Ep. 334: Working with People Who Don't GTD

Summary

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Episode Overview

Podcast: Getting Things Done
Episode: Ep. 334: Working with People Who Don't GTD
Host: John Forrester
Guests/Participants: Thais Codinho, Mark (project manager/Scrum master), Carrie, Joseph, others
Date: October 29, 2025

This episode of the Getting Things Done podcast centers on the perennial challenge of applying GTD principles in environments where others aren’t familiar with the methodology, particularly in the workplace. Listeners share their experiences and ask for advice on influencing teams, balancing GTD with real-world challenges (like retirement or career transitions), and implementing personal productivity strategies in less-than-ideal circumstances.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Influencing Others to Use GTD in the Workplace

[04:21–11:04]

• Mark’s Situation: Mark, a Scrum master, is trying to subtly introduce and integrate GTD principles into a large, established organization where he's not in a formal leadership role.

  • He observes that most colleagues write annual goals and shelve them until year-end, rarely keeping actionable steps in focus.
  • He's interested in fostering better adoption without being overly “preachy” or directive.

• Host’s Advice:

  • Lead by Example: The most sustainable way to influence is to “demonstrate relaxed productivity” and let people notice the resulting calm and effectiveness.
    • Quote (John Forrester, 06:53):
      “If other people see you demonstrating relaxed productivity, they're going to say, ‘What's your secret?’”
  • Identify Pain Points: Thais suggests starting with people's challenges, asking open questions in 1-to-1s such as “What’s overwhelming you right now?” as an entry point for GTD concepts.
    • Quote (Thais Codinho, 09:29):
      “Making those questions, you can introduce small GTD practices to help them to ease those burdens. You don't have to teach the full methodology all at once.”

• Carrie’s Perspective: As a newer adopter, Carrie notes the value in normalizing the struggle and the need for “brain space” among knowledge workers. She wonders if many people simply don’t realize how much hidden cognitive load they’re carrying.

2. Challenges in Nonprofit/Non-Hierarchical Environments

[12:30–22:14]

• Mark reflects on the cultural differences in a nonprofit church organization (vs. his prior work in banking), noting a reduced focus on strict accountability or financial performance.

  • Mistakes are sometimes met with a casual “my bad” rather than serious consequences—a big shift for him.

• He hopes to leave a legacy by helping colleagues “at least be aware” of GTD principles before he retires.

• Host’s Observations:

  • Even in retirement, many find GTD as useful as ever; projects and organization continue in a non-job context.
  • Influence is often greater than assumed: “I suspect that you've had more influence than you're giving yourself credit for...”

3. GTD as a Personal and Interpersonal Life Skill

[17:37–19:10]

• Carrie’s Reflection: GTD is a “life skill,” not just a productivity tool. As people internalize GTD and model its benefits, a ripple effect can foster better functioning within teams and organizations.

  • Quote (Carrie, 19:07): “I feel like it’s a life. Life skill. Like a life. A human skill.”

• Governance and Authority: John explores whether Mark’s difficulties are less about his influence skills, and more about the structure (or lack thereof) within his organization.

4. Practical GTD Strategies for Team Engagement

[09:29–10:23, summary]

• Start with simple interventions—help colleagues capture their “open loops” (things on their mind), clarify next actions, and gradually introduce GTD tools where they solve immediate problems.
• Maintain balance: personalize introductions and be mindful of organizational culture or readiness.

5. Evangelizing GTD and Dealing With Resistance

[23:51–24:38]

• Joseph describes the “evangelist’s dilemma”: excitement leads to sharing with many, but few people adopt GTD completely, if at all.

  • Quote (Joseph, 23:51):
    “I’ll tell, you know, 50 people about it, and, like, one person will be interested, and even that one person will only, like, do half of it...”

• The group agrees it’s common for productivity “evangelism” to fall flat if people aren’t yet ready for a change or don’t see the relevance.

6. Making Space for Reflection vs. Just Doing

[24:38–32:13]

• Joseph is attempting a career change while working full-time and balancing family demands—leading to “squeezed” time for reviews and higher-horizon reflection. He sometimes skips annual or monthly reviews to focus on immediate tasks.

  • Host and Thais Suggest:
    • Continually capture everything—career change generates a lot of mental noise.
    • Use the Horizons of Focus to make sure that immediate steps are in alignment with long-term values and goals.
      • Quote (Thais, 27:03):
        “When you think about your career, it often requires big-picture thinking. So the model of horizontal focus can help you align your next steps with your long-term vision.”
    • If a review task keeps coming up in your mind—even if you think it’s not crucial—there’s likely “something to look at.”
      • Quote (John, 31:39):
        “Even if it doesn’t create any value other than it gets it off your mind, you’ll have saved [mental energy]...”

