10. The Natural Planning Model from GTD

Transcript

Automatically transcribed and lightly edited. Timestamps omitted for readability.

Morten: Welcome to episode number 10 of the Getting Things Done podcast from GTD Nordic. I'm here with my friend and colleague Lars Rothschild Henriksen. Hi Lars.

Lars: Hi Martin. Good to be back for another episode. For those of you new, as we always do in each of these episodes, we'd like to remind you that the goal with this podcast is to help you really become a better GTDer. So that entails to be better at clearing your mind, be better at staying present, and really being better at achieving stress-free productivity. So we hope that you get value from these episodes regardless of your experience with GTD. GCD.

Morten: Yes, exactly. And today's topic is something we call the natural planning model. And as always, or not like always, but since we introduced this new— we would like to— new column of our podcast, if you may, software picks, where we will today talk about two interesting softwares which will help you achieve more friction-free workflows. The natural planning model is an interesting part of the Getting Things Done methodology, and because it helps you plan things. And we talk about the natural and unnatural planning model. And Lars, the unnatural planning, how does that occur, and have you seen it in the wild in your previous work life?

Lars: Yeah, yeah, certainly. I think most, most people have seen that in some way, shape, or form. It's where, you know, you're perhaps getting stuck somewhere. You are stuck somewhere in the process where, you know, the project is not progressing the way that things should be progressing. Problem curve. Yeah, exactly, exactly. So something shows up, and I think what often happens is that we then, depending on where you are in the project, but many people then look to become more organized, see if we can structure our way out of this. And that can certainly help, but often you find that maybe things are missing or you don't have all the pieces of the puzzle. So you maybe want to take a step back and see if you can get the bigger picture. So what are all the components in this? What should we try to be organizing?

Morten: I also see, I just want to comment on that because I've also seen that when we, you know, in work life is that when you see a problem, we have some, you know, some gut reactions. It's like we see a problem here, okay, we need more manpower, we need more people, we need, you know, overtime to solve this problem. Let's do more to solve this. And as you say, if you don't take a step back, how can you make sure you're making the right things? So, okay, back to you, Lars.

Lars: No, but that's a good point to add. And then when you try to do this, you know, getting all of the pieces of the puzzle to see what could we be working on, what are we trying to achieve, then that leads perhaps to the next question that should have taken place before that, which is, well, what are we really trying to achieve? What's the vision that we are trying to get to? So that would then be, Bringing that into people's mind and that alone has been very helpful for me trying to understand what we were trying to achieve. But even before that, there is another question which is the why. What's the purpose? Why are we actually doing this? Because that really aligns the team, especially from my past experience as an SAP consultant. You would always have these huge projects with a really big mix of teams and teams just have different perspectives. What they are trying to achieve just differ, but when we go all the way back to the purpose, what are we trying to achieve, then everyone aligns and can work much better together.

Morten: Yeah. I don't know if people can relate to this, but I can from before in my previous work life is that when you have a problem or an idea what you need to change and then you go into a meeting and you brainstorm about solutions, you're brainstorming about solutions from your side. Let's say you're in the marketing department, the solution could look like this. And if you're an engineer, it looks like this. If you're a salesperson, it looks like this. And project management can look at it like this. And when you come back 2 weeks later, there is just as many opinions of what is this, what are we trying to solve here as there is people in the room. And to get people aligned, it's very important to take it up to the purpose level. And can you just give us a short overview of the headlines of the 5 steps in the right manner or the right order now? Because now we have tossed them around for a while.

Lars: Yeah, exactly. So where we would start with the natural planning model is with the purpose, because that would be the starting point. Why are we doing this? So you would perhaps take one of your more complex projects and you would use the natural planning model to process it and really develop it and get deep into it. And the starting point would be the why. Why are you actually trying to do this? And also, what are the standards? If you were handing this project over to someone else, what are the boundaries that they would be working within? So for example, let's say that we were trying to find a house, to build a house for me and my family. Why are we doing this? Well, that would be to create a safe and happy home and then, you know, put a roof over our heads and really try to develop that part. And the standards would be to, you know, where, in what areas, where would we be looking to place the house, what are the time limits, how quickly do we have to find a house, what are the finances surrounding it.

Morten: The budget, yeah.

Lars: Yeah, that would be the standards.

