15. Tweak your GTD system

Transcript

Automatically transcribed and lightly edited. Timestamps omitted for readability.

Morten: Welcome to another episode of the Getting Things Done podcast from the GTD Nordic. I am Morten Røvik, and I'm here with my friend and colleague Lars Rothschild Henriksen. Hello, Lars.

Lars: Hi, Morten. Happy to be back once again and doing another episode with you. And if you are listening for the first time to this podcast, our goal is to help you learn or become better GTDers, become more productive and less stressed in your work and life. And if you want to be refreshed or need an introduction to GTD, then we recommend that you head on back to the first episodes. Episodes 1 through 6 will cover the basics of, of Getting Things Done.

Morten: Great. And since we started, we have quite a, well, in our own eyes, good success with this podcast. How many episodes, sorry, how many downloads are we on now?

Lars: I think the latest stat was somewhere over 16,000 downloads with these first, at the time of recording, I think we have about 10 or 11 episodes out. So it's been extremely positive. And thanks to those of you for sending back emails to us and giving tips on episodes. Episode content, we really appreciate it.

Morten: Yeah, really, really. This is, if you want to encourage us, reach out to us where you can find us online and give us a beep. We are very happy when you, when people appreciate what we do, and it will also, you know, motivate us to make more and better content for you.

Lars: Yeah, and you will find the, the email address as well for feedback in the show notes of each podcast episode if there's something you want to, to tell us.

Morten: Yeah, and iTunes comments, always welcome. Thank you in advance. So today's episode is how to tweak your system, your GTD system, how to tweak it. And how would you approach the GTD system for someone who's really fresh to GTD? What would you give them for advice, Lars, when they start out and And I don't know, it's kind of in the cards here that we are telling you, you can tweak your system, but maybe when you start out, what is the start-out position for GTD when it comes to your system?

Lars: Well, I think the way I would describe it would be that when people first learn GTD, I explain to them that this is a framework. For managing all of your commitments in a way to, to make you more productive, less stressed, get all this stuff out of your head. We know this framework works. It's been used for so many years now for millions of people, but it also requires that you make it your own, that you adapt it to the ways that you work. And there are many different requirements that you will then identify when you start off using GTD and also as you progress with your experience with GTD and as the world changes around you, you change your job, or technology advances, then you need to again take a step back, reflect, and see how you can tweak your system to make it work optimally for you. Because it really is so important that it is tailor-made for you. So it's definitely worth taking a step back and reflecting and fixing that.

Morten: Yeah. One of the things I would recommend people to do is that when you set up your system for the first time, You know, don't marry that system, don't marry your list, but play with them. Have a little playful manner with them. But, but beware, you can really mess up your system if you, if you make the wrong tweaks. And with that, I mean, a lot of people tweak their system out of not becoming GTD again. There are some core moves in GTD you can't not to use. And for instance, one of the pitfalls I've had in my list systems that I really want to tell people about very quickly is, before I was a heavy user, or when I started using GTD, I used due dates to call them to my attention. And if you use due dates on something and the reality happens and you can't do what you plan to do today, then you have to, at the end of the day, you have a lot of reds, overdue in your lists, and then you have to renegotiate every one of them. And that can be difficult. So that is one of the tweaks I would recommend don't use unless you really need to put something to your attention. It's like, my world will go up in flames if I don't do this today. Maybe even better, every morning or every afternoon before you go home, write the 3 most important things I just have to do tomorrow or my world will go up in flames. How about you, Lars? Have you tried due dates?

Lars: Yes, I think like most people I have. I think overall the issue is that if you put due dates on everything, then nothing really has due dates because it doesn't really make sense anymore that they are due on any given day. So you tend to mix things that actually have a due date due date with things that you would like to do on any given day. And obviously, the end result will be that you might not get the right things done. You don't have a clear overview when you look at your calendar or your lists. So it really is a messy way to do it. So fortunately, there are other ways to give you the overview so you can make the right choice on what to get done.

Morten: And one thing I would recommend people to do is to try and listen to your inner voice talking to you when you look at your system. If your inner voice says, I'm getting nauseous at looking at my lists, then it's time to start looking at it with a little, let me call it, harder eyes and say, what is wrong with this? One thing that we must not forget is that if you have too much in your system, if you allow too much stuff in your system that you're not committed to do, or someday maybes, if you are Like I tell people, if you don't have on the execute part where you engage with your reality, if there's not a balance between what comes into your list and what goes, you know, is ticked off, you're probably overcommitted to yourself and your list grows bigger and bigger and they get more and more uncomfortable to look at. So maybe a good idea is to start listening to your inner voice saying that, am I attracted to my lists? Am I attracted to my system? Or do I need to make some tweaks to make it work better? And the most important tweak, I would guess, is say no more often.

