Discussion Forum > Wait, I'm using GTD? And Long List? And Ivy Lee (Daily Todo)? HUH?
Well, if you take the definition for GTD so broadly, then my long list plus the electronic calendar I use is also a great GTD system.
January 14, 2022 at 12:32 |
Christopher
Christopher
The problem with the Ivy Lee method is that it was developed for 1918 executives in a big firm. In those circumstances it was by all accounts very successful.
When I worked in an office as a Staff Officer in the Ministry of Defence in the late 70s, it was just possible to use a system like that in something like its original environment. We had no computers, we had no internet, we had no email, we had to draft in pencil for typing-up in the typing pool, we had no personal phones, we had a very restricted phone service. The vast majority of messages arrived in our in-trays as paper from the post. It's difficult even for me to remember what working then was like - let alone for someone younger to imagine.
The advantages were that it was a very structured environment and interruptions were far fewer than today (not that that stopped us from complaining about them!)
In that environment it was quite possible to write out the six most important things and do them in order with a minimum of distraction. Is it still today?
Even in 1918, Ivy Lee's principles worked fine in the offices of a big organisation, but would they have worked in a small business or a shop - or for that matter for a staff officer in the trenches in France?
When I worked in an office as a Staff Officer in the Ministry of Defence in the late 70s, it was just possible to use a system like that in something like its original environment. We had no computers, we had no internet, we had no email, we had to draft in pencil for typing-up in the typing pool, we had no personal phones, we had a very restricted phone service. The vast majority of messages arrived in our in-trays as paper from the post. It's difficult even for me to remember what working then was like - let alone for someone younger to imagine.
The advantages were that it was a very structured environment and interruptions were far fewer than today (not that that stopped us from complaining about them!)
In that environment it was quite possible to write out the six most important things and do them in order with a minimum of distraction. Is it still today?
Even in 1918, Ivy Lee's principles worked fine in the offices of a big organisation, but would they have worked in a small business or a shop - or for that matter for a staff officer in the trenches in France?
January 14, 2022 at 15:29 |
Mark Forster
Mark Forster
Mark:
<In that environment...>
A few years ago, I came to a similar conclusion regarding environment (plus family of origin issues, etc) vis-a-vis productivity systems.
Other than "know thy self" - there is no cookie-cutter way to choose a productivity system that integrates well with one's emotional/cognitive disposition and environment (I know, Cal Newport thinks so... but he's mislead imho).
However certain productivity principles can be adapted to different environments i.e. "Little and often", systems over goals, some form of weekly plan/review, etc.
Once you're able to identify the principles that jive for your circumstances, the tools, steps, etc are more a matter of aesthetic and taste more than anything else. For me anyway.
<In that environment...>
A few years ago, I came to a similar conclusion regarding environment (plus family of origin issues, etc) vis-a-vis productivity systems.
Other than "know thy self" - there is no cookie-cutter way to choose a productivity system that integrates well with one's emotional/cognitive disposition and environment (I know, Cal Newport thinks so... but he's mislead imho).
However certain productivity principles can be adapted to different environments i.e. "Little and often", systems over goals, some form of weekly plan/review, etc.
Once you're able to identify the principles that jive for your circumstances, the tools, steps, etc are more a matter of aesthetic and taste more than anything else. For me anyway.
January 14, 2022 at 17:37 |
avrum
avrum
I actually don't disagree much with what has been said above. Especially:
<<In that environment it was quite possible to write out the six most important things and do them in order with a minimum of distraction. Is it still today?>>
But here's where I think things changed for me. I realized that in my situation, rather than trying to cope with the environment around me, I could simply change my environment. And so, I guess the response I have for the above quote would be, "Sure, you can still use it today, if you take the time to alter and adjust your environment to make that possible."
Of course, there's the question of whether that's actually the environment you *want*. However, in my case, by progressively reducing the sources of distraction and gaining more control over my environment, I can now work with a system that doesn't have to be as reactive to distraction, because I don't have as many, and so forth.
In other words, I can leverage constraints, on my lists, on my environments, and on my tools, in order to help simplify my life into something that has the sorts of freedoms I want in it.
I think the key takeaway for me is that we aren't designing a system to handle our environment, but the environment is a part of the system we are designing, and we all have some degree of control over that environment, though some have more and some have less. In my case, changing the environment was superior to changing other aspects of the system, while that might be different for other people.
<<In that environment it was quite possible to write out the six most important things and do them in order with a minimum of distraction. Is it still today?>>
But here's where I think things changed for me. I realized that in my situation, rather than trying to cope with the environment around me, I could simply change my environment. And so, I guess the response I have for the above quote would be, "Sure, you can still use it today, if you take the time to alter and adjust your environment to make that possible."
Of course, there's the question of whether that's actually the environment you *want*. However, in my case, by progressively reducing the sources of distraction and gaining more control over my environment, I can now work with a system that doesn't have to be as reactive to distraction, because I don't have as many, and so forth.
