52. Listener questions #6: What is a project & how to make time to learn GTD

Transcript

Automatically transcribed and lightly edited. Timestamps omitted for readability.

Morten: Hi and welcome to another episode of the Getting Things Done podcast from GTD Nordic. I am Morten Røvik, and I'm here as always with my good friend and colleague Lars Rothschild Henriksen. Privet, Lars.

Lars: Hello, Mr. Røvik. Happy to be back and looking forward to doing another episode with you. For those of you who have not listened to the podcast before, we record these episodes to support you in learning GTD or becoming even better GTDers so you can experience the benefits of GTD. And we really hope that you find these episodes valuable regardless of how experienced you are with GTD. And if you're new to GTD, we always recommend you go back and listen to the first 6 episodes. We talk about the 5 steps there, and that'll be a good refresher or introduction to getting things done.

Morten: Today's episode is a listener questions episode, and we have two listener questions that we will answer today. And Lars, will you read us the first question?

Lars: Sure. So the first question is from Oliver, who wrote to us saying, I'm loving your podcast. It's been great for getting and keeping me going with GTD after falling off the wagon for a few years. So Great to hear that. Thanks, Oliver. One thing I struggle with and may be good for an episode is to talk about projects in GTD. What is a project? What does it look like? How to record them and tie up the next actions? Keep up the good work, Oliver. What would you respond?

Morten: Oh, that's a lengthy question, but just to start with the basics here for those of you who are fresh to GTDs and then a refresher for those who have been doing this for a while, we have 5 steps of getting things done. The first is capture everything that has your attention that you might want to do something about or that you might have a worry about. And then the second and the third is clarify what does it mean to you and organize it somewhere you will find it. And then clarify would then end up to be 2 different things in general. Just an overview is that, that this is a desired outcome/project and a next action that will move that project or next— sorry, decide outcome forward. So, and we— I kind of gave away some of the, the keys here for the decide outcome is very important for you to define what does done look like. So for instance, if I have something that shows up on my radar that I do not know exactly what I need to do. Some things are very evident what I need to do, some, you know, what I need to achieve, what my desired outcome is, but some, some are not. So take time to, to reflect on what is this and what does it mean to me. It's an important question. So what does it mean to me, this thing that is in front of me? And we might want to give some examples after, but just to give the overview first. And then when you understand what it is, what it means to you, you, you might want ask, what do I want to be different about this when this is finished? And we will call that kind of that finishing line.

Lars: How's that?

Morten: How does that look? How should the, how should the future look different than now? And then the next section would be, how, what is the first visible physical next action that you can do in one sitting that where you have everything you need? Anything you would like to add to that definition, just overview, Lars?

Lars: No, I think that's a great starting point. I think, you know, just to frame the project definition a bit more, anything that requires more than one action step to complete and up to 12 months timeframe. And perhaps also refer you back to the first episodes, as I mentioned just before, where we talk more in detail about clarify and organize., and that would be steps then 3 and.

Morten: 4.

Lars: Yeah, so it can really be anything.

Morten: Yeah, go ahead. So why we— I would suggest that what we do is that we just make up a couple of examples so we can, you know, answer the questions that it's, you know, giving, you know, an overview. So I know that you have a summer house, Loris, and this summer house Let's pretend that it needs— you are capturing a new paint summer house, because you want to paint the summer house again. That might be something you're smiling, maybe.

Lars: You'Re— That is an active project indeed, yes.

Morten: Okay, I didn't know that, but okay, so that makes it a good case. So, if you look at that, then what is it? What does it mean to you? You know, if you don't do this, what's going to happen?

Lars: Yeah, besides the visual side of things, it also, it's an old wooden house, so it really needs to be painted to ensure that it lasts for many years to come. So it's, it's just to, since we're now anyway picking up this project, it's a project that we have, you know, it's a shared project with my wife and I. We're both working on this, working to make it happen. A lot of actions have been, you know, a part of this planning when we should do it, buying all the paint, all that, all that kind of stuff. And now, yeah, we're, we're hoping the, the weather will be okay on Sunday and we'll get that fresh paint of, coat of paint on it for the.

