Pamela Poole over to Web Worker Daily wrote up a funny outline of the different types of productivity methods that often come in and go out of fashion. She highlights one that was new to me: GTD - Getting Things Done. GTD is from David Allen and is summarized as:

Sophisticated without being confining, the subtle effectiveness of GTD lies in its radically common sense notion that with a complete and current inventory of all your commitments, organized and reviewed in a systematic way, you can focus clearly, view your world from optimal angles and make trusted choices about what to do (and not do) at any moment. GTD embodies an easy, step-by-step and highly efficient method for achieving this relaxed, productive state. It includes:

• Capturing anything and everything that has your attention
• Defining actionable things discretely into outcomes and concrete next steps
• Organizing reminders and information in the most streamlined way, in appropriate categories, based on how and when you need to access them
• Keeping current and "on your game" with appropriately frequent reviews of the six horizons of your commitments (purpose, vision, goals, areas of focus, projects, and actions)

I bet this type of structure is great for many people, but I couldn't get into it. But as Pamela Poole point out, this simple quadrant from Stephen Covey is very effective.


When you use something like this though, you have to acknowledge the reality of it - you will need to work on each quadrant to stay with it. Otherwise you could get burned out.