Morten: Yeah. And just to comment on that is that when you know Why you're doing something is also there, which is really important. Why are we doing this? But also, what I call them, what is your, what framework do you have to work within? And then be very specific. It needs to be finished on Thursday, should be green, should be 2 meters long, cost no more than 10,000 kronor. Be as specific as you can. And then you come to vision, don't you? What happens there?

Lars: Exactly. So if we were to describe, you know, what does the world look like when this project has been completed? How would you describe that? And really, when we do the natural planning model, we describe this as the wild success scenario. So when things really worked out, everything, you know, nothing went wrong, everything worked out as planned. What would the vision for your project then be like? And really describe that. And that can be, you know, a few lines of description for how you want the world to look.

Morten: Let's say you are moving office to another location. Maybe purpose would be a nice new, well-functioning new office space with a better layout than we have now. And then you decide, describes the standards for what this looks like. And then the vision is the wild success that we've had a good move and good new offices, well-functioning offices where everybody is happy and productivity is rising with 20%. I don't know, the mild success, what does it look for you? And one of the things that I find very interesting when we coach either individual or groups or management teams in this, the natural planning model, I see that When you take it, you show them the, you know, you describe the purpose, the why, the standards, and the vision with wild success, suddenly this project is delegatable. If you want to delegate project to someone, if you take this purpose, why, standards, vision, and wild success either alone before they come or with the person you delegate to, it's a lot easier for this person to actually fulfill your you know, wild success, because the person will know what wild success looks like. I talked to a lot of executives who delegate projects and that are, you know, quite irritated on their colleagues or their, you know, the people who will make work for you. And they don't understand what I mean. And I said, really? I wonder why. And it's really because you don't tell them what wild success looks like and give them some real tools to achieve this wild success by understanding why and what standards need to be fulfilled according to your mind. But if you make the purpose with the why and the standards and the vision with the wild success, it's possible to delegate this to some, some persons or a group of people. As an executive, this, this is really powerful work. And then you can put it on a delegated project list and follow up the status of the project instead of having a lot of follow-up calls from this poor person who don't understand what you, what you really want to achieve here. So, but when you've done the purpose, vision, what's next, Lars?

Lars: So now we have a clear picture of where we want to be, where we're going. So now we can start to brainstorm. That's the third step, to really figure out, you know, what are all the components, what's all the stuff that needs to, to happen, what's the, you know, the delta between where you are right now and where you want this project to to go. So really, normally we would do this as a mind map, really just, you know, brainstorm everything, not in sequence, just as they show up. We need to— so sticking to your moving office example, we need to figure out how to transfer the phone lines and get the internet up and running and moving the furniture and, you know, getting new business cards with the right address and all that stuff that that comes with moving to a new office. So that would show up as part of the brainstorm.

Morten: Exactly. And the underlying question, what could be relevant, is important not to confide— confine yourself with it, because if you make this as a brainstorm session, it could be happening with a mind map or maybe just yellow sticky notes, blank pieces of paper. Make sure you capture everything and anything that could be relevant for this project. And when you've done that, the next stage is organize. What happens there, Lars?

Lars: Yeah. So now we have allowed the brain to just show up and come up with all the ideas about this. And then we start to organize, as you say. So now we start to structure things, figure out, well, what should we actually do first? What do we start with at this time? And really try to plan things a bit more. So in a similar way that we also do with the cap step and the, and the clarify and organize steps in the, in, in the 5 steps that we described earlier. Again, we also here allow the brain to, to really come up with all the good ideas before we start to analyze and, and try to, to sequence things. So that's, that's the separate 4th step called organize.

Morten: Okay, so now we've organized it into projects and sub-projects, and then we have to make sure that we make you know, make something, not just plan something. So then it comes to next actions. And for those who you follow the episodes before, what is our next action, Lars, for those who are stumbling into this?

Lars: The next physical visible action that you would take to, to, to move forward with this thing. So as usual with GTD, we want to define the next action for each of these things that we are now actively working on relating to this. This project. Yeah, so those are the 5 steps: purpose, the why, the standards, then the vision— wild success version of that— then you brainstorm all the stuff that could be relevant. Once you're done with the brainstorming, you can organize things and as usual define the, the next actions.