• Discussion about balancing over-planning vs. action (“my professional weekly review takes me three hours...”). Finding the right balance is key—and culturally, some environments frown on being “over-organized.”

7. Storing and Processing Mind Maps

[35:12–39:19]

• Carrie, a new practitioner, asks about handling mind maps: How do you organize and retrieve a growing collection of mind maps generated as part of organizing thoughts?

• Advice from John:

  • Treat mind maps as meeting notes: after mapping, “process” them—extract next actions, mark as projects if appropriate, file mind map in meaningful locations (possibly with project support materials).
    • Quote (John, 37:50):
      “If you had a meeting with yourself... and you took meeting notes as a mind map... we process those as if they landed in our inbox.”
  • "Organized means things are where they have meaning for you." A mind map about a topic belongs wherever materials for that topic live—not necessarily lumped with all mind maps.

• Carrie’s Insight: “I haven’t finished the thinking on the mind maps. I think I’m done after I’ve mind mapped, but I need to then look at the mind map and say, are there any additional actions, next actions based on this mind map?” (38:23)

8. Living the GTD Lifecycle

[39:19–end]

• GTDer’s Journey: All users go through cycles in their practice: initial inspiration, integrating practices, plateauing, revisiting resources, and rediscovering new insights.

• Revisiting materials (like the GTD Connect library or Getting Things Done) often yields fresh, applicable discoveries aligned with one's current context.

  • Quote (John, 39:19):
    “Many people have read Getting Things Done, you know, more than three or four times, and every time they read it, they get something new out of it.”

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Lead by Example (John, 06:53):
  “If other people see you demonstrating relaxed productivity, they're going to say, ‘What's your secret?’”

• Start Small (Thais, 09:29):
  “You can introduce small GTD practices to help them ease those burdens. You don’t have to teach the full methodology all at once.”

• The Evangelist’s Dilemma (Joseph, 23:51):
  “I’ll tell, you know, 50 people about it, and, like, one person will be interested, and even that one person will only, like, do half of it...”

• GTD as a Life Skill (Carrie, 19:07):
  “I feel like it’s a life. Life skill. Like a life. A human skill.”

• The Mind Keeps Bringing It Up (John, 31:47):
  “People are often surprised when we say if your mind brings it up, there's something about it that you need to pay more appropriate attention to... there’s a reason your mind, which is very smart and creative, is still latching onto that.”

• Organizing Mind Maps (John, 37:50):
  “If you had a meeting with yourself... and you took meeting notes as a mind map... we process those as if they landed in our inbox.”

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 04:21 – 05:35: Mark introduces his challenge about influencing team GTD adoption
• 06:53 – 09:29: Host’s and Thais’ strategies: leading by example, targeting pain points
• 10:58 – 12:21: Carrie’s perspective on cognitive burden and “brain space”
• 14:56 – 16:58: Relevance of GTD for retirement and beyond
• 17:07 – 19:07: “GTD is a life skill”—Carrie’s reflections on ripple effects
• 24:38 – 31:47: Joseph’s struggle with review time vs. action; advice from John and Thais
• 35:12 – 38:37: Handling an ever-growing collection of mind maps; extracting value and organizing
• 39:19 – End: GTD Connect is a goldmine—users go through cycles as their practice evolves

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Tone & Atmosphere

The conversation is warm, informal, supportive, and practical—reflecting the GTD ethos of continuous improvement and generous peer learning. The host ensures participants feel heard and valued, and there’s a pervasive sense that personal productivity is a journey best shared.

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Final Thoughts

This episode reassures both new and veteran GTDers that:

• You can’t force productivity skills on others—change begins with your own example.
• Small GTD interventions are often more effective than grand transformations.
• Personal productivity practices like GTD remain relevant—whether at work, during retirement, or through big life changes.
• Be patient with yourself and others; everyone is at a different point in the journey.
• The GTD library and community are rich resources—revisiting them can rekindle energy and insight.

Listeners leave with concrete strategies for “working with people who don't GTD,” as well as affirmation that leading by example and incremental change are powerful tools.

Transcript

[A]

Foreign.

[B]

Hi everyone, this is John Forrester and welcome to our GTD Connect office hour. Great to see you here. This is a very informal time for us to just talk about GTD and related productivity topics. So that could include questions you may have, answers you may have. I love to hear answers from you. So answers are fine. Questions, ponderings, whatever you've been musing about, considering, that sort of thing. And we're set to go here for an hour. We don't have to stop exactly at the top of the hour, but we generally aim to finish close to on time there so that if you have other commitments, you can get to them. And one other thing I'd like to point out, let's see. Is that one of our participants here is Thais Codinho, who is to call her well Versed in GTD is a, is the biggest understatement of 2025 for me so far. So welcome to Thais. She's a, a long time practitioner and is also a trainer in GTD and just very, very well versed in GTD and has worked with many people on it. There she is. She came on camera and is waving there. Hi, Thais. Hello.