Morten: For the first time. So, so what is the project name? What's the name? How did you name your monster?

Lars: I think it's named to just, you know, finalize painting the summer house, something like that.

Morten: Okay. And one of the things that I would like to add to this, I just listened to, to short podcast from the official Getting Things Done podcast where David talks about naming your projects. Why is it important? And he mentioned— let's see if I can paraphrase this— he mentioned two different cultures around the world where if you name something, you get power over this thing you name. And another culture around the world somewhere where people will not give you their names because if you give them, if you get their names, you get power over them. So, and this might be, you know, translated into that actually if you name something, you can get power over it. And I have a coaching client who has worries, you know, about the future, about projects that's complicated that this person don't know exactly how to handle. I mean, we talk about this in naming your monsters. And if you have a monster in your world, you know, either something you procrastinate that you don't know, you know, you are pushing in front of you, or you have a scare about the naming it, you know, defining it, telling you exactly what is this and what does it mean to me? What do I need to do about this? How should the future be changed? What would be different when this is finished? What's my finishing line? If you use those questions helping you then to define it, it will be better. You're all better off. Do you have any comments on this?

Lars: No, that certainly makes sense. And I think to add to that, you know, Oliver's question is really, really broad. What is a project and what does it look like? I think if we, if we go to what does it look like, it can take some different forms. I think overall when we start off with GTD, we would recommend having a simple list of all of your projects. And this can be just one flat list. I think for most people when they start to build that list, will be sort of a natural way to group things, work projects and personal projects perhaps. But having that plain list of projects is just so helpful and so valuable. I did deliver a seminar last week and just to start to build this list, people can really see the value in this and starting to get that overview that a project list provides. And one of the things that we then don't keep in that list is project support material. So this could be all the relevant data that you might want to pick up and have a look at when you when you want to think about the project. So you might have a project plan, you might have some— I had a lawyer in the last seminar, so she had some case files, materials that she needed to review, things like that, things that you need to bring up and have a look at. That's what you then have as support material. So we don't want to mix that in there. We want to keep a nice clean projects list because that's so valuable, so nice to get an overview, run through that list, and also make sure that each of them has a next action somewhere in your system.

Morten: Yeah. Yeah. And then when you say a flat list, I just want to elaborate on that because, you know, when you say flat list, some people go, huh, what is that? Imagine you just have a piece of paper and you, or you have two pieces of paper, one for work project and one for personal project, and just write them down on a list. And this can then be transferred or just use a note in a notes app. Could be as simple as that, where you record your desired outcome. And forgive people, you know, that there's— we use verbs in both next actions but also in desired outcomes to show ourselves when it's finished. So if you're going to use a verb for your— I'm sure you've, you know, just emphasize on that. What's the verb for the summer house? Finalized. Finalized. Okay, so we would say that the verbs you will use in a project is a little different because it's kind of like milestone more when something is finished. So it could be finalized, could be finished, could be what?

Lars: Yeah, publish, complete, have approved, and things like that.

Morten: Reviewed, something that's kind of like a longer process words.. But now that we have recorded that personal project on the personal project lists, painting the summer house finalized, or something like that. Some people actually then like to add a personal flair. They like to add a— especially if you are not attracted to a project. And there are two things you can add to make it a little more attractive. And some people, myself included, especially when I am not attracted to something, a little emoji goes a long way. So kind of like a smiley face or, you know, happy smiley, you know, something like this. Or even paint a picture of what it would be for me when this is finished. And for instance, we are sitting on the— we sit on the veranda. Outside the summer house, watching the sun go down with a glass of wine and remember how good life is. If you have that as a picture, maybe it's a more attractive picture than the work of painting the summer house. I don't know.

Lars: No, but I have a coaching client who does that for, I think, pretty much all his projects, that he will have a project title that defines the desired outcome, but he does add some kind of wording, some kind description on, you know, to elaborate to himself when primarily I think when he does his weekly review and he walks through each of the projects, there will be in his setup, there will be a small note for each of the projects that he can then look at. And, you know, there'll be a description somewhat similar to what you just described. And then for him, that's really helpful.