Lars: That's certainly a very good tip. And I can, I can recognize that from my own world as well. I really, as I've also mentioned to you before, I really try to minimize the number of active projects because the more active projects I have, the more next actions I will have. And the more next actions I have, I will have more to choose from when I then sit down to work. So I really want to make sure that I only present myself with Yeah, the right amount of information for me to make the right choice.

Morten: Yeah, exactly. And there is a— I've shown you this before, Lars, but the listeners can't see this, but I have a big red button saying no on my desk. And I give this to some of my coaching clients who I think might benefit from saying no more often. If I press it like now, for.

Lars: The last time, no.

Morten: To remind me that. You remind me that we are, you know, often people who are into GTD are yes-sayers and they understand that. And if you are a yes-sayer with a piece of conscience, you're pulled into GTD without— you don't have a lot of— if you understand what GTD is, you will be pulled in. But you have to say more often no to say Yes to the right things.

Lars: I think we need to add that to the GTD shop to start selling that. That sounds good.

Morten: Yeah. Maybe we should. That's a good idea. But if you say that, well, I have a steady inflow to my system, that is, I can get through it, I'm not overcommitting myself, then it's just tweaking to make it work better for you. So that you remove the friction in your system and your lists to make them work better. So, can you give me or give us and the listeners an idea of what tweaks are out there? What would you recommend people to start with?

Lars: Well, a lot of different tweaks happen out there and that really is, you know, take a step back and figure out how can we help you figure out the right things to do in the most easy way possible. I think that could be a good starting point. And we have the default lists that many of the listeners out there will be using, like Agendas, Calls, Computer, At Home, At Office, et cetera. And those are excellent lists to start from. But how can we then tweak some of those lists to make them work better for you? As an example, I know David once showed, I think in one of the calls, that he had 4 different computer lists, for example. So whether he was offline or whether they were, you know, there were different sort of adaptations of those lists. So at least for most of the people that I work with, the main lists from the book, from the methodology, are a good starting point. And then we go from there. And the natural place to start to tweak is based on the limiting criteria. So when you are choosing what to do, you want to look at where, you know, the context as a starting point. That's why we have these context-based lists at computer, agendas, at office, et cetera. But the second one is then time available. So maybe it makes sense for some of those lists, if they become longer, then maybe tweak them into sublists. So how, and how can you do that? Well, that could be based on the time that you need for that specific next action. So for example, if you often have 10 minutes before the next meeting, you'll find yourself, oh, I need to figure out what to do right now and be productive in this time, then maybe a computer-10 minutes might work well for you. I've seen that with coaching clients. I've also seen the opposite, computer-2 hours, so meaning that whenever he actually was successful in finding 2 hours in his calendar, he knew that he needed certainly to go to that list because it was often the case that he could not go to any of those next actions. So that could be a starting point with the time available. And also the third of the limiting criteria is the resources, the energy available for this. So some people, I know a couple of people in the GTD Nordic companies, including myself, we actually have this option to include for a next action, whether it's a high-energy task, whether it's a normal task, or whether it's a low-energy task, something I can do Friday afternoon, not much left in the resources in my brain, but I can still want to be productive. Then I pick from there. Well, it's called zombie list in my system. That's the one that I go to. And similarly for the high-energy stuff, it's the more creative tasks, drafting an article, for example. I will often do it when I'm suddenly inspired to do it, but if I want to take a step back and decide, then this high-energy tag will help me choose the right thing to work on. What about you?

Morten: No, no. Well, I tried the high-low energy. My brain dead list was a tag in my system for a long time, but I abandoned that because that didn't work for me. But this is a good example that it works for Lars but not for me. So it's kind of, if you take something and you throw it to the wall, see what sticks, what works for you. What is it? You have to try and you have to play with the system, be playful, try out and feel. How does it feel to make this? Does it help me or does it restrict me.

Lars: And for me, I added one, one, you know, just as, as an example of something that was not really based on the context list. I have a tag called evening. So when I want to do something in the evening, it might be work related, but more often it's just stuff that I want to get done on a personal level. That list for me has been really helpful if I, you know, feel energized and want to do something for an hour after the kids are in their beds. I'll go to that list, and that's actually been a very helpful list for me to be able to, to pick from.