[C]

Hi, John. Thank you.

[B]

Please know that I welcome your participation here. I just wanted to introduce you and let folks know that you're, that you're, you're there and if you want to dive in at any point here. When I do these things with Ana Maria, she and I often get into, I won't quite say sparring with each other, but I'll have a point of view. She has a point of view. And, and then the, the other people on the, on the meeting get to find out what it's like when, when two people who've been at this for a long time don't necessarily have the same approach to something. So I'm not assigning you or anything like that to, to be contrary with me. But if you feel like you want to, or vice versa, that's all good. All right, so let's see. Any other housekeeping? I think that's it. I think that's it.

[D]

So.

[B]

We'Re happy to have you all here. I could talk about where you all are in the world, but it's spread out a bit.

[D]

So where is Thais? Where are you located?

[B]

There you go.

[A]

Thank you.

[C]

Hi, I'm Brazil. Sao Paulo.

[D]

Great.

[B]

Sao Paulo, Brazil. And Mark, are you in the Salt Lake City area still?

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

All right, great. I'm in rainy Southern California, so it's not a sunny sky behind me. There and I don't know, I don't think you'll hear too much rain coming off the roof, but it's very rainy here. We're, we're having the monsoon season at least for a few days. All right, so this is a time to talk about anything that's been on your mind. So Joseph, you can speak up if you'd like to or chat or just not have anything to say. Primarily listening is good. And Mark, if you have anything on your mind, go right ahead. And one other thing, which is if nobody has questions or comments, I'm, I can always come up with prompt type questions things to stir the pot a bit. So first I wanted to give you a chance to say what was on your mind if you've got anything on a, an office hour agenda.

[D]

So I do have like a couple of questions. So first off, I'm doing my goals. I mean it sounds really late to be doing them in February for 2025, but that's the pattern that we follow in the organization I work in. So, and I'm trying to, I don't know how to say, influence others to, to more use a GTD methodology versus the, the standard year after year. I mean, I've worked for this organization for 13 years now. So any suggestions on how to, I don't want to say subtly, but even just to get that into the pattern and the flow of a, of a larger organization or even just within my own team, I don't lead the team. I'm a project manager, Scrum master. Right now I've stepped back from being a manager, you know, managing people to more managing projects. And anyway, just suggestions that way is what I'm interested in because I'd like to try to get some others interested, so to speak.

[B]

That's a, that's a great question, great topic. It's, it's, it's a perennial kind of a concern for people. Once they start implementing gtd, they start looking around and going, wow, how can I get my, my co workers, my boss, my direct reports to do this stuff too? How do I, how do I get my spouse, my children, my, my parents to, to do all this kind of stuff? It's everybody in our world, we start wanting to help them, help them learn this kind of stuff too. So it's a great question. Let's see. I, I may toss this over to Thais a few times. Thais, I'm just going to let you know, anytime you have anything to say, please dive in. Interrupt, don't, don't be Polite. And I'll just say I, I've always heard from David Allen, the best way is to lead by example with this, that if other people see you demonstrating relaxed productivity, they're going to say, what's your secret.

[A]

Mark?

[B]

How do you do it? Have you found that people ask you what your secret is or how you do things? Are there sources of friction and are there ways that you've already found that people are getting sparked by what you're doing?

[A]

Well.

[D]

On the project management side of it, some of my peers are. I didn't want to say so when I got my PMP certification, I'm familiar.

[B]

With that Project management, Agile.

[D]

Yeah, Agile didn't exist. That's how long ago that was. So at least it wasn't a concept that was actually shared out to the organization that way.

[B]

But.

[D]

You know, I just, I try to coordinate like for this year I have three major goals that I personally say. These are what I'm going to do and, but I have to play with others, you know, and so that's why I'm trying to, I'm just, I'm not doing a great, I don't feel like I'm doing a great job of getting others to march this. I don't want to say march the same direction, row the boat the same way or however that should work.

[E]

But.

[D]

I think if we could do that, if they could adopt some of the principles, at least we would get further along than where we are right now. And yes, I've tried to share specific principles and stuff. I'm just barely reading team, you know, getting done with others right now. And I've shared some quotes and things from that, but it's not a.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

I don't know, I just don't feel like I'm very. Being so super successful in that endeavor, you know, and I think it would be very helpful for others to try to use some approach. I, I'm being judgmental here, but I don't think they have any. I mean, and in fact, most people in the organization, they write the goals and then they shelve them.