Morten: And Getting Things Done is a lot about finding out what works for you. So we give you the kind of the guidelines and the framework for methodology gives you the structure you need. And it helps you then to use this structure and then adapt it to how your brain works. So if you're attracted to emojis, you know, if you need a photo where you Photoshop the finished painting onto the house, whatever works.

Lars: For you. Yeah. So that continues to amaze me. You know, small things, again, a lot of things in GCD are really small things and they have big impact. In the right strategic places. And this is one of the, you know, emojis can be one thing. I tend to use it more when I want to get an overview of things like areas of focus that I want to see as part of a project list, for example. I help myself with emojis. I had a coaching client as well a while back who was really, it was so important for him that we used different colors. So he had multiple businesses that he was running. So to get that clear overview, where does this project belong to? We had to go in there, we had emojis, we had colors, different ways to set up just to signal easily to him that he knew exactly what this was about. So those kinds of things, you know, to be honest, coming from there as an engineer, coming from that kind of background, I would just think I just need a plain list, you know, text black on white. But this really does matter more to some people than to others. But certainly, you know, try it out.

Morten: Play with it just like you said. Play, experiment. That's, I think that's the key word. So, okay, so now we have, you know, kind of shown you hopefully what our desired outcome is, our project. And then to move that project forward, we need next actions. And can you help me define a next action?

Lars: Just refresh that again. So that's what you just mentioned with regards to the next physical visible action that we might see you take to move this thing one step closer to what your desired outcome is. So coming back to your verb example from before. This will be more direct verbs describing a physical action, meaning call, write, you know, go to the hardware store, things like that. And then define the actual next action. So in my— to stick with the painting the summer house, and now I really have to make sure that we get that done soon because I'm sure people will be asking me about it. The next action for that is simply that we just want to check check the status on the walls, I think, when we get there, just to make sure that when there's no more preparation work, that we can just go ahead and paint it. And that leads to the next step in then deciding, okay, so where does the next action go? And like you were hinting at before, Morten, we might have another piece of paper just to capture these, these next actions. But in this case, I know exactly when this has to be done, and that's when the calendar comes into play. So this is booked on the calendar for Sunday when we, when we get.

Morten: To go to the the summer house. So, but if it didn't go to the calendar, it will go on the next actions list. So, we use calendar as a way to prioritize to-do stuff, set aside time to do things that you just need to get done. And, but if it does, if it's not urgent or super important, it could go on Next actions lists, and we would then describe, as you said, Loris, the next action physical, visible. And I also, for help people to understand, and this could be a qualifier for you, do I have a next action is, can somebody see me do this? Can I, can some person observe me do this? That helped me a lot when I learned GTD back in the day. And the second question I would ask is, 'Can I do it in one sitting?' If it's not done in one sitting, maybe you should just say, try to chop it up even more into more physical, visible next actions. And then the third qualifier: 'Do I have everything I need?' And a lot of people then go there and they understand that the first next action they are supposed to do is not what they think it is. Like, change car tires is one of my favorites. Change to winter tires. And you end up understanding that actually you might— maybe you need to buy new winter tires. And then how do I understand this? Well, I need to understand what's the depth of my tire grip. And then how do I find this? Well, I need to buy, you know, one of these measure thingies that I need to do this. And where do I get that? Well, I go to a hardware store. Okay, so you have an errand to go to the hardware store and buy one of these thingies to measure the depth of your of the grip of your tires. And that's the next action. And if you don't have that qualifier, do I need, do I have everything I need? Maybe you should have that qualifier first. I don't know. Does that make sense to you, Lars?

Lars: Absolutely. No, and it's a very Norwegian example to go and measure your winter tires. I know, I love it. But you're reminding me of an example just from the seminar last week. I had a very smart guy from the banking world, and he was starting to build his list. And we were talking about this exact topic of, you know, so how can we really make this clear? What's the next action? Do you have all the things you need? And is it broken down into the right level? And he had a good example of that he needed. So he was into business intelligence and other things, and he needed to actually write some code as well. So that was what he had on his next action, write code. To do blah blah blah. And then we spoke about that and I challenged him a bit and said, okay, so well, could you do this right now? Could you sit down and do this? And yeah, that was sort of his starting point that you could probably do this. It would probably take like, you know, 4 or 5 hours to really get this, this one done. So, okay, well, that, that sounds a bit heavy. What would I see you do? And we were talking a bit back and forth and he might find an old piece of code because he knew they'd done something similar before. So he was working on that and we spoke about this a bit later in the seminar and he had actually changed it to an agenda item because because now that he was thinking through, he actually might have a colleague who had already done this. So it could be the case that we had just saved him or he had saved himself from 4 or 5 hours of work. But it really is, you know, really thinking that thing through. And that can perhaps be the exercise of the day for people listening is to just, you know, keep this perspective in mind when you walk through your next actions list in your next weekly review, for example. Yeah.

