Intro to the 3 Foundations of Productivity Systems
Mondays are productivity days at SimpleProductivity blog.
Today I wanted to take a high level look at some of the most influential productivity theories that most other systems use – the foundations of productivity systems. While there are many, many other systems, these three are the ones that (in my opinion) provided the most radical shifting of thought.
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
Stephen Covey put this out there in 1990. Its main purpose was to talk about seven habits of effective people. These are split into three categories: independence (#1-3), iterdependence (#4-6), and continuous improvement (#7).
The seven habits are:
- Be Proactive. Know your choices and roles, make decisions and accept responsibility.
- Begin with the End in Mind. Make sure you know who you are and what you believe in.
- Put First Things First. Do the right things in the right order.
- Think Win-Win. A win for all is better than one person getting his way.
- Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood. Having an open mind to see everyone’s viewpoint will lead to a better solution.
- Synergize. Draw on the strength of the group to come up with solutions that no one could have come up with on their own.
- Sharpen The Saw. Make sure you take care of yourself and remain balanced so that you can be effective long term.
This book was written primarily as a management book, but people all over began to incorporate the ideas regardless of work situations. Covey’s ideas were incorporated into planning pages at Daytimer before they moved over to the Franklin Planner, which then became Franklin Covey. This book spawned all sorts of workbooks and other focus books (such as “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens”)
Takeaways: you have to replenish yourself before you can give to others; sharpening the saw is the way to do that. We all have roles to play in our lives and we have to know where we stand and act on those in a manner consistent with our highest principles. It is always better to act in accordance with our principles rather than react with possibly less focus. Working with groups requires teamwork rather than dictatorial policies in order to make people feel valued and get their best.
Getting Things Done
Getting Things Done was published in 2002 as a method of productivity. A ground-breaking book, it showed how to corral the day-to-day tasks. David Allen’s theory is that you can’t concentrate on the big picture items if your daily life is out of control.
His methods for getting control are as follows:
- Set up your tools. David Allen is very specific that this system can be implemented with or without technology. He tells us how to get started making a dent in the backlog.
- Collection. Ongoing collection of outstanding “stuff” is the only way possible to keep on top of things.
- Processing. This is the famous “getting to empty” concept which has been used in many other methodologies.
- Organizing. You can’t work with anything if you can’t find it. He talks about contexts, project files and the importance of the calendar.
- Reviewing. Without weekly reviews, your system will get out of whack quickly.
- Doing. This is where he makes the power of the next action apparent.
This book was written as a method of personal productivity. Many software and planner systems have adopted GTD-esque philosophies as a way to make people more productive.
Takeaways: There are different levels to view your projects and your life; the closest to the day-to-day living is the runway. Most blocks we experience is due to insufficient planning. Thinking in terms of next actions keeps our task lists do-able and we can get through them quickly.
Do It Tomorrow
Do It Tomorrow was published in 2006 as a challenge to time management practices. Another ground-breaking book, it gives concrete ideas on how to handle what is already on your plate, as well as to do the stuff that comes in every day. It is primarily aimed at personal time management.
The first part of the system is how to handle what you currently have. Mark Forster favors a backlog approach, where things that are outstanding are stored where you can’t see them. Then after your work is done for the day, you work on your backlog. Current work is on a fixed length list, called a closed list, which forces focus on the tasks at hand.
Mark Forster presents the idea of the tasks at hand to be a closed system. It takes time and focus to get the tasks done, and getting more things done will mean you either need more time, less interruptions, or if time is fixed, less to do. Just because we add more to a list doesn’t mean the time will magically appear in which to complete those tasks. Therefore, each day’s work is on a closed list representing what can be done; everything else is put off until tomorrow.
Takeaways: tasks should be on a “will do” rather than a “to do” list, because that means you have committed to getting things done; the way to get things done is to do a little often, rather than waiting until you have a large amount of time; know what you are committed to doing instead of vague goals.
Common Threads
Even though these three systems are very different, they do have some commonalities:
- Write things down. All three authors believe that writing things down enforces your commitment to them.
- Be clear about what you are doing. Whether it is a mission statement, levels of vision, or simply what you are working on, be clear about it.
If you are new to personal productivity, or feel that your systems need some rework, I encourage you to check out the three books. The 7 Habits is about vision; Getting Things Done is about marrying vision to daily work; and Do It Tomorrow is about getting the daily work done efficiently.
Question for the readers: is there another system that you use that you think deserves to be included on this list? Share below
Photo by 0xMatheus. Licensed under Creative Commons.