[B]

Yes.

[D]

Until the end of the year and then try to, oh yeah, I did this and I'll check this off for that. And you know, things like that versus having an idea of a concept of this is what I'm trying to do. And, and even, just, even to identify the next step. It's just not a common practice in the group that I'm working with. So anyway, that's, that's all. Yeah, I don't know there's a miracle cure for any of that, but if there is, please share that.

[C]

I guess another strategy you can try is to identify people's pain points and needs. And you can, for example, in a one to one meeting, you can ask what's overwhelming you the most right now? Or is there something that is constantly on your mind that you never seen together around you? So making those questions, you can introduce small GTD practices to help them to ease those burdens. You don't have to teach the full methodology all at once. So you can start by encouraging them to capture everything, undermine clarifying actions. So from one simple point of pain.

[B]

Great approach to it, ask that. People love to be asked a question like what's your, what's your pain point here? What, what? That kind of thing. They love to be invited to share about what's a concern for them. And I suppose the danger in that with a meeting is that people tend to hijack the meeting with their, their own agendas. So it does help to have a lot of structure. And I'll say more about structure in a moment. Carrie, it looks like you have your hand raised. I don't know if that was an accidental tap on an icon.

[F]

Thank you very much. And again, excuse the car, but I was just going to listen. But if I may.

[B]

Sure.

[F]

What Mark, what I hear Mark saying and if I misinterpret, please let me know. It sounds like he is working with people like me, which is the entire reason why I am trying to dive into GTD for 2025. Because I do want to be actually one of those participants that feels like they have everything together so that they can actually have that brain space to be able to operate at a higher, I guess, higher horizon. But right now, one of the things I appreciate about David Allen actually even admitting or even talking about this, it normalizes it for people like me who would love to be working with people like Mark at that level is because we feel like that we need to handle our life. And so this is why it's so exciting. I wonder if people, Mark, on your level, I assume they're still. They're at high levels as well. I wonder if they have life management that maybe is taking up that cognitive or psychic space that they're not even aware that they have then the capacity or they don't yet have the capacity to operate at the level that they would love to with you.

[B]

Mark, good insight. Good. I did hear a question in there. Mark, do you have any. Want to address anything in there?

[D]

Well, I Think there's two sides to this. Part of it is I do with. Deal with a lot of very technical people.

[B]

Uhhuh.

[D]

And there's things that interest them and things that don't interest them.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

And yet I am charged with kind of not necessarily leading them but. Well yeah. Leading them within a specific project within. I, I don't necessarily. I'm not there human resource leader so to speak but I try to and, and even just to me that seems logical that you would have a project. You know and there's steps that are happening anyway. It just is hard to get through that and especially it's come to light with these goals because I, I would love to have others in the organization be in track with what I'm. And not necessarily don't have to jump in exactly the way I'm going. But if anyway I, I don't know that there's other things where too you know I have, I have. I report to people within the organizations that are higher up and yeah. They don't necessarily seem to care. I, I don't know how that works because I work for a non profit organization. It's not. We're not. Our goal is not to. To make money. Prior to coming to this organization I've. I was in financial services and banking and so I really had very specific.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

And that I would set and get and reach them regularly. You know. So it's just a very different environment.

[A]

It.

[D]

That's why I'm kind of struggling with a little bit. But.

[B]

Yeah. And you've been there 13 or so years. So.

[D]

Yeah. Which I never thought I would be.

[B]

You're doing. You're doing something right.

[D]

So then actually I've kind of shifted gears here. My next. And I'm sorry I'm monopolizing this but my next question is I am looking at a retirement goal here before too long and. And I'm really at that kind of. I feel like I'm on a cliff edge sort of. And. And so I would be interested to see are there things that in some of the other presentations that have been going there about using GTD in a less stressful or a retirement type situation. Is that out there? I haven't, I haven't played around in the quote library to see. I mean I sometimes go in to see some of the.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

The different presentations that are there but.

[B]

I haven't, I haven't done a. As far as I know we haven't done anything like a recording or anything that's specifically about GTD and Retirement. But I think it's a terrific topic. And I've asked a few people who are in that transition, either they're going too soon or they have just retired, about how GTD helped with that process and helps them now that they are retired. So I don't have a piece of content to point you to directly other than to say it's a great topic. And from what I've heard anecdotally from people, GTD is very helpful. Even if, even if they're not working at a 9 to 5 job anymore. People who have retired generally, well, if they were interested in GTD before, they're just as interested after retirement because they're still so fully engaged with life that the only thing that changed is they're not getting a paycheck from a particular employer for it the same way. But they have projects, next actions, they're busy. So GTD applies as much as ever.