Morten: One of the things that I mentioned to people when I talk about next actions is that if you don't clarify your next actions that are real next actions, like, you will procrastinate that. Maybe. Because your brain knows very well that you've not clarified this well, and it will give you resistance doing that next action. And that might be a trigger for you. Next time you look through your lists, Novi Clear Review, or just look to your next actions list and ask yourself, do I feel comfortable starting moving on this? And if you feel like, nah, I know I don't like this, then ask yourself why. Why do I have a resistance on this? And I'm pretty sure that some of you will, you know, realize that I've, you know, thought this is true. You don't have the first visible next action, which you can do in one setting, and that where you have everything you need. So especially the latter might be, you know, I don't have that email address. That's why I don't feel comfortable trying to write an email, because my brain is giving me resistance on this. So I don't know. I hope that makes sense to people.

Lars: Yeah. So I think, yeah, thanks to Oliver for the question. Short and precise, but a very interesting topic to always. So to always dive into, should we head on to the next one?

Morten: I think that is a good idea.

Lars: Just read the question, please. So this one is from Hugh. He says, hi Lars, hi Morten. Started listening to your podcast as I want to start using GTD, but I'm finding it very difficult to find the time to do so. I would be very interested in hearing a podcast on your thoughts on how to get started with GTD if you're someone who isn't able to set aside a significant block of time in order to get the initial projects list, next actions list, file system organized, and who is instead going to have to set up/start using GTD in a piecemeal fashion. And then he provides several examples of some big projects going on in his life, some good examples of areas of focus as well. And then he goes on to say, it can feel a bit overwhelming, and I feel like GTD could be an enormous help, but I'm currently in a bit of a catch-22 situation. I need to— I need GTD to help deal with all the things I have to do, but I have so many things to do, I struggle to find time to use GTD. I'm sure there are people, plenty of people in my situation who would benefit from GTD, but who only have time to set it up incrementally. And I think a podcast episode on this subject could be really useful. Thanks again for making such a helpful and engaging podcast.

Morten: Kind regards from Hugh. Okay. Thank you, Hugh, for your good question. And unfortunately you're not alone. So I'm sure a lot of people listening to this podcast are using us kind of like, I'm sorry, but maybe you use us as a kind of fancy way to procrastinate learning GTD. Kind of like, I listen to this, I don't, I am not doing GTD, but I'm sure I'm productive now. So of course, this is a bit, you know, jokeful, but still. And we talked about using analogies before, you know, in the pre-show here, and I've been a little culturally insensitive to some people before. So I've reframed my analogy to kind of give you all an idea of a little bit of the absurdity in— because as Hugh says, a lot of you, I'm sure, want to learn GTD, but you don't have the time. And that is just to, you know, you really— you realize that your boat is sinking, it's leaking water but you do not have time, or you don't think you have time, to take it to the dry dock. And I'm just saying that when you're, instead of then using a lot of time and energy trying to, you know, to, you know, using a bucket in here and you're trying to empty the boats of water, which is a lot of what extra work you're doing, instead of that, take it to the dry dock, learn GTD, patch the hole, and.

Lars: Get started.