Morten: Yeah, one of the tweaks that I've been doing and playing around with is inside for the context lists, is that when we use Agenda for lists, we talk often, Lars and I talk often with Espen in Trondheim, and I talked to our managing director, Espen, and I also talk to Jukka Bachmann in Finland often, and we have agenda lists for each other. So when we get an idea, we park it there, or we need to talk about something. And because I talk to quite a lot of people about the same thing, I must make sure that I'm semi-intelligent in this. I remember if— did I talk to you about this or did I not? So in the agendas list, I've made a tag for Laris. So agenda for Laris. And then I have 3 tasks, sorry, 3 tags on the agenda list that I can add is that I can inform about, tell you about for your information. I can tell you this for your information. And then I have raise. I will raise this with you for make sure that we discuss this for discussion. And then I have a tag for follow-up. So in this way, I hope I can seem semi-intelligent when I talk to people and not truly forgetful, but it's easier that way. And then I just move the tags around. So after I informed about something and maybe some, you say, I want to do something about it, then it's a follow-up tag instead. Instead of any form of notes. And that makes sense to me. That's a tweak I've done on my context lists.

Lars: Yeah. Looking at my list now, as you mentioned that, that's actually a very good tip. I'll have to look into see if I can— it makes sense for me to adopt that. I'm just looking at my list now, and I have some computer actions, for example, that require a specific laptop. So I have both a MacBook and the Surface. So some things I want to do on the Surface, because if I need to draw something, for example, that won't work for my MacBook. So that goes on a separate list. I also have for my, the summer house that we own, I've started to split that list into inside and outside tasks. So especially at this time of year, we're recording this in December, it's getting cold and some days it makes sense to do some stuff outside and some days it doesn't. So since these lists started to get long, it's an old summer house, so that's why I added this tag. And it's actually been very helpful for me also to include my kids in some of the stuff that I do, they always want to help. So having those lists more easily accessible to pick from has been really useful for me.

Morten: Good. And it's all about, does it work? How does it feel? Does it give me more overview, more control? Do I get less confused this way? And I wonder if we could move on to the The divider of project lists. I have some— I think I mentioned some of these before, but they're worth rementioning. If you have a lot of projects that you know you must do at some point in time, or you think that you shall do them, this is, you know, you're committed to them, but there is not enough time now. I used with luck on my part, but also on clients' parts, the list called Projects on Hold, which means these are projects you will do at some point in time, but they're in between someday maybe and active projects. And it is a sanity tool to make sure that you have not too much on your active project list so that there is, you know, the flow through of new things that comes in that are ticked off. At the end as engaged and done. But sometimes life throws you opportunities, things you know you must do something about, but you can't do it right now. Then maybe it's a good idea to have a project on hold list in addition to the someday maybe. Someday maybe is even vaguer. It is someday maybe I will make this. And then projects on hold are projects you are going to, you're committed to do, but not right now because You can't have too much on the plate because then you can't pat yourself on the back when you go home because you never finished. You must feel that you finished at some point. Have you tried projects on hold?

Lars: Yes, I clearly remember when I saw that tip for the first time in the Level 2 course, when I attended that as just a normal course attendee or seminar attendee. That really was, you know, an eye-opener for me that, oh yeah, that, that that was certainly missing in my system, having that specific place because— and I've used it last week with a coaching client that they were hesitant to put something on a list called something including the word maybe because it was not a maybe. We had to get that done. It just wasn't active right now. So learning to work that list a bit different and have a sub-list that signals that this is something that I need to actively, or more actively, I guess, consider whether to, to activate now for each time I look at that list. So yeah, definitely a good list to, to add.

Morten: Yeah. And another list in the— under projects that I've seen with, like, especially if you have a lot of people you are delegating projects to, um, you will, of course, when you make this, you will do the, the natural planning model. Of course, we've covered the natural planning model before. Do you remember which episode, Lars?

Lars: On top of your head? No, I don't, but you'll find it somewhere back in the list of episodes that we have already released.

Morten: Could you indicate that in the show notes for this episode? Yes, include the natural planning model episode number because this is very good when you delegate a project to someone. You want to make sure that they don't come back and ask a lot of questions. You should be clear and clarified in a manner so that people really understand what this is about, why are we doing this, etc., to make sure that they feel comfortable of executing on this project, coming back with a result. And then, but if you are in that position, delegated projects is a good list to have. Give them a name and give them a tag so that you make sure that you can follow people up.. And maybe you want to add the tags that I used in my context list when you have people there. For instance, I need to inform about, I need to raise and discuss, and then to follow up, and maybe even finished if you want to have a record of what you've— what's happened in the projects. And that's an idea that you can use for delegated projects. What's the status here? Do I need to inform something, follow up, or raise? It makes it a lot easier to, to manage delegated projects. Are you— you don't have a lot of people to delegate to, I think.