[D]

Yeah, so that's part of the reasoning that I asked. The first question is because I would like to leave some sort of a. I don't want to say a legacy, but the idea that I've gained, I've benefited from this, an extensive career. And so I would like to share that with others. I mean, I first got involved with GTT when I had a boss who was highly critical of me and, and told me I needed to get some sort of an organization, a methodology in my life. And that's when I started exploring and, and stumbled across gtd, really. But that's why I'm kind of saying in this goal process and in working with those, I'd like to get them at least introduced better than I have historically. That's kind of why I asked that initial question is just try to get them at least to be an awareness of what's going.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

So, yeah. And then, yeah, sometime next year I'll retire. So anyway, I, I've said enough. I don't know.

[B]

Well, sometime next year you will hear from me saying, mark, let's, let's do a recording about what your life has, like, is like now that you've retired and how, how is GTD applying? So you'll, you're, you're on my list to be the one to talk to about that before long.

[E]

Yeah.

[B]

Carrie, you've got your hand up again. You're being very polite as far as I'm concerned. You can just dive in as soon as there's any kind of a, any daylight in the discussion here, just dive right in.

[F]

Okay, thank you very much. One of the Things that I was thinking about was what Mark said, which was kind of like the miracle or the life changing aspect of gtd. And I think speaking from the experience of somebody who. What I do with my job is actually I work with a lot of people that are kind of at the stage of needing some sort of organization, especially with personal knowledge base being A lot of my clients are knowledge workers, things like that. So what I'm taking away from what Mark is saying is he is on like the having having been the type of person who then implements the system and sees the life changing aspect of it. And I think what I'm taking away is that maybe a few years out, me doing this work and then religiously doing it and then changing not only like how I manage my life, but then have the capacity then to work with at a higher level because now I can have the brain space to be able to actually think and create more. Then that actually will be helping clients do the same, which then hopefully will have the ripple effect of people working in nonprofits. Like Mark is talking about being able to operate and have those skills in place. I feel like it's a life. Life skill. Like a life. A human skill.

[A]

Excuse me so very, very much.

[B]

Yeah, I, I completely agree. It is, it is a life skill. One thing that occurred to me as you were talking, Mark, is I'm wondering if some of what goes on there could be helped with. I'll just use a term, a broad term, governance. Like are there, are there things that you're finding where you're trying to get something done and others aren't lined up with it where it's more of a. It's not about your skill, it's more about a governance issue. Like do they, do they look at you as somebody who doesn't have the authority to guide them in this area or are they looking to you as an authority when in fact you're not and things like that.

[D]

I was really surprised the first time I was in a meeting and had identified a real. I thought a fail. A real fail in cost thousands and thousands of dollars.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

And the person responsible said, oh, my bad. And I. In any other organization I had been in previously, that would be. They would be gone, you know, by the end of the day probably in all likelihood, unless they were the owner or you know, somebody with, you know, the son of the owner or something that way. But. But no, it was not a. There was not a direct causal effect there of.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

You know, but it just, we went on which. Yeah. Was a Big change. But that's come around. The governance has changed quite a bit, but still. So I, I'm going to drop here in just a couple minutes because I'm. I'm going on a call with my counterparts in, in Europe.

[B]

Oh, okay.

[D]

And it's the end of their day and I need to get on there before they leave. Sure.

[B]

Right.

[D]

But yeah, it's a multinational organization. I work for a church, so anyway. But yeah. And yeah, it has improved over time. But yes, there is that. There's not that same intensity, I guess.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

Of how this happens. That's why I say even in the goal setting for this annual goal, I'm much more intense in that than anybody else that I interact with.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

And maybe that's why. And I do want to have some sort of a. I don't want to say legacy, but I would like to pass the torch somehow within that organization as I anticipate what's coming up.

[A]

So anyhow.

[B]

I suspect that you've had more influence than you're giving yourself credit for. If we were to talk with some of the people you work with, they'd say, oh yeah, he told me this whole thing about a waiting for list. Or he taught me that you don't do a project, you do a next action and you have a project as a defined outcome. But it's all about these next actions where I'll bet people would say I learned a lot from you. So.

[D]

Yeah. And one good thing about the organization is that they're very accepting of, of commingling of business and personal. You know, there's. That is very generous. More so than any other organization I've worked in.

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

And I've worked in several other multinational financial organizations. So yeah, it's, it's good that maybe I just need to mellow out a little bit. I don't know. Okay, well, I need to drop, so thank you very much.

[B]

All right, we'll see you later. We'll be in touch. Mark, thanks for being on.

[E]

Bye.

[B]

So let's see. Joseph, good to see you. I mean see you as in there you are on webcam.

