
- Do now- Is it a task that will take 2 minutes or less? Do it. That includes putting appointments in your calender, adding addresses to your contact list etc.
3. Do– Do your to do list.
4. Weekly review– Be on top of your to do list.
Of course there’s much more but if you start with this then you’re already ahead of most people.