Lars: Let's see. Not today, no, no, that, that, but I used to, certainly, as a project manager, a test manager within the IT world. Having that list of delegated projects was just absolutely essential for me to maintain the overview and also, you know, very very helpful when you have the one-on-ones. I would, of course, check my waiting for list. I might have something on the agendas, but just going through that list of delegated projects was, was very helpful. And I think also very much appreciated. You know, we— that helped both me and the direct reports of the people that I worked with have a clear overview of what they had committed to deliver. And they saw that I had that clear overview as well. And an interest in making them succeed in their tasks. So I think everyone benefited from having.

Morten: That list set up. Yeah, definitely. And the feeling of that you're actually seen and remembered what you committed to is also good for anyone. We all want to be seen for what we're doing. And now there's a project manager or the boss or something like this, you don't forget. And this is both, I think, both scary but also good. The boss never forgets. He gave me this project and he followed this up and, you know, it's important for him. I must sit up straight and do my job, but at the same time it's good because I feel seen and supported in my job. So yeah, that's delegated projects. And do you have any other?

Lars: I'm just looking at— that reminded me when you said the projects on hold, I'm reminded of a list that I have added, which is also a sublist of the someday/maybe lists. And I stole this from this idea from, from Kelly Forrester on the forums or in one of the GTD Connect webinars, I think, back in the day. She has a list called When-Then. So when-then. And this list holds stuff that when something happens, then I want to do something. So I, I was always looking to see if there were ways to be reminded at the right times, but just some things are just more vague. So So for example, in my, in my system now, I have these when-then lists set up for me to be reminded just when I do my weekly review. I will walk through that and I will check stuff like when I have a speech in a specific city, I've promised someone to let them know if they are able to know if it's an open speech they can go to. When we start selling GCD system folders, I have on my list a couple of people who have asked to be notified because they really wanted those. Things like that, just when something shows up. That's clever. It's actually a very nice list when I need to stay in Copenhagen for the night. I have a couple of checklists that I want to run through, people I want to meet for dinner maybe, or things I need to remember about booking the hotel if I found a good hotel, or things like that, stuff that I want to be reminded about. About things that show up in my life at random times. So that when-then list has been really good for me.

Morten: And I guess this is something you see every time you make a.

Lars: Weekly review. Exactly. So that's part of the someday-maybe list review is that this list then shows up.

Morten: And that's a good segue also to our tweak your weekly review checklist. We decided to talk about this. I've, with luck, and I would recommend this to anyone who thinks sometimes it's difficult to focus on GTD, to remember that actually you're pulled into email the minute you get into the office and you feel, oh, this GTD, oh yeah, I must remember this, yes, okay, you know. And to have a physical reminder is to make a physical checklist you keep on your desk in your office. And I've seen when I coach people, this has been very highly successful, it works. So for instance, a daily checklist that's divided in morning routine, midday routine, when I travel routine, and before I go home routine. So you can actually grab it when you're on the go. And remind me, what is the— and the checklist is like you make, for instance, Review my calendar for today and tomorrow. Check. When you've done that, look at my project lists. Check. Clarify and organize my email. Check. And this is what you do in the morning. You can also add, of course, if you want to, the first, maybe empty my head. You know, sit down and write stuff down. And to have these checklists are helping you, are beneficial in many ways, but one is that you are a physical reminder that you actually committed to do something about GTD. And this is a good reminder for you to get yourself going with the good routines. And you can also then put on the same list or another list your checklist, paper-based checklist for your weekly review. For those of you who've been trained in GTD in a seminar or in coaching or read the book, there is a checklist for what you should cover. I suggest that you look through them or they are available at gettingthingsdone.com for downloads, the system guides which have the checklist. They're also available at produktivnordige.no if you want to buy them in the Nordic region. I'm sorry, produktivnoegi.no is only for Norway. We recently rediscovered that it's only for— we don't have the possibilities to sell outside Norway there. But so gettingthingsdone.com for a set of guides, for system guides, download them and look for if you want to have a checklist for starters, if you don't find it in your book or what is this GTD, maybe you ask. So maybe this is a good idea to start. And then the checklist is tweakable. I would suggest that you look at them. I changed the order of some of the things. One of the last things I do instead of one of the first things is to bring my email down to zero. This happens in the suggested checklist.