Morten: And I'm I've, you know, in so many coachings, I've, you know, people are saying the same thing. I don't have time. I don't have time to find, you know, but at the same time, they understand that they need this. So let me talk about just one minute this, what I call the strategic planner thinker and you're the little bit more emotional worker who will do things. And If you use what we call the amygdala, which is the part of the brain that's in the brainstem back in your, you know, back inside your brain, is full of your emotions. This is where all your emotions go. And that emotions can be happiness, it can be also anxiety and panic. And I think that the two latter is a lot of people feel that I have panic. If I take time to learn GTD, a lot of people will be angry with me because I can't deliver on my work. But remember that, that is if you use your common sense and your strategic thinker thinking ahead. I'm sure that you will understand that. And that's, by the way, the frontal cortex. He lives here, the strategic, or she lives here, your strategic thinker. And, um, and if you use the common sense called strategic thinker saying that, well, and I will ask you a couple of questions now, which is interesting. What would the future you Be happy for what you make today. So if you're the future you, when you are, you know, a little older, a little wiser, what would, would, would that person be happy if you learned GTD today? Today, not tomorrow, but today. You start learning today, you start, you know, we will talk a little bit about how you can get that, but I just want to give you some arguments for why Why is this important to you? If you start focusing on what would my life look like if I did this? What would change in my life? And we see again and again that people saying that I'm more happy with getting things done. I feel more overview and more control. I'm doing more of the right things. That's, you know, I get to go home on time. I don't work as much overtime. I spend more time with my family, my loved ones, and that's valuable to me. So what's valuable to you? What's valuable to you? If you want to burn yourself out, please continue. But if you want to have a strategy for, you know, get more of the right stuff down, done and get yourself into a place where you are in control of all your commitments. And I think getting things done, learning getting things done will be very good for you. So that was a long rant, but okay. Lars, what's your.

Lars: Take on this? Yeah, no, it really is an interesting topic. And it is interesting always to hear from people because it, you know, when they come across this challenge that I don't have time to become more productive. Productive. And it just, it, it, I see this relatively frequently, especially when people are, I had a talk, it's been a while now. It was maybe a year ago. And I spoke to a possible coaching client about coaching. And it was clear that he had sort of been recommended to talk to us. And it just wasn't, you know, any priority for him to become more productive. It was just, he was, you know, he did not see the need to become more productive. And clearly, Hugh is in a sort of a different place because he does see the need for it. Struggling to find the time and starting in sort of a, I think, a piecemeal fashion was the way that he described it. So if we were to take that approach, then, you know, where to start? And I think one of the interesting things that we have in the seminar now was these new videos created with David Allen, the author of Getting Things Done, in the reinforcement program that you attend as part of a seminar. And there are these videos on the 5 limiting mindsets that continue to hold you back from parts of GTD. And one of them is that you don't get started. You just want to have something in order before you get started. And then there are so many reasons. Yeah, exactly. Let me fix this first and then I'll start GTD. Yeah. So really, you know, the advice would be to just get started, start somewhere. Start by, I think David says, cleaning a drawer. Pick up anywhere that you feel like you can pick up. The right place to start is really something that you know once you have an overview of GTD. And you can get that overview from the book or from the seminars or wherever you get a complete overview of GTD and then figure out where's the right place to start for you. It's impossible for us to point to say, you know, start with that. Especially when you have such a leech, such a bitchy life that you describe here.

Morten: Yeah, I'm just— well, I have a comment, and, uh, but if you look at the difference between how we, you know, at least I do, um, describe, you know, Getting Things Done as a productivity methodology. So, um, you know, just doing things, uh, very effective is good. You are, you are, you know, you're efficient, you move fast, you remove friction., but you don't know if they are the most correct things to do. Getting Things Done helps you with that, and that moves you. When you do the right things, you get productive. So if you define Getting Things Done as that, you're doing the right things the most effective way. So maybe now you are doing things you should not do. A lot of people understand that with getting things done, that there is always more to do than there is time. I always come back to this. It's kind of like a mantra for me. If you are focusing on that, there is always more to do than there is time, you will also understand that, well, I have to prioritize. And then you get back to values. What's valuable for the company I work for? What's valuable for me personally? And just use your— What's valuable for me as a way to, you know, to, to choice or to choose the things you need to get done. And, but I have a suggestion for where you should start, which will kind of force you into getting things done if you feel a little resistance. So just start with step number 1, just capture everything that has your attention. And if you do this, you will feel a relief. You want to go back there. You want to start emptying your head. On a regular basis. But if you then don't clarify and organize, they will move back in. You know, if you don't clarify them well, they will go back into your brain. If you don't organize them well, your brain will not trust that system, and it will not trust that you captured them at a good place, and it will move back in, in your brain. So, so, you know, start with capture, and then start clarifying, organize them into a system, and then look at them at a regular basis to make sure they don't come back into your brain again. And if you do that and then engage on a regular basis with the most important things, that your brain can relax, that while you are doing the most important things now, then you are in the zone of getting things done, stress-free productivity. But if you start capturing, that's where it all starts. Just grab a piece of paper or, you know, a digital tool of sorts and just one place and then start filling that place with whatever shows up in your brain you might want to.