Morten: Great, so purpose, vision, brainstorm, and organize next actions gives you the quickest project planning model you can find. This is. And it's based on what we call common sense. When I talk to people about common sense, most people recognize common sense when it comes and kisses them in the forehead, myself included. When I understand this model, I go, "Ah, yeah, exactly. This is what we need to do. This is how we need to structure things to get things done." And for those of you who want to learn more about the natural planning model, we are doing level 2 courses, Project and Priorities, who are deep diving into this, and we give plenty of time for you to birth your, your, um, your project in a good way and to get start moving on them. And this model is really powerful for, for, you know, move the stock project also. This is very, very, very good.

Lars: Yeah. And people are, you know, as you say, especially in the level 2 seminars or when we, when we coach people, this is really really a powerful model and it really makes people excited. They're seeing projects that they, like you said, they could be stuck or they could be complex projects that really have a lot of moving parts. Then going through this model is just so valuable for people to think these things through. And it really, in my experience, often becomes very inspiring to go through this. Brainstorming part is fun on your own. And like I mentioned in the beginning, if you have multiple people, multiple teams. I know from some of the biggest companies in Denmark that they have sat down and worked through this model and it really, they found some things that they hadn't noticed before that really had a big impact on the project. So really have a look at this, give this a try. I think it's a very underutilized model from GTD. So really, really use that. And for those of you listening who have already participated in the Level 1, seminars. You may remember this from the methodology guide. So you have this list of steps in the natural planning model, and on the back of that, you have a project planning trigger list, which ever since I attended the Level 1 seminar back in the day, I've used that a lot. And that's— I know they also use this in companies in Denmark where they, for example, identified a group of stakeholders that they had not been aware of for a specific project. So that really helped them so much and really helped mitigate some huge risks that they might otherwise have faced.

Morten: Great, great, good. And this is a valuable model, use it. And it's in the book, read the book if you don't have the— well, if you can't come to a seminar, read the book and try it out, see if it works for.

Lars: You. And it's easy to go through as well, you know, it's chapter 3 where all of this is covered and it's, you know, you can work this model with GCC, GTDers and with non-GTDers because you don't have to understand the concepts to understand the value and see how this works. So that's helpful as well.

Morten: Yeah, and it really can stand alone as well as a separate tool in your productivity toolbox. So, okay, well, that was the natural planning model. Now we come to software picks of this episode, and Lars, you picked something to help you brainstorm clearly.

Lars: Yeah, so very much relating to the natural planning model steps that we just walked through. As I mentioned, on the brainstorming step, we often use a mind map as the way to capture all of these ideas. And my engineering background didn't really make me think that much about these mind maps. I like my lists, they were nice and structured. But certainly when I started using these mind maps, I noticed that You, you think differently, you come up with, with different things. So, so that really helped me a lot to, to start using this, this way of capturing. So I was looking for software to support this, and as many of you out there, I like to have my things digitally so I have with them with me all the time. I can search them, export them, work with them digitally. And Morten, you recommended this to me at some point in the past, a map Sorry, not a map, an app for my Mac called Mindnode. M-I-N-D-N-O-D-E. So that's a, it's a very simple tool. It's a very nice clean interface. I use it a lot for my, when I use a natural planning model and when I work with clients, when I work with people to walk them through this, I like to bring this up on the screen. You can go full screen. There are no controls. It's just a blank canvas with a box in the middle that you maybe describe the wild success scenario or just in the key terms of that. And then you just brainstorm. And it really is a nice program to work with. It can export to the official open-source standards as well. So you can export to other documents. You can even make it a small checklist if you would want to do that. But, you know, just for the basic mind mapping parts, I really enjoy that. It does come with a price tag, But for me, it was certainly worth it.