Lars: Very.

Morten: Early in the list. And I changed that because that didn't work for me. Have you done any changes, Lars, to your list?

Lars: I have mostly expanded the standard list. So that's at the top of my weekly review checklist, just to remind myself what some of the steps included. So I've adapted it a bit with, you know, getting a good cup of coffee, enabling Do Not Disturb on my Mac and iPhone. I have a specific playlist that I start. So those are the initial steps. And then just reminders for myself when it says get into zero, for example, that's one of the steps. Which inboxes do I mean? So, so to make sure that I don't miss any. And also especially the review action lists. I remember at one point where I was, you know, well, that's, that's reviewing my action list. I'll go into my system and I'll review them and then I move on. But I also had maybe some emails in my action folder. I maybe had, you know, some activities in our CRM system. So, so not limiting myself to just the list, but actually remember all the places where I have reminders of actions to be taken.

Morten: Yeah. One of the things that I've had that's, you know, and this is highly tweaked. So for those of you who want to be, you know, clean GTDers, this is a little maybe, you know, heresy. But one of the things I've made really for make it easy for myself is like do not disturb is the first thing I do on my mobile and my Mac. And then I make it really easy to get started because I sometimes I have difficulties starting with GTD, but it's kind of empty read-in folder into physical inbox, empty wallet into inbox and read, open, read through notebook after meetings for actions and then write them into your program. This is, you know, make it easy to get started. That was important for me.

Lars: Yeah, but that works. You know, that's next actions that works. And it also reminds me from a coaching client that I worked with last week. She had just read a somewhat famous nudging book in Denmark right now. And she was spotting so many similarities back to that. And how do you get people to do things? Well, you make make it easy. And that's exactly what we do with GTD and that's exactly what you're mentioning now.

Morten: Yeah. I've been asked many times what you do when you don't want to do a task like clean the bathroom. And I said, make it easy for you. Don't commit to clean the bathroom. Commit to fill a bucket with water, warm water, put some soap in it and a sponge or whatever you use to clean your bath and then go inside the bathroom with that bucket. That's all you commit to and see what happens. Yeah. Once you're in there with your bucket, it's, yeah, okay, I can, I can clean a little, and then suddenly, whoops, you're finished.

Lars: Yeah, trick yourself. Yeah, exactly. And, and, um, and, and, and adding to those standard steps, I think a lot of GTDs will tend to have their own edition of a weekly review checklist, so For me, I've— it's grown a lot over the years, and it's really one of the key things that helps me hang on to the Weekly Review because I know there is so much stuff in there that I just need to see and get done, perhaps. So that certainly helps me hanging on to it. And, you know, there are different sections that I've added, you know, questions for myself, stuff I need to do this week, or habits that I'm establishing. Well, that's then a reminder list for me, maintaining the right focus from a business perspective, stuff I need to reflect to reflect on. You know, I can sometimes become too much of a perfectionist, so I have a checklist for me to say, or an item on my checklist to see, has there anything, you know, something shown up in this week where my perfectionism has worked against me? So if so, then take a note and put that in the inbox. So that's an example of a specific thing that's on my list. So just these reflections, and then at the end, my treat, which is a folder with URLs, with websites that I'm only allowed to see once I have done my weekly review. So that's the carrot at the end of the review.

Morten: That's your hot chocolate beverage there.

Lars: Exactly, exactly. My.

Morten: Digital fix. Well, that's good. What's not been— I hope— well, it might be a digital fix for people listening to this podcast. I hope we have helped you. And we are now on 32 minutes something, and we didn't think we would fill this episode with a lot of content. So you see, open your mouth and talk to GTD, it's something falls out. So will you take us out today?

Lars: So to wrap up, we always mention where you can go to find more information, and that is gtdnomadic.com for all of you listening in the Nordic region, you will find our Facebook groups, other GTD meetups, other groups on social media. You can find us, Morten and myself, on the various platforms, et cetera. And if you're outside the Nordic region, then gettingthingsdone.com is a good starting point for you to find the franchisee in your local country. And as mentioned, we really hope that you find these episodes valuable. And if you do, we really appreciate it. If you share the podcast with a colleague or, or rate us on iTunes.

Morten: Good. Thank you everyone for listening in, and thank you Lars for doing this with me, and, um, see you next time.

Lars: Bye everyone.

Morten: Bye-bye.