In other words, I can leverage constraints, on my lists, on my environments, and on my tools, in order to help simplify my life into something that has the sorts of freedoms I want in it.
I think the key takeaway for me is that we aren't designing a system to handle our environment, but the environment is a part of the system we are designing, and we all have some degree of control over that environment, though some have more and some have less. In my case, changing the environment was superior to changing other aspects of the system, while that might be different for other people.
January 14, 2022 at 23:13 |
Aaron Hsu
Aaron Hsu
Aaron Hsu:
<< the environment is a part of the system we are designing >>
Yes, that is a very important insight, and one which I adopted somewhere around 1990, when I refused to travel to the office for my then job and insisted on working at home. But I wouldn't have been able to do that if the personal computer was not then just becoming a reality. The other technical development at the same time which made life a lot easier was the mobile phone - and in those days phones was all they were. A satnav could also have saved me a lot of time, but they weren't widely available in those days.
Nowadays of course I have my working environment exactly as I want it and the technology is so good I hardly have to think about it.
BUT this does come with one huge disadvantage. The ease of communication means we are flooded with messages. it's like the faster your computer, the more you ask it to do.
<< the environment is a part of the system we are designing >>
Yes, that is a very important insight, and one which I adopted somewhere around 1990, when I refused to travel to the office for my then job and insisted on working at home. But I wouldn't have been able to do that if the personal computer was not then just becoming a reality. The other technical development at the same time which made life a lot easier was the mobile phone - and in those days phones was all they were. A satnav could also have saved me a lot of time, but they weren't widely available in those days.
Nowadays of course I have my working environment exactly as I want it and the technology is so good I hardly have to think about it.
BUT this does come with one huge disadvantage. The ease of communication means we are flooded with messages. it's like the faster your computer, the more you ask it to do.
January 15, 2022 at 11:35 |
Mark Forster
Mark Forster
I think adjusting my environment to radically reduce the number of incoming messages I have to deal with has been tremendous for my well-being. Maybe I'm missing some opportunities, and maybe I'm also missing out on something else that could be letting me do more, but the extra peace and space I get is, at least to me, for now, worth it in spades.
January 16, 2022 at 6:00 |
Aaron Hsu
Aaron Hsu
Aaron Hsu:
<< Maybe I'm missing some opportunities >>
I think it was David Allen who said "You can do anything, but you can't do everything".
<< Maybe I'm missing some opportunities >>
I think it was David Allen who said "You can do anything, but you can't do everything".
January 16, 2022 at 9:52 |
Mark Forster
Mark Forster
I'm using a daily planner with my calendar and a set of two Ivy Lee lists at the top for Work and Home, a daily schedule, and then an open area for writing down things during the day. The monthly calendar has lots of non-dated whitespace around it, so I have routines/checklists, and my goals (also limited in count) on that page that I evaluate monthly and as I complete my goals.
This is a super simple system in appearance. In fact, I first thought I was just using Ivy Lee. But then I realized that I'm also using a MF long list, because in the blank area I end up writing a series of todos, and during my end of day review, I go through the list and mark out my next 6 items for the following day. I also try to make my items small enough when they go on the daily list that I have a chance to complete them. This means that, in a sense, I'm doing a form of FV, except that I just go through the list fresh each day and add dots to ensure that there are 6 dots at the beginning of each day. I also use Mark's techniques of live and active pages to keep track of which pages have actionable work on them and which don't.
Then I thought about it more and realized that I also have pretty much the entire system described by GTD. I do Capture, I do Clarify in pretty much the exact same approach, I am doing Daily and Monthly reviews instead of Weekly reviews. I am still intuitively choosing items, just not quite in the same way, and I have flexibility to deviate from my Ivy Lee list if necessary. The Mark Forster style long list ends up being what amounts to a Someday/Maybe list because I'm critically not letting myself over commit, so a lot of times those are options, but not commitments to myself yet. I refine the todos on my long list to represent short next actions when they go into the Ivy Lee lists. Having the two lists, I've created two contexts in the GTD sense. I'm using a set of checklists for routine tasks and core daily scheduling outside of time specific calendaring. I have a reference and project support notebooks that I maintain with my planner. I utilize the concept of a project and waiting for contexts, just inline in the long list instead of separated out. I take advantage of Inbox Zero and the 2 Minute Rule concepts.
Pretty much, I'm doing GTD along all categories, including thinking in terms of Horizons of focus and using the Natural Planning model.
This feels somehow paradoxical and interesting at the same time. I think it's especially interesting because I haven't thought about GTD as an explicit process for myself for a while, but after letting myself evolve a bit more, I've somehow basically ended up at GTD, just with a little bit of spice (okay, maybe a lot of spice) thrown in there from Ivy Lee and Mark Forster.
I was really surprised how closely GTD and my process matched.