Morten: Yeah, and it's not a horrendous amount of money, but it's not for free. So, and I use this as well, and I just want to add that it's also an iPhone app, and it's also an iPad app, or I don't, I think it is a Plus app, so it goes for both iPhone and iPad. So if you feel you need to, or you feel you will function better if you can touch your project, this is How you can touch this also with your fingers. No, but I second that it's a good app and it's very clean and easy to use. And it does have some bells and whistles underneath the hood, but you don't have to use it if you don't want to use them. And it's good. And also have export to PDF so you can send your mind map to someone for this purpose as well. My software pick for this episode is Evernote. Evernote has been described as an all-bucket tool. I think that it's very important when you start using any tool that you define for yourself in your mind what am I really going to use this for. Some people already use Evernote as their GTD list system for their projects and next actions.. And for that purpose it can be good. And some people make it also as their reference system where you put your reference material and notes and documents. And for some people that works really well. For me it's not my GTD list system, it's only my reference system for notes I can take for paper-based notes I scan or send from another tool I use called Remarkable. And this is where I keep my reference material. This is normally very rarely for something I change all the time. My only exception, as I can say, are two at the moment where things change, is actually this podcast. We use an Evernote Lars and I, and that changes when we make changes to it and synchronizes so we can share the updates we make, so we can see what, what we are doing. And I also use this as a changeable document for, as a Master Trainer for the Nordic region, I have to follow up all our trainers, make sure they maintain their certification, and make sure that the trainers in training gets the right information at the right time and that they can follow their progress. And these are the notes that change over time, but also it's like I can use them as checklists. But else it's for me a place to toss whatever I think is valuable as reference material in the future. Like I send all— before I sent, I used it a lot for receipts. Now I found a another way of taking care of those. But for receipts, it's also a very good way. The Plus app, where you buy a subscription, you can have a very good powerful iPhone and Android app where you can also scan business cards. You can also get them then, the results integrated into your contacts database very easily or automatically at some time. Sorry, in some platforms, at least the Mac, that happens.. You can also use it for storing any kind of documents you want, and I would suggest that you only use it for what I call finished documents, like a signed contract. If you want to put something in there, make sure you don't want to change it a lot. In my experience, it works best, especially for documents, as the end place, the signed things, the things you've you've finished off, ticked off as really as a reference system. I also use it for meeting notes when I am in meetings with both my clients and my colleagues for taking notes, and it can also be used then to put scanned PDFs, for instance, you can use a scanner app inside the Evernote app and the font. Just take a photo of whatever you write down if you want to write down by hand, and you can put it in your meeting notes section, and you can find it very easily. So that's my software pick, Evernote, for reference material preferably, and maybe for some living, changing documents, but not Notes but not documents, that's my suggestion for you. Okay, you use the 7Note as well, Loris. Yeah, I use— how do you use it?

Lars: I like it as well. I mainly use it today to capture meeting notes. That's where I would go. So that would— I normally, the way I use it, I would put a star as the subject and I would write the subject. So that would be, you know, biweekly meeting with Morten and then the date and then I would take all the notes in there and once I had then at a later stage I would go through and process those notes and then I would remove the star as I would be certain that I had transferred everything into my system that I wanted to get in there. So that's my tiny hack to make sure that I capture all those notes. And otherwise I've used it for support material at times. I've used it for various scripts. I've used it for capturing notes, so that would be reference, capturing notes about different races that I've run, what to remember. So I've captured some coaching notes in there as well. Today it is mainly my capture bucket for meeting notes.

Morten: That's what I primarily use it for. And one little thing that when I look at Evernote now that I forgot when we when I start talking about it is that it has a very good— in the iPhone app, I'm sure that's same in the Android app, but the mobile app have a possibility to scan whiteboards. And that is really valuable when you have a client or you have a— you do brainstorm or you try to share something with the client. You can then take a photo and it will not only take a photo but also scan it so it's like white with black text or white with blue text, whatever your preference are. But black and white or, or color makes it a lot easier and it makes small, nice— instead of 1.5 gigabytes photos, you get 155 kilobytes. It's like a fraction of the megabyte. Small, easy-to-use notes also from the whiteboards.

Lars: And you can even capture on your Apple Watch if you have that. So just to add to that, when I last time recommended another app, Braintoss, I was searching for input from other GTDers and someone recommended to me that I would look into the Evernote app, and that can actually capture audio as well from your watch if you if.

Morten: You use that as well. Cool, cool. I just— that I didn't know. So good. Okay, um, I think we are at the end of this episode, Lars.

Lars: Do you agree with me? I think so. So normally we wrap up, uh, and, and I will do that as usual as well, uh, to, to mention to you that if you want to learn more about GTD, more about the work that we do, more about, you know, the, the various groups that we, um, manage to support GTDers in each of the countries, uh, go to gtdnordic.com. Uh, you can find links to all of the country websites for all of the Nordic countries. And as usual, if you find these episodes valuable, and we certainly hope you do, then we would really appreciate if you could leave a rating on iTunes or perhaps refer a colleague to also listen and learn more about GCD.

Morten: Okay, great. Thank you, Lars, and thank you for listening. Hope you will hear— you'll continue listening to us. Hope you find this valuable, and until next time, have a great and stress-free productivity. Goodbye. Bye everyone.