Lars: Do something about. Yeah.

Morten: Start nice and easy. Yeah, make it easy and make it just capture things. It's going to help you. And some people never get past capture, but they then just fill that list and then tick things off the, what I call that, a panic list if you don't, because they're like, 'What's on top of my panic list today?' 'What am I— my anxiety today drives me to do,' instead of saying, 'What is most important for me to get done today?' Instead of your anxiety level, what comes in and shouts the loudest is often not the most important thing. And the only way you can find what's important is that you have to record it. You have to write it down and reflect on it on a regular basis.

Lars: That's getting things done. And with regards to the timing aspect, maybe because I'm reminded about a coaching client that I actually was just in contact with. So someone that I worked with her recently, and one of the first places we started was that she was really, you know, she had a completely booked calendar, several hundred emails per day, really struggling to find time for this, but knew that GCD would provide value. And in the end, it also turned out to be to be the case really for her. One of the first places we started was to find time in her calendar. So if, if this— I don't know, I haven't seen Hugh's calendar. I don't know if this is a problem. But, but start to book time, start to block time so that your calendar isn't just, you know, grabbed by everyone around you. And as soon as there is a free slot, and they will grab that time, start to set aside time, block some time for yourself. Start with the steps that Morten described, maybe block some time as well for the weekly review, start to prioritize this over all of the other things going on if you want to get started. That could be a place to start without having the full overview of where.

Morten: You are right now. Yeah, I do agree. And the idea of you just capture everything that has your attention first and then, you know, try and define them as we answer the first question with desired outcomes and next actions. Just get started. And it doesn't have to be perfect, but you have to get started. This, if you don't start, you will never move anything forward.

Lars: So, yeah. Okay. I saw that in the seminar last week as well. One person was like, I want to make sure that I make the right projects list from the start. So I want to have these projects over here. I have some over there. How do I do it? Just get started. Get started and then we will reorganize.

Morten: As we go along. Yeah. And getting things done, you can't make it perfect because there is no perfect, but it's just iterations, a little better every day. The direction towards GTD mastery is more important than, you know, doing it perfect. So, yeah. Okay. Signing off with those words. I think we are at the end of this.

Lars: Yeah.

Morten: I don't know if you agree with me. This sounds like you are.

Lars: So will you take us out as always, Lars? No, I think that was a good one to wrap up the episode on. And as always, we end the episodes by mentioning a reminder for you to go on over to gtdnordic.com, have a look around, because on there you will find links to each of the country websites for each of the Nordic countries. And when you click on those links, you will find the local sites and you can find articles about GTD, links to the newsletters, links to groups on social media where natives discuss the methodology and tools. And of course, you can find all of the offerings that we provide speeches, coaching seminars, both physical and virtual. If you're outside the Nordics, head on over to gettingthingsdone.com to find your local partners. And lastly, as always, we really hope that you find this episode's value, both Oliver and Hugh, but also everyone else listening out there. If you have any questions, be sure to send us an email, podcast@gtdnordic.dk. You can find that in the notes of the podcast. And if you appreciate the podcast, we really, you know, we're happy if you share it with a colleague who might benefit from this or give us a rating on the platform that you use on iTunes or whatever you might be using. It really helps the discoverability of the podcast. So thanks to those of you who.

Morten: Have already done so. Thank you, Lars. And dear listeners, until next time, stay safe and stay productive. Bye-bye. I will and finish.

Lars: Okay, I clipped it. Okay, the first question for Lisa. Yeah.