[A]

Yeah, it's funny. It's, it's, it's. Anyway, I was having lunch, so I apologize. You wouldn't wanted to see me.

[B]

No need to apologize. We've all seen somebody eating on webcam more than. More than once by now, I think.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. It's good to. Good to see you anyway. Yeah.

[B]

I've seen your name so many times over what seems like forever, but nice to put A face to it. And, Carrie, thanks for hopping on too. Good to see you as well. It looks like you're out of the car and into a different place now.

[F]

Yes. So thank you. Thank you very much.

[B]

You're welcome. All right, either of you have anything more you'd want to say about. To give an answer to Mark now that he's gone? We can give the answer he was looking for or bring up something that you've had as a concern.

[A]

The only thing I would just say about Mark, I'm kind of a beginner. I guess I've been doing it for maybe almost three years now, but. So I have nothing to say. I'm the kind of person where I get overzealous about something and then try to evangelize to everybody, get disappointed. So I wouldn't want to, you know, But I just noticed that, like, I'll tell, you know, 50 people about it, and, like, one person will be interested, and even that one person will only, like, do half of it, you know, which is. Which is not a bad thing necessarily. So, yeah, I have. I feel like that's a dilemma. Like, I don't understand why you wouldn't. To want. Want to have something that would help you, but I'm sure there's lots else going on in people's lives. So, you know, I. I had another question, if that's okay. Sure.

[B]

This is wide open.

[A]

Yeah. So I'm going through kind of. Try not to get too personal, but I'm going through kind of a career change. Well, attempting to make a career change at least. And, you know, I have a family and everything. And so, you know, put in, you know, eight to nine hours a day for work. So I'm just finding that my time is so squeezed for doing things like reviews. And so, like, I have an annual review that's on my list to do. I have a monthly review. I have all these reviews that. And I kind of keep not getting to them because I have, like, very small windows of time when I can just make this transition that I'm trying to do it to a new career, which is, like, I've already sort of identified it subconsciously. If not, it's not on a list anywhere. Well, actually, it is sort of on the list. I mean, it's a project, and I've just identified, like, that's my number one goal in the next six to eight months. You know, it's just that I just have to put all my energy into that. So I keep finding that I am.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

Kind of skipping More reflective time in favor of just doing, doing, doing, doing, doing. It's kind of, I'm trying to learn software development so you know, just, it's just a ton of practice, you know. And again, I have so little time, I feel like outside of work. So within the work context I'm just religious about, you know, daily review, end of day review, waiting for list, I mean just like, and it helps a ton. I do my weekly review every week and I wouldn't, I wouldn't do without that. But outside of that I find that I'm just sort of like skipping a lot of those, those reviews because in my mind like I know what my goal is in the next six to eight months and I just need to put all my action time towards that. Like any minute that I have. I just wondering if you had any thoughts about that kind of a situation, if you felt like that kind of an attitude might backfire, you know, like I'm not doing an annual review because it's like I know what I need to do this year, you know, and I'm just kind of using like my daily list task manager as a thing of like, okay, I have to do this thing on that day, like if that, if I don't do that, you know, my life will slip, etc. But I'm kind of trying to create more space to just do, do, do, do, do. So if you had, if you or anyone else has any thoughts on that.

[F]

Yes.

[C]

What I suggest is something that you probably are doing already that is capture everything on your mind because a career shift comes with a flood of thoughts, concerns to dos. And so if you do a mind sweep, doing a mind sweep helps you to get everything out of your head. So you can process it systematically and then you can identify if there is an immediate next action like update your LinkedIn profile or something or is this part of a larger project. And you can also use horizontal focus to guide your decisions. So because when you think about your career, it's often require big picture thinking. So the model of horizontal focus helps, can help you to align your next steps with your long term vision. So what kind of work aligns to your values? Where do you want to be professionally when we talk about Horizon 4 and what specific milestones will get you there and so on. So that's my thought.

[B]

That's really helpful.

[A]

Give me one second. I have to. The coffee is boiling and I have to.

[B]

There's nothing like something like that to give you an immediate focus that, that it means everything else on my list Goes away if, if the coffee or something else is boiling.

[A]

And it's guaranteed that whenever the coffee starts boiling, people, People say it, start saying super interesting things and then I have to, like, interrupt them. It's always happened. So, no, that, that's, that's really helpful. And yeah, like, I have all those lists and I kind of try to do that, but it's like there's this sort of always this thought at the back of my mind. It's like, should I take, like, you know, an hour to clarify? Should I take two hours to do an annual review? Should I take, you know, an hour and a half to do a weekly review? Or should I just be doing, you know, because it's like that kind of existential thought. And I realize it's probably a false dichotomy, but I was wondering if.

