The Art of GTD – The Core of GTD

Previous Posts in this series:

The context has been set, now it is time to get in to the mechanics of the process by following my personal journey towards mastery of GTD…

Big Book, Little Book, Focus List

My journey of cultivating personal organisation started early in the 2000s when most senior people in the professional environment still used a pen and paper to take notes. So, while the specific methods I used may not be directly applicable or relatable for some of the younger audience, the journey I went on still holds insight and the destination is relevant to all.

Big Book

By big book I mean an A4 spiral bound pad. The big book was my first book for organisation and I started off by using it to capture all my meeting notes, conversations (learnings to refer back to), and actions.

I would add to the book simply by opening it up and locating the next available space, then capturing my notes. While this was quick and efficient for storing information. Over time as I accumulated more actions, I found it increasingly difficult to keep track of what was done and still to do as I kept having to flick though the book to find the tasks and check them off.

I thought to myself there must be an easier way…

Welcome, the little book…

Little Book

With my note taking habit starting to become ingrained, I decided to create a separation between information for reference, and actions. As such, I acquired a A5 spiral bound pad – the little book.

I would still take notes in my big book, but then would periodically review these notes and write up the actions in to the little book. That way when it came to getting things done, I would simply need to refer to the little book and check things off as they went.

As I became more diligent in this practice, I found myself naturally capturing more and more actions. Mostly things that I needed to do, but also reminders for things I needed from other people and when I needed them to get these things done by.

Starting with just one monster list which was endlessly added to and ticked off, I brought further clarity to my organisation by each day writing a fresh list of things to do where I would always start by putting the most important things at the top. I did this for a good few months enjoying the clarity it gave me when I wrote the new list.

This approach was great, but I started to become frustrated with the admin overhead of writing a new list every day, especially when the list covered a whole page in my little book.

The outcome of the list was what I wanted, but the method needed to be improved…

Welcome, the focus list…

Focus List

My focus list was no more than a simple post it note, containing a short list of just what I would do that day.

The introduction of a focus list changed my habits with the little book. Each Friday afternoon, as my closing ritual for the week, I would write a new list of actions in my little book for the week to come. I would then grab a post it note and write on it the specific tasks I would complete on Monday. Then at the end of each working day, I would prep the focus list for the next working day.

I stuck the post it note on top of the list for this week in the little book, and from that point on the actions on the post it were all I needed to think about. If new actions came up during the day, they got added to the little book so I could make their way accordingly on to my focus list as needed.

If urgent things came up, they made it straight on to the focus list then got done and ticked off.

Ticking was a key for me. I enjoyed the act of ticking off the things on my focus list and felt extremely satisfied when all the tasks were complete. During each focus list prep session, I would then tick off on the master list all the things I had completed that day before selecting the next set of priorities to make the focus list for the next day.

Basic Rules for Focus List

Over time, I developed some simple rules for what went on to the list:

Time critical – This is the most obvious rule. What must be done next in order to hit my deadline.

Quick wins – Can I complete this task quickly so that I can get the day started with a win under my belt?

Is it Achievable? – Can the task be done in a day? If not, how can I break this task down in to smaller steps so that I can complete the step in a day? This rule is as more about how I managed by backlog of actions in my little book to make sure they would fit the criteria to make it on to the focus list.

These are just three simple yet essential rules for managing a focus list. I am going to build on these further when we explore habits for success.

The Rise of the Digital Age

The system I developed came to work incredibly well for me meaning that I has become confident in my ability to track and manage significant volumes of work while being assured that I would be able to focus on what mattered most and get things done on time. As I have come to learn though, things can always be improved.

Around 2016 a colleague of mine introduced me to an app called Todoist. Todoist is a task list management app that is available on both smart phones and as a website. While initially uncertain about moving to a digital solution (I liked my ritual of writing a list) I decided to give it a go. Now, 10 years in I can honestly say that shifting to leverage the power and efficiency of modern technology was completely the right thing to do.

The beauty for me was that I had already cultivated the habits of capturing my actions and prepping my list of things to do. Technology simply provided me a more efficient way of doing it. No more little book and focus list, that was all replaced by an app. The big book however lives on!

Today I use Todoist for both professional and personal organisation and even have some shared projects with my wife in there so that we can see a shared schedule and even set tasks for each other. Instead of having a focus list for just the day, I can schedule tasks and reminders as far in the future as I like.

The same habits and rules still apply though; I just let technology do the heavy lifting for me.

I strongly recommend you give this app a go and make the most out of some of the gamification features in there such as accumulating karma points for completing tasks and managing your backlog. The app is designed with the user in mind and the rewards systems are there to drive the right behaviours.

Hell, once I finish writing this tool, I will be ticking of my task in Todoist to mark it as done! 😊

What’s Next?

The foundation has been set, and in this we describe the habits that sit at the core of the GTD approach. This however is only the core, so in the next post we will move on to explore the broader suite of habits that compliment and amplify the GTD approach.