GTD Tricks
Here is an article collecting 18 tricks to improve your GTD system. They are all perfect for you if you no matter how long you have been a GTDer. I pick some of my favourite:
2. Make your ubiquitous capture tool really ubiquitous. When I first started my own GTD system, I tried to capture ideas with a Palm TX PDA, my ThinkPad/MacBookPro, or my cellphone, and also dreamed of a Treo650/680. Unfortunately, they don’t work for me. Writing in Graffeti is slow, and it is hard to draw even a small map in Memo/Diddlebug. I can not take my laptop everywhere. And my beautiful but slow stupid Samsung cellphone, oh, no… Well, I know you are much smarter than me and you can handle those eletrical device much better than me. But I have a final gift for you to stop using them: all their batteries just suck. Now I use my pen and paper. It is simple, beautiful, cheap, and available everywhere.
8. Always capture the outcome of your decision making and thinking.
16. Mark and group next actions before you start your day. Now I start every workday with a list of Most Important Tasks (MITs). Keep the list short so I can accomplish them, and I do accomplish them. Quick note: NEVER make a Many Impossible Tasks list.
18. Always "eat that frog" first. I used to track my working hours and confirmed that I can achieve more in the mornings. If I cannot finish the most difficult tasks in the morning, most probably I cannot finish them in the afternoon. So I simply start early everyday on tough tasks and have some free time doing happy things later.
CONGRATULATIONS! You boring reader finally arrive at this line. Here are some of my own suggestions as bonus for you:
SMART: make your goals specific, measuable, attainable, realistic and timely.
FOCUS: do one thing at one time. I believe there are only few people in the world can do multiple tasks efficiently at the same time. Obviously I am not one of them. Are you?
HABIT: change your habits before changing your tools. They are far more powerful and enduring.