[B]

I think you got something there where you said a false dichotomy because it. You could try it both ways and experiment a bit. But my hunch is that you could experiment more with the side of clarifying, getting, getting control at the ground level more like getting the inboxes at or near zero more regularly, because you might find that that relieves pressure in a big way. One of the things I've heard David Allen say is often when we feel overwhelmed about everything, it isn't everything. It's usually one or two things that are. Are most of the cause of it, but, but they sort of filter, they color, they, they cast a pall over everything else because they're not in balance that way. So it could be that if you identify one thing, like, I don't know what the thing is for you. I work with it constantly to figure out what the thing is. For me that's most, that if I do that one thing, everything else seems easier that day.

[A]

So you would not recommend skipping even like, even like, let's say an annual review or a monthly review in favor of just like, hey, I know what this goal is. In my mind, you would still recommend going through the process because you're saying, like, in the process of doing that, you might realize that what, whatever that subconscious focus is on, like, this one thing that just has to take everything could, you know, you could. Well, first of all, you could figure out that, like, so there's something major in your life that's going on and you just need to take care of it. Of course. But you could also realize that there's a realignment of focus or even values or something like that that you might not have anticipated that might be Buried.

[B]

That could be there. So I don't do a whole lot of annual reviewing, at least the last couple of years. But if that's something that keeps showing up for you as a. It's got your attention, I think I should do it. Then it could be that you have spent. I'm just going to throw out a number 10 hours thinking about that over the last month. And the actual annual review could take an hour. So even if it doesn't create any value other than it gets it off your mind, you'll have saved nine hours in the next couple of months that you don't have to tell yourself, oh, I should be doing the annual review.

[A]

That's such a good point. Yeah. If it keeps bothering you, even if it's, even if it isn't important, if it keeps bothering you, there's something there to look at.

[B]

Yeah, there's a reason your mind would keep bringing it up even if it's on a list. People are often surprised when we say if your mind brings it up, there's something about it that you need to pay more appropriate attention to. Either it's a project, but you only had it as a next action and not a project, or it's a project but you haven't defined what the outcome really is. There's some reason your mind, which is very smart and creative, is still latching onto that.

[A]

Thank you. Thank you for that. Yeah, it's funny, it's like. I don't know if it's like the kind of person that I am or if it's the kind of work environment that I am in, but I find that. Well, I do. I'm the kind of person who will just spend way too long reviewing things. Like, I think I've even been on these webinars once and was like, you know, my professional weekly review takes me three hours and my personal one takes me two hours. And Anna Maria was like, well, there's. You could, you could find ways to shorten that, you know.

[B]

But Maria probably said, oh, you're broken, Joseph. You're irretrievably broken.

[A]

No, no, she was, she was nice about it.

[D]

But.

[A]

But so I am the kind of person who can just take away too long thinking about things versus doing things. So there's that, that element. I'm also in a work environment where I feel that people are a little bit disdainful of like over organization and over planning etc, and so I had that perception of like, oh man, I'm spending too much time reviewing, etc, so I wonder if that might be coloring it too. So obviously I know there's a balance there between over planning and just doing reviews. So that's also something else that I've just been trying to. Trying to balance. But I appreciate what you all are saying about just paying attention to that thing that's bothering you.

[F]

You know, one of the things that I listening to both Mark and Joseph is how we're at different stages of our organization. And I know David Allen says that the people who often need it the most are the ones or the people who need it the least are the ones that are actually the ones that are so excited about this. And I absolutely can see that. And when Joe was talking about the people maybe having a disdain or over organization, let's just say, or people who are over organized, I think that people secretly want to be you and they're just. They don't know how to do it. So they feel like they're kind of broken. And so when they see somebody else, they're like, I'd love to be that. Because if they had experienced it, they would know how much more freeing and peaceful it is. They just can't. They just don't know how to achieve it. So that's what I appreciate about David Allen. Just kind of just talking about how this allows you actually to get to that place of having that experience, but quickly. This is my first office hour. How long do these run?

[B]

Well, they're scheduled for an hour, so we've got something like 19 minutes left. But there have been times, there were a couple of times when people were so engaged that we let it go on for 15 or 20 minutes longer.

[F]

Oh, wonderful. Thank you.

[B]

Because I have another meeting not too long after this and things like that. We'll end pretty close to the top of the hour.

[F]

Okay, wonderful. May I just jump in really quickly and just ask a couple questions as.

[B]

A new practitioner, what we're here for.

[F]

Fantastic. Thank you. So one of the things that I am struggling with and I actually hopped onto the Reddit thread about gte, gtd, which has been helpful as a knowledge worker. I have been doing a lot more mind mapping, which has been extremely helpful. Externalizing instead of trying to do the organization of writing down your notes in a thoughtful process. Mindmaps have been amazing. I know at one point I heard David Allen saying, He's got 200 stored somewhere. My question is, now I have a lot of mindmaps, so maybe that's a project done for me. It turns into a project like what do I do with all the mind Maps in a way that can be a retrievable process for me so that I can not only store them, but then be able to retrieve them in a way that works for me. Because you're right. As you do this work and as you do your mind sweeps, now all of a sudden you have so much more creativity. Because my things are now on lists, so maybe I could throw that back. Is that even a. I guess the GTD thing is, is that a project for me?

[B]

Or it may not be that it's even at the point of asking, is it a project for you? It might still be that your mind map is something to put into a mind sweep where you say, do I have any more attention on this? Or did just having that mind mapping session do it for me? Do I have anything I. When I look at this mind map, do I have any actions I want to take out of it and kind of capture it? Like if you. What occurs to me is you could pretend you had a meeting with yourself, okay. And you were on the meeting with you, and you took meeting notes in the form of a mind map. One of the things that we do with meeting notes after the meeting is process those as if they landed in our inbox. And now we've got notes to process and say, do I have any action to take on this? If I have an action, put it on my next actions list and then ask myself, is there still a larger outcome? Then that's a project, that kind of thing. And it could be that you look at your mind map and say, that did it. I. It was kind of like. Kind of like a mental sneeze. It's over now. I don't need to do anything more with it. And. And there are maybe others where you look at the mind map and say, this is full of treasure. This is gold. I don't want to lose this. And you capture many things out of it.

[F]

So, so what you're saying. So I thought I was just asking organization of my mind maps question, but actually what I learned was I haven't finished the thinking on the mind maps. I think I'm done after I've mind mapped, but I need to then look at the mind map and say, are there any additional actions, next actions based on this mind map? If there are, in one step, I'm going to put it on a next actions list. But if there's multiple things, I'm going to put it on a project list specific to whatever the mind map says.

[B]

It could very well could be that I answered the wrong question or answered a question you didn't ask.

[D]

So.

[F]

And I got some, and I got some missing pieces actually, because that's what's happening is I have a lot of mind maps everywhere.

[B]

So as far as organizing goes. And then I'm going to, I'm going to make myself shut up and see what Thais has to say about this. I go back to David's quote, which is organized means things are where they have meaning for you. So if you have a mind map about a particular topic, the place to organize it might not be with all your other mind maps. It might be organize it with your support materials for that topic or. Oh yeah, okay, something like that.

[E]

I'd like to give a short message to, to those of you who've been participating and playing with GTD Connect for a while and sort of remind you that all of us with this GTD methodology and this set of practices go through cycles. You know, I still go through cycles myself initially. There's kind of the inspiration and there's a lot of material to ingest and to get familiar with. And so people oftentimes when they first come onto Connect are just potentially overwhelmed by how much information there is. In a way, it's just a huge library where we've been able to archive so much different information from so many different perspectives and people and points of view and so understood that it's like walking into a library going, gee, where do I start? So that's oftentimes the initial phase of this and many people after a year or two probably get on some level or some plateau where they go, well, I kind of got it now. I've got, got my system set up and everything's fine and I'm fine tuning. And you may find yourself at that point also finding yourself saying, gee, I'm now becoming a resource of this methodology for people around me, people asking me for assistance and help in this. And we've seen in the forums a number of people now sharing ideas about how to get your teams more involved or families more involved with this information. So some of that information is in there as well. But I think you'll find yourself going through cycles of this and you may find that much like if you've ever read a software manual. I remember when I read, when I learned Microsoft Word to begin with, for instance, I read the manual, wow, this is really cool. And I started to use the tool and didn't need the manual anymore. As a matter of fact, a good example of that right here, the manual for this camera that's taking this picture right now. Initially, I read this, got it all set up. That's really cool. And that's really fine. And so pretty much everything was on decoration control. I didn't need to go back to my library to make this really work. And then, of course, as I started to get more sophisticated in terms of the stuff I wanted to do, got more inspired about some things I saw other people are doing. I go, how do I do that? Went back to the manual. I went, oh, God, I didn't realize I could do that. I didn't realize I could do that. I remember at least two or three iterations of going back to Microsoft Word back in the days when there actually was a manual for that as a opposed to just all online and realizing, oh, my God, I didn't realize that. Oh, I could do that now. I could do that now. And I think that's what you might find with Connect, too, is that it's a gold mine of stuff. Well, many people have read getting things done, you know, more than three or four times, and every time they read it, they get something new out of it. So I think you may find Connect the same way and probably even easier because, hey, it doesn't take much to just click on, surf around, see what might be new or what might be of interest to you, and pay attention. There's more than meets the eye in there.